W2's Firestom FR-S

[W2]

Well it has been a long couple weeks but I finally picked up my M6 Firestorm FR-S yesterday after work. Needless to say I was very excited but I did not get to put many miles on it last night.

We had some nasty weather roll into VA around 9pm and in the span of me running into the grocery store and coming back out crap was blowing everywhere. I was cringing the whole drive home trying to avoid the falling tree branches and dirt blowing sideways across the road. I get home to no power and ran inside frantically to manually open the garage door and pull the car in. Lucky for me I saw no damage to the paint and since the power was out I spent that time inspecting it with my phone flashlight app. While I was lucky I talked to my salesman this morning and his Camry had a branch land on it, about $2000 in damage.

Well I just pulled the car into the garage not long ago and now another storm is rolling in... I expect power to go out again soon.


Pictures from today after cleaning and polishing the paint. I also applied Opti-Coat 2.0 and de-badged the trunk.

[ssmtsx]

Congrats! Where did you buy from? On Friday the car carrier that dropped a prius off at my dealership had a red FR-S on it. I bet it was yours..

[W2]

Originally Posted by ssmtsx

Congrats! Where did you buy from? On Friday the car carrier that dropped a prius off at my dealership had a red FR-S on it. I bet it was yours..

Down here at Shelor Toyota in Christiansburg, awesome dealership and great service. It came in around 1:00 here and I was just heading back to work on my lunch break. Those last few hours at work felt like forever.

[W2]

Since I really didn't hit on it in my initial post I detailed and used Opti-Coat 2.0 myself. This was something I was concerned about doing but had done a lot of reading on over at AutoGeek. Honestly applying the opti-coat was the easiest thing I did.

I started off using the 2 bucket car wash method with new micro fiber mitts and then brushes specifically for the wheels. In each bucket I used a grit gaurd. I tried to keep as much of the car as possible in the shade while going panel to panel.

Next up was Iron-X, I read about new cars coming in with a lot of iron deposits from the transportation process and decided this was a good route to go. The car was still damp from the initial wash and I applied to all the panels and wheels. I let sit but not dry and then hit with a sponge. I really didn't have much iron on the car and probably could have skipped this step but better safe than sorry.

Now I washed the car down again and dried with a micro fiber towel.

The clay bar was next and this was something I had never done before. I used Pinnacle lubricant and clay bar and followed the instructions. Easy enough and it picked up a little bit of debris. I wiped the car down with micro fibers towels after this step.

Almost to the Opti-Coat... first it was time to hand polish the car with Optimum Polish II. I did this with a 3" pad and hit the whole car. I then wiped with a damp microfiber towel.

Finally the Opti-Coat. I started with a trial run on the trunk lid. It was the easiest process of the day. You will feel the applicator grab at first then once you work the product in the paint it glides over. You will see it flash and the high surfaces appear, wipe these down with the supplied microfiber towel. Done.

Now I spent about 5-6 hours doing all this and spent around $175 on all the products I used. This should give you guys considering doing it yourself an idea of what it took. I am very happy with the finished product and glad I got this out of the way early.

[Tad_07]

Originally Posted by W2

Now I spent about 5-6 hours doing all this and spent around $175 on all the products I used. This should give you guys considering doing it yourself an idea of what it took. I am very happy with the finished product and glad I got this out of the way early.

That is cheap and I'm highly considering this. Please update us as you wash it and how easy bugs, bird poo and everything else comes off. Subaru isn't in good standing as far as their paint goes for the last few years

[W2]

First tank of gas 394 miles I am beyond happy with that. Only 150 was highway and the rest was back country roads (55 mph) and such.

So far I have no complaints and love everything about the car.

[RallySport Direct]

The Firestorm red is growing on me for sure, love the way the rear end looks de-badged. So much cleaner! Congrats on picking her up and making it through the storm unharmed. I Heard you guys are getting hit hard with storms and blackouts, stay safe!


Thanks,
Rick

[W2]

Originally Posted by Tad_07

That is cheap and I'm highly considering this. Please update us as you wash it and how easy bugs, bird poo and everything else comes off. Subaru isn't in good standing as far as their paint goes for the last few years

Well I took it on a trip this weekend and it was plastered with bugs when I returned. I simply hosed the car down and washed with a soapy micro fiber mitt. The bugs wiped off easily and the water tends to bead right off. I wiped it down with a damp micro fiber to finish. The car looks just as good as it did after I applied the opti-coat. Well worth the money and I am happy I took the time to get this out of the way early.

Originally Posted by RallySport Direct

The Firestorm red is growing on me for sure, love the way the rear end looks de-badged. So much cleaner! Congrats on picking her up and making it through the storm unharmed. I Heard you guys are getting hit hard with storms and blackouts, stay safe!


Thanks,
Rick

Thanks, the red was my second choice originally but after seeing it in person I loved it. Most pictures don't do it justice, the red is a very deep color and looks great on the car.

As for the storm luckily everyone around here made it through safely. There is still a lot of debris on the sides of the roads but not to bad. I was up north of here yesterday and some of those areas got it worse, I saw a few power line poles at 45 degrees and my grandparents flag pole was bent all the way to the ground. Also a lot of trees down everywhere you look.

[RallySport Direct]

Originally Posted by W2

Well I took it on a trip this weekend and it was plastered with bugs when I returned. I simply hosed the car down and washed with a soapy micro fiber mitt. The bugs wiped off easily and the water tends to bead right off. I wiped it down with a damp micro fiber to finish. The car looks just as good as it did after I applied the opti-coat. Well worth the money and I am happy I took the time to get this out of the way early.



Thanks, the red was my second choice originally but after seeing it in person I loved it. Most pictures don't do it justice, the red is a very deep color and looks great on the car.

As for the storm luckily everyone around here made it through safely. There is still a lot of debris on the sides of the roads but not to bad. I was up north of here yesterday and some of those areas got it worse, I saw a few power line poles at 45 degrees and my grandparents flag pole was bent all the way to the ground. Also a lot of trees down everywhere you look.

Glad you hear everyone made it out okay, crazy though how powerful the storms can be. I would be worried sick if I just bought a new car and there were tress falling over around you haha.

Keep us updated on the car!
Thanks,
Rick

[W2]

The big 1 -0 - 0 -0 Review:



I hit 1,000 miles today on my trip home for lunch and felt it was time to write a little review of my impressions so far.

1. First off I love this car and I have no regrets I bought it.
2. I love the simplicity of the features:
   • Not too many buttons and everything I need is in easy reach while driving.
   • The gauges are easy to read and the important stuff is where I expect it to be.
   • The all in one base stereo head unit is great. Honestly I thought I would have swapped it out already but have come to really like it. It has plenty of features, the Bluetooth works flawless, it has USB, the menus are easy to navigate, and the buttons are easy to use and well placed while driving.
3. The handling is simply amazing and makes it great fun on the road. I have never put so many miles on a car or motorcycle in such a short period of time. I have to tell myself "no you cannot go driving." I don't want to rack up all the miles and be out of my warranties in the first year.
4. The styling, this car is a head turner and I have seen plenty of people snapping pictures. Personally I love the stock lights with the Firestorm color and plan took keep it that way. No light tinting for me! The paint has a very deep color to it and shows the lines of the car beautifully.
5. Headlights; well they work for me and seem to be pretty good, but I have only driven with a few HID setups (never owned). This car is better than any of my previously vehicles in the lighting department.
6. The seats! Wow they are comfortable! Looking at them originally I thought they might get a little uncomfortable after an hour or two, I was wrong. I wish my office seat was this good.
7. Mirrors, personally I would like an auto dimming rear view mirror but this is no biggie. The side mirrors are OK but you do have blind spots, I have driven much worse though.
8. Arm rest?!? Honestly I don't care if they do make one in the future or not. I find my right arm rests comfortably across the rear of the parking brake boot and along the center console. I tend to keep 1 hand slightly on the shifter most of the time.
9. Backseats = almost non-existent. I don't have any need for them anyway.
10. Trunk space is not too bad and you can always fold the rear "seats" down and have a lot of useable space.
11. Power. Well its there in 2 levels. We all know about the torque dip and I personally treat this like 2 separate power bands. I use the lower range for daily driving and it is still a blast to drive while short shifting it. For more fun please visit 5000+ RPMS and have that rush a lot of people desire. I haven't played around too much in the higher RPMS but it is fun. The power this car puts out is perfect IMHO. For anyone familiar with motocross I compare this to a 125 2-stroke; momentum is key as well as keeping the revs up when trying to go fast.
12. The shifter is good, I love the throw and it seems to just drop into gear. It is getting smoother with more miles.
13. Fit and finish is on par with my other Toyota products, nothing to currently complain about. I even like the stock HVAC controls, they feel solid and operate smoothly.

Now for some of the bad:

1. Grocery shopping sucks. Now all of my items need to be bagged twice; once at the store and then again in my driveway. For some odd reason gremlins come out and raid the bags and throw crap all about the trunk. I have heard them wrestling with my beer on more than 1 occasion.
2. It sits low, which isn't really bad it just makes things interesting. I stopped by Chick-fil-a today and the roof was below the drive-thru window. Good thing I don't eat fast food very often and really don't want that smell in my car. It does make it harder navigating in parking lots trying to look around the SUVs everywhere.
3. Dumb-ass drivers, this car seems to attract them. I have seen more people slightly drive off the road, tailgate me, drive erratically, and just plain suck at driving. It all happens when they are around this car, not so much when I drive my truck or any other vehicle.

On a more serious note the only real problems I have are the flimsy seat belt loop, and um.... if I think of something I''ll add it.

Overall this is pretty much my dream car and I plan to be driving it many 1000s of miles more. It is probably time to start doing some slight modifications now and I'll keep this updated as I go.

[RallySport Direct]

Originally Posted by W2

Now for some of the bad:

[*]Grocery shopping sucks. Now all of my items need to be bagged twice; once at the store and then again in my driveway. For some odd reason gremlins come out and raid the bags and throw crap all about the trunk. I have heard them wrestling with my beer on more than 1 occasion.

I think this problem may be completely solved by not putting the tires through a stress test on the way home from the grocery store

J/K

Great review by the way, I pretty much agree with everything!

Thanks for the update.
Rick

[BioRage]

Nice color!

Not a fan of where you placed your front plate, should leave that to the lancer and evos.

[W2]

Originally Posted by BioRage

Nice color!

Not a fan of where you placed your front plate, should leave that to the lancer and evos.

Yeah not my favorite location but I did not want to drill the front bumper and in VA front plates are required. Its growing on me though.

[BioRage]

Originally Posted by W2

Yeah not my favorite location but I did not want to drill the front bumper and in VA front plates are required. Its growing on me though.

Yeah, guess it just takes time. My VW buds have a towhook sticking out of their front bumper with the front plate sticking out.

I too wouldn't want to drill my front bumper on either.