CodeRedR51
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Sorry if there is a thread for this already. Searched and came up empty.
Edit: here is the concept they are referring to:
Edit: here is the concept they are referring to:
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Call me crazy but given the success of the 86, the annoyingly good Supra, the GR Yaris, and the upcoming GR Corolla, I actually trust Toyota to do a better job with an MR2 than Honda with the NSX. Toyota is an expert at hybrids after all - while Honda has finally found success in F1, Toyota has been thoroughly committed to LMP for quite a long time now. Plus, the MR2 never achieved anywhere near the excellence or expectations as the NSX did so it'll be harder to bellyflop. I always thought it was weird that the Supra wasn't planned to be the top dog but the current arrangement actually is a decent strategy to curb expectations. Instead of risking the Supra name on a world-beater like Honda did with the NSX, they just turned it into a decent sports car, and now the MR2 is free to be anything they want since the name never had that much cachet anyway. In fact, making a new MR2 supercar be a left-field oddball would actually be more in line with its market position throughout its history.An electrified V6 engine? Could this be the first car in history where the weight doubles between generations? Even the Eclipse didn't manage that and that turned into an SUV.
In fact, I can already imagine the years of articles we'll get from car journalists shaming people for it when it immediately flops.
Lotus?Hopefully it’s not far off the Supra in terms of price and is 100% Toyota. But they will probably do collaboration with another manufacturer.
Is it economically viable for a large manufacturer to even think about creating a whole new platform for a low-volume niche car these days?
If they were to platform share who would it be with? Lotus is the only one i can really see it working with, but the Elise, when they still made it, was a £40k+ car. I'm not seeing how an MR2 wouldn't be treading on the Supras toes. You'd have to aim it between the £30k GT86 and the £50k Supra - so somewhere in the region of £40k is about right. When Lotus have spun-off Elise-based cars in the past, Vauxhall/Opel VX220 and Tesla Roadster, they've been built at Hethel on the Elise/Exige production line. Do they even have the capacity there to produce the sort of production figures Toyota would be expecting? I assume Lotus has plans for a Elise replacement in the near future, so it might tie in.
The trip is that neither of those feel all that long ago to me and yet both companies are dead.
You need to factor that current Geely era of Lotus seems to be gunning for heavyweight electric hypercars at this point, which goes against the classic lightweight Lotus formula.Lotus?
They're pretty much experts in lightweight MR vehicles, plus they've been powered by toyota too.
True, Toyota could buy the Elise Chassis IP and work of it.You need to factor that current Geely era of Lotus seems to be gunning for heavyweight electric hypercars at this point, which goes against the classic lightweight Lotus formula.
Why have 2 manufacturers share development costs, when you can have 3 of them do it!
As if I don't have enough to daydream about. Thanks.A mid-engined car on the Yaris platform?
All of the rumors are pointing to this new MR2 being cheap, thank god - perhaps cheaper than the 86? Not much daylight in price for a sports car between the 86 and Supra... I happen to really like Suzuki and Daihatsu too, two manufacturers that do cheap really well. I wonder if there will be a new Cappuccino out of this too.
Please don't crush my dreams Toyota, otherwise I'm putting my money on Hyundai's 74.
It claims a new turbocharged three-cylinder 1.0-liter mild hybrid sports car is being developed with help from Suzuki. Since these are just rumors, it's unclear if this car would make it to the United States.
The small sports car could reportedly weigh as little as 2,200 pounds. The vehicle is also reported to have a wheelbase of around 100 inches, or near that of the Toyota GR86. There's no indication there are any carryover parts between the two cars, though. That being said, the car wouldn't be completely a completely ground-up effort. The Japanese publication reports that the car might share some parts with the current-generation Yaris, namely the front suspension.
As far as Suzuki's role goes, it's allegedly developing the 1.0-liter engine, which reportedly could produce around 120 horsepower. Toyota already makes a 1.0-liter three-cylinder in the Yaris, though.
That's not the only strange part of this report. It also claims that the price would be in the neighborhood of $20,000. That would make it the cheapest mid-engine car for sale—at least in the United States—by a huge margin. Even if it does carry parts over from at least one existing vehicle, that's pretty unbelievable.
There has been concrete evidence beyond rumors for a new mid-engine sports car from Toyota, which is part of the reason why the news refuses to die. Toyota has filed patents detailing a body structure for such a vehicle which we dug up in the past, and it also showed off a full-fledged concept for a GR-branded electric roadster several months ago. Related rumors for parts sharing also just keep coming.
That thing is hideous, I'd rather take an Aztec