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Odd thing is, at least where I live, you are less likely to see an FD on the road than a McLaren which I'm fine with. A clean FD or MKIV Supra tends to draw more of a crowd at a regular car show locally than a McLaren as well.
Yep, within a couple miles of my house there are 15-20 supercars and only 3 FDs(all in my garage). There is well over 100 supercars in the Nashville area and only somewhere around 20 FDs. Ill be honest though, my 993 911 does get a lot of attention at local gatherings and on the road. Its even more rare to see one than a FD or Supra in the Nashville area. The T-Rex is probably the biggest attention getter of the group. Unfortunately, with the Slingshots now available most people equate them to being equals. Kind of like comparing a Miata to a FD or a Fiero to a Ferrari. It is clearly not the same. I still have a few more cars to add to the garage, but I have to figure our a better storage situation first.
I
I should have included a pic of the FD. If you ask my 11 year old son it’s still the coolest car we own. My 7 year old son chooses the T-Rex and my 4 year old will choose whatever car his mom is in. Lol.
Sounds like you raised them right. My 15 year old is torn between my FD and my old GC STI. He likes the wife's S14 but not as much as the other two. My 12 year old loves BRZs for some reason (could be because the wife is a Subaru ambassador and we've spent a lot of time at autox and subaru events.) They have been around a lot of supercars and while they are nice, I think the wife and I have rubbed off on them as far as car taste goes since we were heavily into the car scene in the late 90s and early 2000s.
Strangely enough, if Subaru would throw an STI caliber drivetrain in the BRZ, that may be somewhat close to an FD as far as a driver's car goes. Leave traction control out and keep ABS like an FD. They feel very well balanced, I've driven a couple during autox, just lack power much like a Miata or RX8.
you are less likely to see an FD on the road than a McLaren which I'm fine with.
Silicon Valley is kind of weird, you see tons of crazy cars all over the place, people street park McLarens. Then you can go to Monterey for car week and see Ferrari GTO's at red lights in traffic.
but i've only seen 4 Rx7's this year. a nice FB, a 10AE FC, and a pair of JDM FD's.
I might have missed the scope creep in earlier discussions in this thread, but we're adding a few $000k's as an FD replacement with the latest input - showing just how good of a lightweight fighter it is
Originally Posted by boostin13b
the 911 with some serious power mods would be closest in my books from what I have driven.
Maybe a base 911 or an older gen, but a modern 911 GT3 RS doesn't need many tweaks to make it at the sharp end at any given track day - stickier tires, racier pads, and minor suspension tweaks. My friend and I used to have some fun playing cat and mouse out on track with his modified R35. I have a feeling I will be giving a point by early and watching him disappear with his new track monster RS.
Of course, there's always something faster than you - we couldn't shake a Turbo behind us as my friend was setting his PB's in his 3RS, so I think your recommendation iceman on the Turbo is spot on too (again if we are talking about adding a few $000k's to a budget). Then again, there was another 3RS out there 2.5 seconds faster than them both with a few more mods, so... Turbo or GT3 RS win win
I took a ride in a 1of200 GT2 RS CS and realized I will physically never go as fast around my home track, so might as well enjoy my laps in the FD
By the lap times: FD < GT3RS < Turbo < GT2RS.CS < someone else into perpetuity - might as well just have fun
FWIW on McLaren's vs P-cars, I took a ride out in a 720S and it felt sloppy compared to the GT3RS everywhere; too twitchy like you couldn't get on the acceleration unless you had zero steering input. Granted my home track is twistier where this car would probably be hard to beat at a power track like WGI, but I thought the back to back comparison was interesting. The active aero was cool to see, but it didn't seem to be helping compared to a monetarily bargain GT3RS
Two cents on rarity, I saw a handful of beautiful GT3 RS cars all generally the same at one event... I never see anything at the racetrack like my FD in New England
This is a beautiful ($0.5M) view...
...completely biased, but I am perfectly fine owning this one
Back to the topic at hand, I'd take an NA1 NSX for the street coupled with the Exige for the track as an FD replacement.
I drove my friend's NA1 and the seating position and driver focused interior is comparable to the FD. Low on power, but great on engagement!
I would never give up my FD for an NSX, but I could easily add it to my fleet (if you could find one these days)
Last edited by ZumSpeedRX-7; Dec 16, 2022 at 04:13 PM.
I had a good buddy with a decent bit of track experience go from a GT3 to a 600LT. He never got over how easy the McLaren over powers the tires. The McLaren was more capable but takes a lot more driver. My 650s is not as track capable as the 600lt but is far more car than I will ever be driver. It’s a high 9 second rocket and the first car I’ve owned that makes me a little uneasy with all the safety features turned off.
Yeah but I bet you could do some easy mods to bump that thing to 5 or 600 horses on stock internals. I have always loved the Nissan v6. It’s bulletproof. And to get one, with twins in a 2 seater rear wheel drive…
twin turbo v6 as well. I like it more than the Supra. Might be my next car.
I like this more than the Supra mainly because Nissan stuck to their roots and is using a Nissan drivetrain. It was pretty disappointing when Toyota (who can make great engines) uses a platform from another manufacture for a flagship car. The GR Supra is an amazing car........but really isn't a Toyota at heart.
you guys think that Z car would be too much for a 1st time driver?
dangerous I mean..
Probably. I've seen some people not be able to control BRZ's and such in the rain which are much less horsepower. RWD is honestly a bad idea unless you bring the kid up with autox or something so they know how to handle the car in quick response situations. I would hate to see Z's turn into the next mustang or Charger with the young kids doing donuts anywhere they can as well
It depends on how badly they're driving... there should be a bit of understeer engineered into the Z in stock form, especially on a dry track with fresh tires.
I drove the manual Supra at the track (Driver Development Track at the Canadian Tire Motorsport Park, Drive Festival) this weekend... it was fast and grippy, solid and very stable through corners and transitions. No concerns about safety or too much power on Michelin Pilot Super Sport tires.
Not a lot of feel with electric steering, but the body was well controlled and easy to exploit through fast and slow corners, with responsive and easy-to-modulate brakes.
The Supra has a fairly long clutch travel with a weird bump at the bottom where engagement happens... I didn't need to shift on the short track as the instructor told me to stay in 3rd, but the throttle response is excellent and people say there isn't much rev hang. Rev matching is also a standard feature you can disable. The gear shift is short and solid with a reverse lockout.
if i sold the Rx7, i would be really tempted to do something way more elemental, and pre smog.
i really like the 30's GP cars too, and it occurs to me that the Type A,B,C Auto Unions basically use a VW Beetle suspension. the Beetle was actually the next car Dr Porsche did.
so the Auto Union Type C is basically a VW bug with a 600hp V16 in the middle, what could go wrong? (1934-1937 the weight limit was 750kg, so its nearly 1hp per kg)
obviously i'd use a Rotary of some kind....
these cars were very high tech for the time. it had an onboard data logger. this one in the pic is compound supercharged. and the Type D was the first car with limited slip
As conventional as it is, I went from FD --> NB2 Miata --> ND2 Miata --> now to one of the last 2023 (outgoing generation) Mustang GT's built. I did manage to get a manual, although it doesn't have the performance pack which I have mixed feelings about. It has most of the options (leather, heated/cooled seats, heated steering wheel, 2nd to highest grade stereo). Without the performance pack it also has all season tires from the factory, so I can drive it in mild winter weather. As for how it drives, you can definitely feel the weight, but it revs out to 7k. I do wish it had shorter gearing, and if I keep the car to when the warranty is up I may go with a new final drive. Being the end of the generation, the bugs have basically been worked out.
The deciding factor was that I have kid #2 coming in January and with the draconian car seat laws, I basically need my fun car to be able to legally have a car seat in it so I can transport at least one kid. That means 4 seater. See above pic of the car with rear carseat installed. The logistics of not being able to drive around with your 3 year old will be just too much. I would barely drive a 2 seater since I can't put a forward facing car seat in it completely legally (legally I could do front seat, but you need a vehicle with top tether anchor for front seat, which isn't common). Even though it's a Mustang, manual V8s are almost dead at this point so there is some "rareness" to it. I thought about a Porsche but with daycare being so expensive a new/recent Porsche 911 was just too much.
The Rx7 will never go, however as I've grown older I wanted to find something that gives me the thrills while offers some more creature comforts and durability
Consensus is, if you’re not spending 100g’s+, you shouldn’t replace the FD.
Which is fine by me. She’s not gojng anywhere anytime soon.
I did have to replace my daily though. The RX8 betrayed me so I had to replace it sooner than I expected.
Im kinda grateful it happened now because I’m benefiting from the upgrades they’ve done since they introduced the model. I absolutely love it! I look forward to driving it as much as the FD.
My wife and I considered a Model 3 Performance as a daily driver
I was excited about Track Mode for an occasional track outing, although mid-session charging and battery longevity would split my typical FD day in half best case scenario
My great respect for Randy Pobst (raced against him at an SCCA endurance race at Virginia International Raceway) and how he helped develop the track mode is exciting for the future, but I think we would be fooling ourselves in thinking the Model 3 is a true FD3S replacement (what Neo and arghx are saying model 3 is agreeably a good DD, not FD replacement).
Keeping with the discussion, my vote is still a Lotus Exige where I won't look in my garage with sadness to a missing FD track toy
or a GT3 RS where I'd be more than happy on a race track / smiles for miles out of the box perfection, but I'd be sad in how common they are at track events around here (sadness in looking in my garage to a common - but damn beautiful! - track toy versus my "unique track build" FD)
Last edited by ZumSpeedRX-7; Sep 25, 2023 at 11:10 AM.
Reason: video add
it ran the quarter in 14.2@97mph, which is like a stock FD. it also feels like an FD from the drivers seat
gas mileage is about double (37+), and its just about the most reliable car on the planet
the only odd part is that its FD speed, but no shove in the back like the FD
Admittedly, it's been a long time since I've driven a stock FD, but I have a hard time believing the ND is "FD speed" in real life, especially as you say if there's no feeling of power. I recall the "official" FD time being 13.8, with some quicker and over 100mph. I wonder if the advances in tire tech alone account for some of it. Maybe some refinements regarding wheel hop, which I recall made 1/4 miling the FD tricky (I've never tried it). 225/50/16 is almost comical now if you think about it.
I'm glad they finally gave the Miata some real grunt though. It was way overdue!
