NA first drive days for BRZ? This week?

[rawpoly]

Originally Posted by Yoshoobaroo

What do you mean closer to launch? Orders are open.

I meant launch as in production cars available to customers.

[slimfit]

Originally Posted by rawpoly

I am really disappointed with the quality of reviewers too. None of my favorites seem to have driven the car- Jason, savagegeese, the canadian youtubers(throttle house, straight pipes), smoking tire.

Hopefully there are more indepth reviews with these folk closer to launch.

^^Totally agree! I wanna see guys that understand driving dynamics. Not some guy explaining that the GR86 is the better pick because of the ducktail spoiler

[Yoshoobaroo]

Originally Posted by slimfit

^^Totally agree! I wanna see guys that understand driving dynamics. Not some guy explaining that the GR86 is the better pick because of the ducktail spoiler

The guy over driving the front the whole time while saying it's so easy to drift got to me.

[Stonehorsw]

I don’t get Subaru’s marketing. Maybe just out of money, but they could’ve brought people that would drive harder and provide more feedback to enthusiasts. Or maybe they thought about bringing to a new audience, and expand their mkt to a normal Subaru driver.

Toyota on the other hand did not spare efforts to mkt the car and I expect them to have better sales (as they did on the 1st gen). In the end, it is good for Subaru who is the actual manufacturer.

[racingfool]

Might as well join in.
Pretty weak BRZ reviews compared to the GR86 content.
These guys might have had trouble controlling the looser Toyota.

[Yoshoobaroo]

Originally Posted by racingfool

Might as well join in.
Pretty weak BRZ reviews compared to the GR86 content.
These guys might have had trouble controlling the looser Toyota.

The only reassurance I get from these videos is this:

If these people can get the tail out even a little bit, driving like this, the car will be plenty tail happy for me. Gimme some camber bolts for the front and I am set.

[Blighty]

I'm still stuck on the GR86 styling, but I think I like the enhancements that BRZ made instead of Toyota, yet I am still a little unsure on both of those points.

Because I haven't seen the BRZ (or 86) up close, and the BRZ has a real lack of good pro driving reviewers.

I do strongly feel however that we just cannot lose here boys.

These cars are just fantastic.

[DAEMANO]

Originally Posted by Veloist

I think the verdict is pretty much what the Japanese first drives said. The BRZ is more stable in turns and less tail-happy...

...The GR 86 looks a lot better but the BRZ is the car I’d appreciate with my driving style. It’s a hard a choice for me…

The big difference is the GR86's springs are 11% harder in the rear and 7% softer in the front. The BRZ has a 14mm rear anti-roll bar vs the 15mm rear anti-roll bar in the GR86. Lastly due to use of aluminum in some of the front suspension components (instead of steel) the BRZ is probably a few ounces-to-lbs lighter in the front. So in stock form, the GR86 has more front grip and possibly better turn in while the BRZ has better rear grip and a more stable back end. This would be something you could easily effect with aftermarket springs on either car. So, in the end, I'd say get the car you like the aesthetics, dealer experience, and warranty of most and tune the suspension to your liking in the aftermarket.

The slide where this is shown is at the 25:54 mark of the Matt Maran Motoring BRZ review video:

[timurrrr]

Originally Posted by DAEMANO

The big difference is the GR86's springs are 11% harder in the rear and 7% softer in the front. The BRZ has a 14mm rear anti-roll bar vs the 15mm rear anti-roll bar in the GR86. Lastly due to use of aluminum in some of the front suspension components (instead of steel) the BRZ is probably a few ounces-to-lbs lighter in the front. So in stock form, the GR86 has more front grip and possibly better turn in while the BRZ has better rear grip and a more stable back end. This would be something you could easily effect with aftermarket springs on either car. So, in the end, I'd say get the car you like the aesthetics, dealer experience, and warranty of most and tune the suspension to your liking in the aftermarket.

While I agree that spring and ARB rates can be easily tweaked with aftermarket parts (heck, I'll do coilovers either way),
I'm still worried that the other differences.

All things being equal, if the throttle in the GR 86 is more like an on/off switch, and in the BRZ it's more linear, I might decide to avoid the GR 86.
Although it might not be too hard to fix that with an OFT in a year or two?
But also some people want/need to keep the stock engine tune for various reasons (e.g. CARB).
EPS is even harder to re-program, I presume?

It lloks very much possible to swap steel vs aluminum front knuckles, but also a non-trivial amount of effort and $$$.
But perhaps the difference in practice is minimal and even die-hards won't bother.

The rear ARB mounting and harder rear trailing link bushings on the BRZ sound like nice improvements, but perhaps most people wouldn't even notice.

Originally Posted by DAEMANO

I like how Subaru calls some last minute changes by Toyota the way they are: "carry over parts".
Ooh, burn

[DAEMANO]

Originally Posted by timurrrr

I like how Subaru calls some last minute changes by Toyota the way they are: "carry over parts".
Ooh, burn

Yeah this part really cracked me up too. From what I heard, the BRZ was delivered with the specs in the shown slide and then Toyota took the car and tuned it to their likings. As it turns out, some of this was to replace the new lighter aluminum parts with the previous gen stronger steel parts, solid ARB, change the spring rates for less understeer.

In the end it looks like Toyota's vision for the 86 is a for a lively street oriented sports car that will likely be aftermarket modded if used on a track. Whereas Subaru see's the BRZ as a sports car that should be tracked as-is (likely for the first few go-arounds, but most BRZs that spend more than a few weekends at the track will get modded anyhow.) Toe-MAY-toe... Toe-MAH-toe.

[PandaEighty-Six]

I'm going to echo a lot of the sentiments here: disappointed by the lack of quality reviews by journalists who are also driving enthusiasts and can do a proper comparison. Maybe it's too early and those videos will inevitably come.

Also, like others have already mentioned, it seems that Toyota's "carry over" philosophy when making the 86 means the BRZ will be more linear. (Keiichi Tsuchiya said the same in an interview after comparing the two and gently hinted that he preferred the overall dynamics of the BRZ despite having consistently gotten better lap times with the 86).

What frustrates me about Toyota is they claim to be all about being sporty, want to launch a dedicated sports brand (GR) yet seem to cheapen out when it comes to small details/favoring gimmicks like oversteering via bump-steer issues than actually fleshing out a well-balanced car. What's most frustrating is that of all the car companies out there, Toyota actually has the cash necessary to fine-tune these things better.

[DAEMANO]

Originally Posted by PandaEighty-Six

Also, like others have already mentioned, it seems that Toyota's "carry over" philosophy when making the 86 means the BRZ will be more linear...

"Carry Over" seems to be Subaru's characterization of the chosen parts (as evidenced by the PowerPoint slides in their presentation to this round of journalists.)

Seems like Toyota's approach was that they preferred the handling balance provided by the previous parts (i.e. "if it ain't broke, don't fix it.")

Now if results from those choices resulted in both the faster lap times for the GR86 that you referenced, and a more lively/fun car on the street, then Gazoo Racing might be on to something with this approach.

[ayau]

Wouldn’t look too much into the “carry over” phrase. It was probably written by someone in Subaru North America marketing.

[dowroa]

What's most frustrating is that of all the car companies out there, Toyota actually has the cash necessary to fine-tune these things better.

In the industry, the focus is not on improving car driving dynamics and sporty cars.

It is all automation, alternative power sources (hydrogen / electric) and making your car a SaaS device.

That's where the money is being spent by the large companies. Don't expect to see a performance team to have a large budget / focus and an engineering being able to give an ROI on expensive changes like these and how it further's the companies core pillar / business objectives.

I supposed that Subaru is a more niche company that they were able to institute changes.. and if they work out well, maybe we will see those on GR86 in the future?