Took the BRZ up to ACH today and decided to have some fun now that it's finally out of break-in. I encountered an older base 911 (I think 997 C2) wearing track numbers. The driver seemed pretty good and kept a good canyon pace so I decided to chase him a bit. Couple of thoughts.
- This new BRZ has noticeably more midrange torque than my old FR-S on E85. Coming out of corners at ~5000 RPM, this car will push you into the seat more. That more than anything else makes this 2nd gen feel stronger than the 1st gen. It kept up with the 911 pretty well exiting corners and on the straights.
- There is a fair amount of entry and mid-corner understeer compared to my FR-S on RCE T2's. It takes more throttle to induce rotation. Overall balance is definitely skewed towards understeer. I'm hoping a decent alignment with camber bolts (say -2.2 degrees front camber, 0 front toe, 1/16" rear toe in) will neutralize the handling a bit and lessen some of the front shoulder wear I'm seeing. There's also more body roll, but that's probably the price for the fantastic street compliance with this OEM suspension.
- I know Subaru/Toyota claim to have upgraded the pads, but the OEM pads still can't take much heat. I was getting pad fade halfway through my latter runs. I may try some old Stoptech 309 pads I have laying around from my FR-S and see if that helps any.
- Steering feel is about the same as the 1st gen. It's definitely lighter, but the actual feedback through the wheel is close. Both gens have good feedback compared to most other EPS units. The only time I noticed less feedback through the wheel was this one corner where there's a dip before a turn. The steering on the 1st gen typically loads up heavily in those situations (and with sticky tires on the track will actually cause the EPS to cut out) whereas this 2nd gen doesn't load up like that.
- Oil temps got hot. It's hard to tell with the bar display (wish the BRZ had the GR86 digital oil temp readout) but looked to be around 250 F. It's not too surprising given I would hit north of 240F in the canyons with my FR-S w/Perrin oil cooler, but I'll need to decide whether to add an aftermarket one to this BRZ.
Overall I'm loving the balance between comfort, performance and responsiveness on this 2nd gen.
