Whats it goin ta take???????
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Whats it goin ta take???????
A friend of mine is about to buy a ford focus in the near future. So the question is what will i need to atleast stay up w/ him???? he is gettin the one that puts out 151hp and i got a 02 lx, ground kit, cia. Any advice on mods would help!!!!!!
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lol, those new focuses are actually pretty damn quick. I work at a Ford here in AZ and drive them around daily and they have some power to um compared to the 03' and earlier years.
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Rep Power: 0 the car will be quicker than you, not by much though. and there is nothing you can do about it unless you go turbo. nitrous, i dont consider, because its not always that fast.
i was told it was gonna be a sad day when american car's surpassed the performance of jap cars. well, it is a sad day.
i was told it was gonna be a sad day when american car's surpassed the performance of jap cars. well, it is a sad day.
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Originally Posted by Echelon04
He may be quicker than you...but at least you have a quality car and not a hunk of rattles.
I sure wish my car was newer
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Originally Posted by Silversleeper
i was told it was gonna be a sad day when american car's surpassed the performance of jap cars. well, it is a sad day.
It would be a sad day when the Japs passed the Americans in performance?! lol! Guess what - that would require Japanese performance to be ahead at some point in the history of the world. And Japanese performance has never been ahead. The only "great" performance claim Japanese carmakers ever had was that they could make 100hp/liter. But even that is a bullsh!t claim. Is the Ferrari 612 Scaglietti a piece of junk since it makes less than 100hp/liter? That hp/l argument was made by people who couldn't accept what Japanese cars were good for - economic transportation.
Sure, there are the exceptions. There is the Z-series, Mazda's rotary division, and a few others, but the majority of them pale in comparison to American performance.
And I'll even grant you the fact that many Japanese cars handle well, but even then, the only reason Camaros got bad raps for their handling was because people didn't know how to handle 300rwhp. It wasn't the car's fault.
So, even with all that said, where is Japan's supercar? Well, you could mistake the NSX as their supercar, but the NSX misses the mark by miles and miles. Hell, you could have nearly two Z06s (one of the best sports cars of all time, mind you) for the price of one NSX. The long-nose 350Z is a joke, too. They added 160lbs of metal and only ~15hp. Not good enough. In my mind, the 350Z or RX-8 would be Japan's current supercar. And not to say I wouldn't want either of them - because I want both of them - but if I was going for a straight performance car, it wouldn't be coming from Japan.
(Disclaimer: I am working with the definition of performance as "straight line performance" since even the C5 Z06 Corvette has a perfect weight distribution.)
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Originally Posted by Zzyzx
Well, you could just learn how to drive and beat the snot out of him at autocross and road courses...
edit- japanese cars are about quality, period. the cheapest cars they make are twice the quality of most domestics. most usa cars have weight problems, horrible suspension, and engines that take to mods like, well, the d17a lol (hey japan isnt perfect either). this quality of japanese ( and ferrari, lambo and renault etc) allows them to be tuned to a much higher extent.... im sorry but give somone with a viper or vette, and somone with a porsche, lambo, or rx7, Z, skyline, or silvia 100 thousand dollars to use in mods and see which one wins in a full regement of testing from drag to track and all the others like skidpad etc....
in the end you with have viper/vette 1 (drag) any other car not made in america = everything else + they run more than 50k miles before the tranny falls out the bottem.
ps the key word here is most, there are a few good ole usa cars(zo6) that can rock up the ring, with the proper tuning.
Last edited by mykungfuisthebe; Nov 8, 2004 at 11:39 AM.
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Just to clear up some stuff for you...
actually they handle poorly because they are nose heavy (just like the Mustang) and have a Live axle rear end... The Camaro and the Mustang have the rare distintion of being some of the few RWD cars that in stock form Plow like Pigs hunting for truffles.
when the NSX came out originally, it was actually a very well performing car. and it still is. however if you are just looking at HP numbers and 1/4 mile times then yes it is quite lacking, and a bit overpriced too, but you can find a used one quite reasonably priced now. The Z06 is some thing special, though corvettes have allmost allways broken the mold of US cars.
Yes the 350Z is a joke... so much so that the S2000 is still beating the snot outa it in autocross, as well as open track.
I fail to see how a 350z or an RX-8 could be considered a super car 
and I agree, If I wanted a straght performance car, I wouldnt be looking for it from Japan, but then I wouldnt be looking for it coming form the US either..... but rather Jolly ol' England....
Originally Posted by white2K2EX
The only reason Camaros got bad raps for their handling was because people didn't know how to handle 300rwhp. It wasn't the car's fault.
Originally Posted by white2K2EX
So, even with all that said, where is Japan's supercar? Well, you could mistake the NSX as their supercar, but the NSX misses the mark by miles and miles. Hell, you could have nearly two Z06s (one of the best sports cars of all time, mind you) for the price of one NSX. The long-nose 350Z is a joke, too. They added 160lbs of metal and only ~15hp. Not good enough.
Yes the 350Z is a joke... so much so that the S2000 is still beating the snot outa it in autocross, as well as open track.
Originally Posted by white2K2EX
In my mind, the 350Z or RX-8 would be Japan's current supercar. And not to say I wouldn't want either of them - because I want both of them - but if I was going for a straight performance car, it wouldn't be coming from Japan.
and I agree, If I wanted a straght performance car, I wouldnt be looking for it from Japan, but then I wouldnt be looking for it coming form the US either..... but rather Jolly ol' England....
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Rep Power: 0 how has no one mentioned the evo or the sti in all their various forms. In a recent car and driver, or road and track, i don't recall which one, a tuned vishnu evolution beat out cts-v's, an m3, and a few others in the "sedan" class. the only reason it lost out to a mallet cts-v by 0.2 seconds was the intercooler hose kept falling off. it still managed to run the fastest 0-60 time of all the cars tested, that includes a hennesy venom twin turbo viper with its engine bored out to 8.5 liters, several twin turbo corvettes, a few other turbo vipers, and turbo charged cts-v's, and a lamborghini gallardo. on top of all this it cost less than the next least expensive car by $18,000. the many of the other cars included in this test cost well over $100,000, the vishnu evo was in the 50's. how can you say japanese cars can't contend in straight line performance? the hennesy viper ran the 1/4 mile the fastest, close to 11s flat i believe, but the evo ran it in less than 12 (someone correct me if i'm wrong, i don't have the magazine in front of me) and the viper has 6.5 liters on the evo and it's boosted as well. i'm sure some other people here have read this article, someone please fill in the holes i have left. if you ask me, a 2.0 liter 4 cylinder car and outperforms several cars with more than 2 times the displacement and twice as many cylinders and twice as many turbos is pretty good. i don't think japan is lacking in performance at all. booyah.
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Rep Power: 338 seems like ppl have forgotten what a super car really is.... it's more like the untouchables, McLaren F1, Enzo, F50, Carerra GT... etc.
unfortunately, Japan doesnt really have anything to compete against that,
unfortunately, Japan doesnt really have anything to compete against that,
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Rep Power: 338 I thought we were talking about pretty much stock cars. If youre talking about heavily modified Supra's and Gt-R putting down over 800 WHP... thast a different story all together. B/c they have those type of beasts in the US as well, Vipers and Corvettes.
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Originally Posted by Zzyzx
actually they handle poorly because they are nose heavy (just like the Mustang) and have a Live axle rear end... The Camaro and the Mustang have the rare distintion of being some of the few RWD cars that in stock form Plow like Pigs hunting for truffles.
Originally Posted by Zzyzx
when the NSX came out originally, it was actually a very well performing car. and it still is. however if you are just looking at HP numbers and 1/4 mile times then yes it is quite lacking, and a bit overpriced too, but you can find a used one quite reasonably priced now. The Z06 is some thing special, though corvettes have allmost allways broken the mold of US cars.
Originally Posted by Zzyzx
Yes the 350Z is a joke... so much so that the S2000 is still beating the snot outa it in autocross, as well as open track.
Originally Posted by Zzyzx
I fail to see how a 350z or an RX-8 could be considered a super car
Originally Posted by Zzyzx
and I agree, If I wanted a straght performance car, I wouldnt be looking for it from Japan, but then I wouldnt be looking for it coming form the US either..... but rather Jolly ol' England....
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Originally Posted by xxnoshelterxx
how has no one mentioned the evo or the sti in all their various forms. In a recent car and driver, or road and track, i don't recall which one, a tuned vishnu evolution beat out cts-v's, an m3, and a few others in the "sedan" class. the only reason it lost out to a mallet cts-v by 0.2 seconds was the intercooler hose kept falling off. it still managed to run the fastest 0-60 time of all the cars tested, that includes a hennesy venom twin turbo viper with its engine bored out to 8.5 liters, several twin turbo corvettes, a few other turbo vipers, and turbo charged cts-v's, and a lamborghini gallardo. on top of all this it cost less than the next least expensive car by $18,000. the many of the other cars included in this test cost well over $100,000, the vishnu evo was in the 50's. how can you say japanese cars can't contend in straight line performance? the hennesy viper ran the 1/4 mile the fastest, close to 11s flat i believe, but the evo ran it in less than 12 (someone correct me if i'm wrong, i don't have the magazine in front of me) and the viper has 6.5 liters on the evo and it's boosted as well. i'm sure some other people here have read this article, someone please fill in the holes i have left. if you ask me, a 2.0 liter 4 cylinder car and outperforms several cars with more than 2 times the displacement and twice as many cylinders and twice as many turbos is pretty good. i don't think japan is lacking in performance at all. booyah.
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Originally Posted by CuRiOuSfIsH
I thought we were talking about pretty much stock cars. If youre talking about heavily modified Supra's and Gt-R putting down over 800 WHP... thast a different story all together. B/c they have those type of beasts in the US as well, Vipers and Corvettes.
