Good RWD tuner platform car
A big, hairy Kentucky boy
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Originally Posted by Touge *****
Miata....1st Gen MR2 (Supercharged).....any of the smallplatforms such as these. The MR2 has very good handling characteristics because of the midship design(mid-engine, RWD).
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Rep Power: 335 ^ meh sr20's in 240's are gettin over rated. ka-t produces just as much power. but still im kinda gettin tired of 240's id say go rwd corolla or miata also take a look at mkIII supras
K-DUB
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Rep Power: 0 Well if he is on a budget, you can eliminate the rotary platform. As the old saying goes...they work 60% of the time, all the time. They are more hassle than its worth if you are a budget racer. SR20 are nothing impressive, I pull much stronger with my K-series, and yes the KA-T put down same if not more than an SR20. So you are pretty much left with: Miata, 1st Gen MR2, MKIII Supra, and if you want to be Takumi then go Hachi (AE86). Keep in mine, the only two that will have much power are MKIII and MR2.
Autocross Junky
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Rep Power: 380 for cheep parts and cheep cars, you cant beat a miata.
especially ever since Mazdaspeed started selling parts at cost for people who use the car for compitition.
especially ever since Mazdaspeed started selling parts at cost for people who use the car for compitition.
Last time I had this much fun some furniture got broken!
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Originally Posted by Touge *****
Well if he is on a budget, you can eliminate the rotary platform. As the old saying goes...they work 60% of the time, all the time. They are more hassle than its worth if you are a budget racer. SR20 are nothing impressive, I pull much stronger with my K-series, and yes the KA-T put down same if not more than an SR20. So you are pretty much left with: Miata, 1st Gen MR2, MKIII Supra, and if you want to be Takumi then go Hachi (AE86). Keep in mine, the only two that will have much power are MKIII and MR2.
Rotaries are extremly strong and usually the supporting components fail long before the engine. Even with bad seals it will still work fine for a while, just not be outputting optimal power. The rotart design is absolutly great.
And the whole 60% of the time thing is bs. if you have a rotary car, you must take extra care of it. if you have a turbo car, you must take extra care of it.
guess what, if you have a turbo rotary car, you must take extra care of it.
If not, it will break sooner or later, just like any other FI car.
K-DUB
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Rep Power: 0 Then why are you recommending him a rotary when he is on a budget? His key point was CHEAP. Rotaries are pains in the *** when you first get them. If he buys a cheap rotary, it will no doubt need a rebuild assuming it even runs strong. This money thrown in for the rebuild could be performance parts on a miata/mr2 for a chasis nearly the same price. This minimal tuning into either of these chasis will no doubt out perform the fb/fc. As zzyzx said, miata's are some of the best performing cars out there in respect to handling. That is why they dominate most of the categories in roadracing/auto-x.
Originally Posted by diskreet
Not really. As long as the apex seals are good on the rotor, the thing will pretty much run forever.
Rotaries are extremly strong and usually the supporting components fail long before the engine. Even with bad seals it will still work fine for a while, just not be outputting optimal power. The rotart design is absolutly great.
And the whole 60% of the time thing is bs. if you have a rotary car, you must take extra care of it. if you have a turbo car, you must take extra care of it.
guess what, if you have a turbo rotary car, you must take extra care of it.
If not, it will break sooner or later, just like any other FI car.
Rotaries are extremly strong and usually the supporting components fail long before the engine. Even with bad seals it will still work fine for a while, just not be outputting optimal power. The rotart design is absolutly great.
And the whole 60% of the time thing is bs. if you have a rotary car, you must take extra care of it. if you have a turbo car, you must take extra care of it.
guess what, if you have a turbo rotary car, you must take extra care of it.
If not, it will break sooner or later, just like any other FI car.
maita or late 80s rx-7...both are cheap and easily replaceable if you wreck it, plus you won't feel bad about totaling it, since it was prolly already on it's "last leg" lol
miata ftw
miata ftw
Last edited by tuningmycivic; Apr 7, 2006 at 08:18 PM. Reason: Automerged Doublepost
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Rep Power: 434 i still say e36 m3. it will have more power stock and probably better handling characteristics than most of the cars you guys mentioned so far, minus the miata and mr2. if you think about it, you'd be paying a **** load of money to modifiy a cheap car to produce a lot of power and handle well, so why not just get the entire package at once?
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Rep Power: 257 like some posts, i had an MKIII Supra before i bought my civic. despite it's mass, it's a nice drive and a blast to modify. . .just be extremely cautious about the head gasket, which proves to be the Achilles heel of the car. other than that, id say Miata.
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Rep Power: 0 i just say 240sx with sr20det swap... i am saying this if you are going to boost it and planing to get quite nice numbers... ka24 has a longer stroke so it needs to be destroked so you will have a lower displacement if you want to run same numbers as an sr20 running on pump gas... a 240sx i can easily get them for $1000 with a ka24... those engine are strong so down the road you can save up for an sr20 but run with the ka24 until then...
mr2 are fun... so that is another choice, but i like nissans better... if you like toyota i would choose that...
i dont like miatas because i dont like convertibles... the best looking miata i have ever seen was the one converted to a real coupe... i saw it at the la auto show i think two years ago... but you can do a rotary swap, ford 5.0 swap, or do ls1 swap=$$$$$$$$...
ae86 are too hard to find
rx7 if you eventually want to do a rebuild on the engine... i dont trust early ones just because usually i think the engine has been abused if you arent spending that much
mr2 are fun... so that is another choice, but i like nissans better... if you like toyota i would choose that...
i dont like miatas because i dont like convertibles... the best looking miata i have ever seen was the one converted to a real coupe... i saw it at the la auto show i think two years ago... but you can do a rotary swap, ford 5.0 swap, or do ls1 swap=$$$$$$$$...
ae86 are too hard to find
rx7 if you eventually want to do a rebuild on the engine... i dont trust early ones just because usually i think the engine has been abused if you arent spending that much
hey where're you located?? my friend is going to sell his mr2 before he gets a new car. 1991 N/A automatic MR2 in red. it's been repainted but his mom backed into it with their benz and it chipped the paint off the front. i know.. it's like a double negative that isn't a positive with it being N/A AND automatic =\, but hey, it's still rwd, and you can still drop a jdm turbo manual engine into it right?
but yea i dont know when exactly he's going to be selling. It's in Southern California by the way.
but yea i dont know when exactly he's going to be selling. It's in Southern California by the way.
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Rep Power: 346 Miatas are the way to go. Superchargers/turbochargers and all the suspension parts you will ever need are available.
240 sx's and AE's are expensive now-a-days.
240 sx's and AE's are expensive now-a-days.
I'm 6'3" though so while a miata sounds good, it might be a problem for me (haven't set it one yet though)
I'm not looking to buy anything atm, but very possibly next year
While the e36 m3 is an awesome car, parts are expensive to it and I'd be looking into more of a project car type of thing.
I'm not looking to buy anything atm, but very possibly next year
While the e36 m3 is an awesome car, parts are expensive to it and I'd be looking into more of a project car type of thing.
Last edited by noooorb; Apr 7, 2006 at 10:13 PM.
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Originally Posted by infinite012
e36 m3. they can be had for about 10g
My buddy just bought a 95 M3, had 117K on it, but was very clean, blown struts and needed brakes, we thought he made out "ok" at 15K. Good shape, those cars are still upwards of 17-18K
2. BMW parts aren't cheap, M parts cost even more. His brakes, AT COST (employee discount) were almost 400 bucks for 4 rotors and OE replacement (bosch) pads. Struts alone were 700. Motor parts? Ha, forget about it.
There aren't too many RWD ricermobiles left that are cheap. You can thank driftmania for that. 240s used to be cheap, now even the POSes cost a lot. AE86s if you can find them, are pretty expensive as far as parts go, cuz you need parts from japan (no FATF reference intended) and they're old.
Best bet is probably an RX7, just cuz there's lots of them to play around with.... they can be picked up for as cheap as free (1st Gen) to who knows what for a 3rd gen FD. Plan on doing some work to it (I.E. buying a new motor), but if the car is cheap enough, you're basically buying a motor, not a car. Might also be able to pick up a MK3 Supra... depends who's selling it I guess.
Last edited by Boilermaker1; Apr 7, 2006 at 11:09 PM.
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Rep Power: 434 he said project car. buy a busted up, raped to all hell e36 m3 for 10g. i've definitely seen some in that range on autotrader, bimmerforums, dtmpower, etc. if you find good condition ones, then yes, they will be 15g+.
