The plan for our 1991 Toyota MR2 Turbo all along was to have it ready for the traditional kickoff of the SCCA’s National Solo season, the Dixie National Tour, which usually happens in mid-March at South Georgia Motorsports Park. We’re running the car in the SCCA’s new Xtreme Street category.
But we were in for quite a surprise when the …
Cool to see this progressing. I'm greatly looking forward to hearing how the car behaves after all this work. Specifically, if the coilovers and geometry kit reduced the mid-corner understeer that J.G. mentioned at some point (Classic Motorsports Boxster review?). While it's a different generation even my AW11 does that.
Looking like nasty weather this weekend :( I was going to be at the rallyx going on simultaneously.
Lof8 - Andy said:Looking like nasty weather this weekend :( I was going to be at the rallyx going on simultaneously.
Reigning General Tire Challenge Champ since 2017
Currently an 80% chance of over an inch of rain which, even by Florida standards, is pretty gnarly. I'm definitely taking extra shoes.
In reply to JG Pasterjak :
Bring rains?
David S. Wallens said:In reply to JG Pasterjak :
Bring rains?
I think all the rains are coming on their own
This car is so cool. Where is the running tally on parts and total cost?
In reply to JG Pasterjak :
I was doing the math in my head, and sadly I don't think I have any full-tread tires that would fit the MR2.
tuna55 said:This car is so cool. Where is the running tally on parts and total cost?
Good idea. I'll get that together and we'll add it to the project updates.
Okay so we had some practice starts and a few corners worth of action today. The cool thing was they were corners I was intimately familiar with, as there's only so many ways you can set up an autocross course at The FIRM and have it work.
Initial impression: Wow
I honestly felt like the car was down on power at first. Previously, there was a hard cap to how much throttle you could give it at launch or past the apex and get away with it, but that point has now basically been erased. I email Alex and he did confirm that the rear suspension mods increase rear anti-squat by as much as 33%, but the reduction in dynamic toe changes also contributes to the ability to get power to the ground. It just flat drives off of corners. After our last test, I was thinking to myself "Yeah this thing has more power than it can use, I'm not going to do much more engine stuff." Now I'm trying to figure out how to budget for a motor build.
Turn-in is likewise improved. The time lag between input and action is seriously reduced, and the secondary motion that you previously had to adjust for as the car turned, transferred weight, then finally took a set is completely eliminated. It just turns, sets the tires, and finds its way through the corner. You can actually toss the thing a little, too, and get away with it, instead of completely losing momentum.
So, yeah, initial impressions are overwhelmingly positive. And this is before I've even had a chance to tweak and tune and re-learn to drive the thing.
Also, bonus internet points to anyone who can correctly identify the three bird species helping in the shop.
Thanks for the preliminary update. It sounds like some of the inherent handling issues the chassis had are largely addressed. Props to the work Alex has done, although he never entertained my terrible geometry ideas in the last thread. 
The parrots are... white. green. grey and red? Can we get a better shot?
Matt B (fs) said:Thanks for the preliminary update. It sounds like some of the inherent handling issues the chassis had are largely addressed. Props to the work Alex has done, although he never entertained my terrible geometry ideas in the last thread.
The parrots are... white. green. grey and red? Can we get a better shot?
Sorry! Didn't see that comment until now.
In reply to Alex_W :
No apologies necessary - thanks for spelling it out for me over there.
Have fun dealing with KW on warranty issues. News flash, they suck at it!
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