Crawford or 2jz it up

[Dipstik-sportech]

I mean I did a fullBlown built fa20 so you know what my answer will be lol.

[JK21]

Originally Posted by YMAA

According to this video released by Crawford themselves, their development car featured in those famous /Drive and MotorTrend reviews was tuned by none other than...wait for it...Visconti. That probably explains the boost not coming on properly occasionally in the /Drive review.

The other failures such as the clutch and CV joint are drivetrain failures you'd kinda expect from a car putting out that much power. The overheating definitely can be fixed with an aftermarket cooling system. I haven't heard much about the Crawford BRZ lately but I'd suspect that if the car is still being driven today those bugs have been worked out.

OP, if you're serious about getting your car built by Crawford, my suggestion would be to have them do the physical install then use a different tuner. FA20Club or Full Blown seem to be about the most commonly used for high-HP Twins.

Yeah I have heard and I even met Visconti last year at TX2k. He was doing a street tune on this dudes GTR and wanted to see how it would stack up against my GTR that was Cobb tuned. I beat the dude and we had similar mods. My tuner is good with boxer motors although he doesn't prefer them. He leans towards Evos, Supras, and GTRs but will knock them out really well. A friend of mine just got her STI back is making 600+ now.

Originally Posted by suaveflooder

My concern with crawford would be reliability. Their car is bad ass, BUT it seems to have a lot of problems when pushed. Not a reliable car. FA20 or Full Blown would be the way to go IMHO

I have looked into Full Blown and they are a serious next option. I will research FA20 and as far as Crawford is concerned the issues that were made known were in the development car. The overheating issue I know of was corrected by adding a radiator they use and where I live it doesn't get deathly hot. As far as tuning goes I trust my tuner to work with this platform and he took care of my GTR (600+ ahwp and daily driven most weeks)and I never had any issues so I think he can handle this. But I will further my research and thank you for the advice

Originally Posted by Yamajee

2jz

Maybe this will change your mind..?

Believe me I want to but since I have an opportunity to do this build it will cost over half as much as the 2j build. This saves me money ultimately and i don't affect any of the characteristics of the car.

[TylerLieberman]

Fuck 2JZ. Unless you're specifically trying to make over 500whp and go fast in straight line or drift and be competitive, there's no point in a 2J swap. 1J is the better option and can be done for a fraction of the cost and can easily make over 400whp.

If you're trying to keep the car similar to the original nature, then I would keep the FA20

[suaveflooder]

Originally Posted by YMAA

According to this video released by Crawford themselves, their development car featured in those famous /Drive and MotorTrend reviews was tuned by none other than...wait for it...Visconti. That probably explains the boost not coming on properly occasionally in the /Drive review.

The other failures such as the clutch and CV joint are drivetrain failures you'd kinda expect from a car putting out that much power. The overheating definitely can be fixed with an aftermarket cooling system. I haven't heard much about the Crawford BRZ lately but I'd suspect that if the car is still being driven today those bugs have been worked out.

OP, if you're serious about getting your car built by Crawford, my suggestion would be to have them do the physical install then use a different tuner. FA20Club or Full Blown seem to be about the most commonly used for high-HP Twins.

LOL, that's actually pretty funny….not gonna lie. My buddy has raced with crawford a couple times and says they have never left that track running….they always break down. Oh well.

Originally Posted by JK21

Yeah I have heard and I even met Visconti last year at TX2k. He was doing a street tune on this dudes GTR and wanted to see how it would stack up against my GTR that was Cobb tuned. I beat the dude and we had similar mods. My tuner is good with boxer motors although he doesn't prefer them. He leans towards Evos, Supras, and GTRs but will knock them out really well. A friend of mine just got her STI back is making 600+ now.



I have looked into Full Blown and they are a serious next option. I will research FA20 and as far as Crawford is concerned the issues that were made known were in the development car. The overheating issue I know of was corrected by adding a radiator they use and where I live it doesn't get deathly hot. As far as tuning goes I trust my tuner to work with this platform and he took care of my GTR (600+ ahwp and daily driven most weeks)and I never had any issues so I think he can handle this. But I will further my research and thank you for the advice



Believe me I want to but since I have an opportunity to do this build it will cost over half as much as the 2j build. This saves me money ultimately and i don't affect any of the characteristics of the car.

As far as the heating problem is concerned (talking to both of you), there will always be issues when pushed hard without SERIOUS cooling modification. That's the joy of high boost FI.

I have another friend of mine that runs a whipple charged Mustang cobra. He tracks religiously! He has had A TON of issues with cooling. He's actually running a second radiator (of of a VW rabbit, so not sure if you can really call it a radiator ) for his Heat exchanger, obviously an upgraded radiator for the car, no thermostat and a couple other old school cooling tricks (bigger air dam, ect….)

Granted, he's a good driver and the OP sounds like he's mainly wanting a reliable car, not necessarily a track monster

[jadewbj]

Keep in mind the trans on the 2JZ is mad expensive, almost as much as the motor. Plus you need to have a new tunnel cut to fit that trans in the car.

I would say built FA20 along with proper cooling would be better.

[jadewbj]

Keep in mind the trans on the 2JZ is mad expensive, almost as much as the motor. Plus you need to have a new tunnel cut to fit that trans in the car.

I would say built FA20 along with proper cooling would be better.

[nalc]

2JZ is pretty long, tall, and heavy. If you're looking to stay within the realm of power that can be made from a FA20 with FI, which it sounds like you're all, it sounds like you'd be spending a ton of money and doing a ton of work to ruin a lot of things that makes your car good. For 500+ hp I'd be thinking engine swap, but 350-400hp seems to be feasible for a BRZ.

[thill]

If you have access to E-85, I would go with Full-Blown. Especially if you plan on driving this in the street for rear world driving. I remember Crawford saying they had to drive their car at like 20% of it's potential on the streets or they would be in jail.

[slicktop]

Originally Posted by TylerLieberman

Fuck 2JZ. Unless you're specifically trying to make over 500whp and go fast in straight line or drift and be competitive, there's no point in a 2J swap. 1J is the better option and can be done for a fraction of the cost and can easily make over 400whp.

If you're trying to keep the car similar to the original nature, then I would keep the FA20

I'm seriously ignorant on the reasoning behind going 1J over 2J in all circumstances. Please let me know....

[Obja]

I wish i was wealthy like you...

[Yamajee]

Didn't realize there was this much hate on the JZ series engines. One of the most successful engines ever built if you ask me... yes it would kill the purpose of the car (low center of gravity) bla bla, still.. go hard or go home is why I am "for" 2jz I guess.

[calmtigers]

From the things I've seen the twins have a huge problem with cooling in stock form, so the issue of the Crawford can probably be easily fixed ( in terms of hardware). Honestly you've got an incoming gtr and at that point you might as well have a unique fa20 than an overused 2j in a soon to be common chassis

[chrisl]

Originally Posted by Yamajee

Didn't realize there was this much hate on the JZ series engines. One of the most successful engines ever built if you ask me... yes it would kill the purpose of the car (low center of gravity) bla bla, still.. go hard or go home is why I am "for" 2jz I guess.

If that's the goal though, I'd lean more towards an LS instead...

[Whitigir]

Originally Posted by JK21

Hi guys. I have done a few posts on here and I am looking for feedback.

I am on the verge of doing a 2jz swap on my FRS but I just recently encountered an opportunity to where I can do a full build like the Crawford Performance BRZ. All my parts would be purchased and I am looking to the forum for some opinions. One of the biggest pros is that the weight of my car wont be affected as opposed to an iron block getting placed in the bay. I am calling Crawford tomorrow to get more details and looking at the specs I feel this would be better for overall performance (street and track mostly). Thoughts and opinions greatly appreciated.

One thing I know for sure is this: My FRS is going to be a nice little toy until I buy me my GTR again hehehe


Oh and the TRD exhaust and intake will most likely be coming off of the car......PM me if interested in either or both......My car is at 9500 miles and it came with the parts so they have 9500 miles on them. Let me guys

If I was you, I would sell the FRS, and put the Modding money toward the GTR. I assume you paid off your FRS. Sell it now for the lowest of 15,000 together with 15,000 on your mod, you are in 30,000.

Now that 30,000 is very reasonably down payment for a GTR. Don't bother waiting for brand new GTR. If you can not afford it now, you will never be ( new ). Say a used GTR run 75k, you only loan 45k. That isn't bad.

Now if you was to mod your car with 15k. All went smoothly, and say nothing is wrong, you can always take a modded car with a grain of Salt. Reliability went down the drain. Two years from now, if you decide to sell it, you probably pull in 20k, if you are lucky. That is 10k out the windows. Assuming all thing go perfectly.

Now if you mod your FRS, and problems happen, your engine blown up on tuning, your turbo chip, and ruin everything, or whatever the hell else happen. You will lose your car, your mod parts, and probably not losing labor installations. Keep in mind that whenever you tune your car, any places will not be responsible if your engine blown. Even if most of the things went right, you still need to replace more things down the road. There are some where in the forum of a guy who lost 250k modding his GTR. Think

Your drive shaft, your suspensions, your transmission, your linkages...etc. Most of the manufactured vehicles were produced in the cheapest way possible at the minimum reliability of a brand. Therefore most of your drive train components are most likely to not be able to take in too much more power.

Assuming you own a shop, and you do everything for free labor, cheaper parts. Sure, go ahead, that boosts your shop reputation up, bring you more business, and more sponsors.

So, unless you own a shop, or race your car for money, then sure, do it. If not, why ? Especially when you want a GTR.

How do I know ? Why am I saying this ? I had been there, done that, and the reason why was because my stock turbos seal went bad. I mildly modded it, but one thing lead to another, and in my case, 85% of things went smoothly! the last 15% was taken care of by a reputable shop. At the end, what did I lose ?

1/ too much power = pointless on the street
2/ things need replaces down the road, and most of the shops don't work on it, he'll lot of annoying to go to my fav shop
3/ resell value was shitty, I was lucky to re-scoop some back.
4/ I lost the car original value, and rescoop 90% of modding parts plus labor back. I was lucky

What I learn ?

1/ don't mod, if you don't race
2/ if you race, any activities, buy a used car to mods, you don't need most of the stock parts
3/ be prepare to lose a lot of money
4/ it is a non profit and a lose lose situation

Why even race or any activity beside cafe meets and talk ? To most of the people you are more likely not to see again, or only on the forum ? You will just waste your time, and money.

Beside, a guy in my platform wasted 55k because his modded engine blown twice, and when it happens, those people point fingers to each other faces....you can't do sht

However, do whatever you want, it is your money and car. I would prefer to buy my kids diapers, and food. If I had the chance, I would kick myself in the ass before I consider modding it.