Realistically meaning without raising the price or compromising all weather usability and reliability:

Remove and replace spare tire + tools with can of fix-a-flat - 30-40 lbs (depending on laws)
Smaller washer fluid reservoir and less fluid - 2-4 lbs (est)
Single exit exhaust and muffler - 20 lbs (Tanabe concept G as benchmark)
Manual on CDROM - 1 lbs
Lighter weight front seats - 14 lbs (est)
Delete front strut bracing - 3 lbs
Remove all sound dampening tiles - 3 lbs
Smaller door speakers - 2 lbs
Sound tube delete - 3-4 lbs

So maybe 90-100 lbs lighter without adding cost or sacrificing usability. Now what would an owner think about a car with no spare, shittier speakers, and more NVH?

I think they could have done the following:

1) Utilize more aluminum in the suspension (control arms, etc)
2) Single-sided exhaust
3) Manual windows, mirrors & locks option
4) Aluminum trunk
5) Lighter wheels

Of course, all of this would put the car up into the $30K range then you guys would be bitching that it's too expensive.

Interested in the comments regrding the spare. Here in Australia many of the cars were delivered without a spare, just leak fix juice. Toyota has changed it's mind a few times on this. Mine came with no spare ( I put in a space saver). Right now it's an optional extra.

I don't follow your rationale. It's an interesting topic because there are engineers on this forum? :iono:

For car design it is usually a case of marketing coming before engineering. Sure they could have made things lighter but at the trade off of nvh and/or cost. It's a street car. I am suggesting most people wouldn't know or care if it lost 50kg.

lol. Don't start :lol:

hmmm, oh yeah, my papers says I am a qualified wannabe.

I'm not qualified. I'm just a wannabe wannabe.

Just thought we might have some creative suggestions from people with engineering backgrounds. I do think the car is pretty light for all the standards it needs to comply with. I'm willing to bet there are things that people thought could be lighter- and I was just curious.

I figured a rear seat delete option would have been neat. I know some people utilize it, but for me, I think I must have only used the rear seats 3 times since purchasing the car. It could even be a dealer option so insurance companies could still classify the car as a 2+2.

Does the price remain the same or not? I'm assuming that you're asking what they could have done and kept the price the same, and retained the same features. Deleting stuff is the easy way, like AC, rear seats. But the car is also sold on certain features, so just taking stuff off is not really an engineering challenge. You can remove things yourself like the spare or rear seats.

me too.

Yeah but that doesn't really require any engineering. Bottom line is Cheap, Light, Strong. Pick 2.

I could have gone with even less bells & whistles but gains from things like manual windows and locks aren't all that great any more. They went back to a good formula used with the original 240Z. It started out really light because they went super thin with all the sheet metal. Compared to any other car of this day, it's a beer can. The engineering really came into play with how they focused on the whole package as a structural system and came out swinging. It's amazingly rigid given the material thickness.

edit: And just like a beer can, it's engineered to optimize for specific goals/requirements. As Snooze says, "Everything's a compromise."

4 lug wheels

All the noticeable from the outside things have already been mentioned, the only truly inventive ideas can only come from people who know every inch of this car, stuff like sharing mounting points for hardware, creating shorter harness pathways, and the stuff that would add to the cheapness, thinner plastics, carpet removal, no little rear window etc.

Personally I would have loved if they spent money on the suspension links and done some fancy forged aluminum like the NSX instead of the stamped steel. And built in alignment adjustability would have been great.

featureless car?

loool

A single exit exhaust would've saved a few pounds I feel:D