Quote:
Originally Posted by tekFRS234
They grew up with Mustang and Camaro, and drooled over cars like the last Supra and RX-7 because they were beautiful and powerful, but too expensive.
|
I absolutely agree with everything you said with the exception of this. The fabled Supra and FD35 were not that powerful. They have been placed on a pedestal that they only partly deserve due to street lore and movies like The Fast and Furious. They, along with the 300ZX TT and some other Japanese cars were obscenely expensive for their time. Because they followed the automotive performance stifled late 70s and 80s were 455 cubic inch motors produced 175HP they were considered high performance. Compare them stock for stock with today's cars and they pale in comparison. True their cast iron blocks will hold a ton of boost but they were also very overweight (excepting RX-& which had horrible reliability issues).
The sports car market has always been limited in the US. These cars are not expected to sell like Camrys. They are image cars for the companies that produce them and prove that driving excitment is not dead within that company. That image bleeds over into the other models that are more mundane. That is why Mazda continues to build the MX-5. Toyota is widely viewed as a company that produces dringing appliances for the masses. They needed a car like the 86, GT86, FR-S to infuse some excitement into their brand. If you look back at the pre-release News Releases from the company they did not expect the FT86 to be a huge seller. The MX-5 is not a huge seller, the Z cars are not huge sellers yet those cars are still being produced as Halo cars and image cars. Every car company that wants to stay relevant and have any appeal for younger (or even older) enthusiastic drivers needs a car like this.