DrewII

no country in the world today would allow this car to be road registered. i'm sorry Ferrari. bragging that your stripped out non-road legal car beats a street-registered GTR in full trim is pretty lame. next...

looks hot unfortunately the front bar on the R34 is low as. its all part of the pain of owning a dumped car. i sold mine with duck tape wrapped around the lower lip of my car. after 2 years of constant scraping it, a part in the corner eventually completely snapped off. so i would do something about it sooner than later. if the car is lowered perhaps raise it to an acceptable level. you can still drop some stiffer coils inside if you're keen to see the track with it.

KU36 tyres offer very good dry weather grip for the money. terrible in the wet. semi slicks will provide you a further benefit, but they have different degrees of wear and can be costly. If your car is standard, i would go KU36 (roughly $200/corner for 17") + camber adjustments + thicker adjustable sway bars ($5-600 installed) FIRST. this will be the cheapest starting point. then start adding more if you feel you're still lacking traction.

Mickey T ETs FTW

all that you just mentioned. its not an easy job at all getting a RWD turbo that isn't set up for extra power to grip very well. you could adjust all the above, and you might still have issues with traction. depending on your engine setup. work through the list above, start with wheels, then start with camber/toe adjustments, then for track work possibly look into a better LSD. sway bars are also probably the first point of call and most benneficial bang for buck mod you can do to any car. by reducing overall body roll through corners, the wheels/tyres will stay closer to their wheel alignment settings. a stiffer rear sway bar will reduce roll in the rear and leave the front wheels more evenly loaded so there can be more available grip in the front. also helps with tyre wear. and when the lack of avilable grip finally starts to piss you off. get an AWD. i'v never looked back

exactly its a bullshiit myth that WRXs have weak/shiit gearboxes that break all the time. all user input. would happen to any car under the same abuse.

yeh like who do you know? this is what everyone says. even before i went to subaru this is all i ever heard. but after owning a couple and being active on the rex forums for a long time, i rarely hear of people blowing their boxes EVER. i have heard of some of the earlier classics pre 00 doing their boxes. but these cars were used for hill climbs and motor sport. the old rexies have had 10 years of hard launching from various young males. this is to be expected. extreme launching on startup time and time again will make any gearbox blow. whether it be ferrari, or evo or wrx. go on the evo forums and find out how their 10 year old gearboxes are going after so many years of launching abuse. they all share the same fate. like i said its user abuse over many many years and many many launches. not actually a design or manufacturing fault.

i agree. past experience WRX's like most japanese cars are mostly unbreakable. start feeding more power pound for pound evo engine can handle more. but lightly tuned they are unbreakable. earlier models i'm talking the classic rex 10 years ago had gearbox issues if launched too hard repeatedly. but EVOs have exactly the same issue with blowing trasfer casings in their gearboxes with hard launches. EVO 9's are famous for blowing gearboxes with repetitive hard launching. some guys have blown the transfer casing 3 times in an EVO through gearbox abuse. spend some time on the Oz EVO forums you will see the EVOs have their fare share of issues too if treated with no respect. recent models included. with either car. treat it well. and it will be good to you.

WRX = nicer interior, better day to day driveability (which makes it not as good as the EVO on the track), even with no mods the boxer engine purrs and sounds way better then the stock evo engine, rear seats split/fold 60 40 so can fit more luggage on long trips EVO = track monster, much harsher for mon-fri driving, interior compared to the WRX is shite, your wife wouldnt like it, rear seats don't fold/split

ouch

have you tried carmate.com.au yet? that is the fake 400R AU Spec version i had a proper jap version on my series 2. they do look different from the front. i had mine fitted before the car left japan. and in the two years i owned it i couldnt find one distributor in australia that sold it or a version that looked just like a real 400R front bar.

why has it been off the road for 3 months?

i convinced myself months ago and since then have been reaping the rewards and from my experience i suggest you do the same.

couldnt agree more. the understated looks are one of the best parts about the car. really underneath the car is a beast. i got over people staring and pointing in traffic. for a daily driver the only time i liked being noticed was on the weekends. mon-fri i just wanted to get to and from work ASAP without being noticed at all. you can't relax in bumper/bumper traffic with every car staring at you as they drive past you in peak hour traffic. its annoying and you wish you hard the darkest tints in the world to hide you from everyone.

i know where you are coming from. and you are correct. however i was spending my weekends fixing, driving around for spare parts etc etc stopped actually "enjoying" my car. and because it was a daily driver when it needed a part fixed that stopped me from driving it each day i obviously had to sort out that problem that weekend (which i may have had other shiit to do ie going out, functions, beach etc). and this is one of the reasons why i bought a brand new car. it does 0-100 in 5.3 seconds in standard trim. 0-400 in 13.4 seconds stock. and shoots around wakefield park in 1:12 stock, it performs as well in the wet as it does in the dry, sat nav, electric sunroof, full leather interior, blue tooth hands free, rear parking sensors literally all the latest technology and some nice toys to boot (Sti gear knob, sti shirt shift kit, sti front lip) and ALL FACTORY FITTED WITH 3 YEAR WARRANTY, a phenomenal AWD transmission and a fantastic engine, and they even chucked in 3 years 24/7 NRMA assist. and theyre still extremely cheap for what you get. they're japanese after all. the other biggest reason why i bought the car was for tax purposes. i construct a log book as i use my car daily to drive between sites (company accountant) so i calculated that after 4-5 years of ownership, as long as i sell the car and not give it away for nothing (and so long as my business kms are extremely high which they are and i can easily appropriate to the tax man) then after the tax savings and sale price. the car would have cost me virtually nothing to own in those 5 years of ownership. and the same goes with any car i choose to purchase in the future. under a hire purchase due to the fact you can claim depreciation on top of everything else once you sell the car its basically cost you hardly anything at all during the time of ownership (so long as your business usage is very high). obviously need to keep it for long enough to get a big enough tax saving but around 5 years and yeh. this was a massive factor for me. so it was a calculated purchase. but also one because i was sick of spending weekends fixing my car, and not even being able to drive it during the week as i needed it every day. the car had to go. i'm only 24 so i'm definitely still into my toys and will be for a very long time to come.

i was in love with mine when i first bought it. until all the niggling boost leaking issues, clutch pedal snapped off, diff issues, this and that needed replacing and no amount of $$$ i was spending on it was going to give me a return these skylines just start to fall apart eventually in the last 3-6 months i had it i hated it so much and couldnt wait to get rid of it. its what you get with spending money on a 10+ year old turbo. spend more money for diminishing returns. in the end i think most people get rid of it because the pain outweighs the fun. wouldnt surprise me if most people selling in the "cars for sale" section on this forum are doing so because their car is falling apart and they're sick of spending constant $$$s fixing it. the day i sold my skyline was one of the happiest days of my life. biggest sigh of relief. the sigh could be heard for miles.

and "typevu" i believe your starting to use your head with a lot more maturity once you start to appreciate a car design that fits in with other cars in the normal flow of day to day traffic. i'm not sure if your R33 is your daily driver or not but im guessing it is. i had a 40th anni like yours. i was sick of people pointing and staring at me in traffic everyday. you get over the attention eventually. its just a stage that we all go through. i would recommend you go take one for a drive. you will be very surprised.

lets agree to disagree then. you can keep your 12 year old R33 and i'll keep my MY09 WRX. i wasn't evangelizing anything. just adding to the first post in this thread for all other people out there that haven't had the opportunity to share the same experience. my car definitely ain't no revelation let me tell you now. in case that's what your thinking.

thats not the angle i was taking at all just giving an opinion from someone thats been in all of your shoes not so long ago. looks are too subjective anyway. i wasn't boasting about the looks of the new WRXs. im talking purely about the cars performance. in the 4 years iv been on these forums, there have been that many threads boasting "Which model looks better??? the R33 looks like a boat, the R32 looks too old and dated, R34 boxy ugly interior etc etc" so even skyline owners reckon other skylines look shiit. but again. all in the eye of the beholder. and there have been a lot of these threads over the years.

and i'm having my car flashed by Chiptorque via Ezyflash. for $1095 the gains above standard 20-25kw at all four wheels WITHOUT an exhaust. the tuning capabilities of these cars are also very impressive.

i will admit i am a MY09 WRX driver and i did used to own a 200kw 98 40th anniversary R33 GTS-T prior so this is coming from someone that has owned both. but i did drive the 08 Sti before i test drove my MY09. straight line speed the WRX is 1/10th slower from 0-100 and down the quarter compared to the Sti (5.4 0-100 to 5.3 0-100 quarter mile 13.4 compared to 13.3) they do share the same turbo the VF52 only the Rex runs slightly lower boost and seat of the pants they felt just as quick as each other i could not tell the Sti was 1/10th faster in the straight than the rex. in a straight line the evo IX (which i was considering up against the MY09 Rex) was slower than both in a straight line. reason why i went the Rex over the Evo was simply because i never saw myself going to the track, and for the same money i was buying an older car with less technology, a bumpier daily ride and similar attention to what i used to get in my skyline (which looked over the top and was part of the reason why i got rid of it). and in the 6 months i'v had my rex the performance for the street is really amazing. the grip defies physics. and the new technology in these newer cars really makes a huge difference to the overall cars performance. my Rex has 195kw which is the same power that Stis used to produce up until 2006 (only in a lighter body than the Sti) so the launch off the line is out of control. literally all 1400kgs leaping forward off the line in one motion is an unreal feeling that everyone should experience at least once in their lives. IMO AWDs in general are a lot more fun than RWD. and i have driven both. there is so much more available grip. exit speeds out of corners are rediculously fast. and they corner with so many more Gs than a RWD car that you can simply chuck it into any corner with so much confidence they are a lot less involving and a lot less challenging. these new AWDs are no revelation at all but i will say go and test drive one if you are interested in buying one. and with a simple chiptorque/ekutek remap (flash of factory ECU) they respond very well to mods. they are literally point and shoot. which is part of the reason why they make such an excellent performance daily driver. a lot of people ask me to compare the ride of my old R33 (sway bars, tein coil overs, strut bars, bushes, buddy club P1 racing wheels with Toyo tyres) to my new rex. and to put it simply. there is no comparison. the WRX is in a completely different league. its wet weather grip is almost as good as its dry grip WHICH IS FKN SCARY AS HELL AND DEFIES ALL PHYSICS. and my rex isn't even the Sti version. in the pouring rain corners that i would normally be hitting in my skyline at about 40-50kms/hr i could take at 80-90 km/hr and STILL no tyre slip. wet weather, dry weather, uneven mountain roads, uneven surfaces (in particular Sydney's shitty roads) AWD is king.

yallah emshey biyada habibi sickest dose eva bro

shitload of power. light car. and enough grip to get it off the line quick enough. AWDs are synonymous for the feeling you have described. they have enough grip to jump out with urgency, reasonably light and the jap AWD variety aren't too $$$ to make the necessary power. i have a friend with just under 300kw at the rear in a S15 silvia. great car. intense in gear. but off the launch its hopeless. tyres/camber/suspension/lots of practice has to be perfect to get it off the line with intense G Force. of course more $$$ machines will do it but i take it you are talking street legal/driveable?

i wouldnt be dissing the new gen WRXs for a street oriented car they're a lot quicker than what people think. motor mag recently did an article on the MY09 the car reeled off 0-100 in 5.6, 13.6 quarter and a 1 min 11 around wakefield ALL IN THE WET. for a stock standard car the thing is fast. i had a Gtech in my R33 and these straight line times are definitely not a myth the car launches extremely hard when you get it right. its not a hardcore track car definitely wasn't intended to be so quick around a track as its design purpose is more for day to day pracitcality and street use (hence why i bought one). but you can't argue with the facts. i was going to buy an evo 9 however the WRX was better in stock form in every single aspect bar the suspension. the interior in the EVO 9 is still so shiit and wasn't a huge "upgrade" from my R33 interior which was a big turn off. suspension in the 9 was still hard, there is no sunroof option too, plus buying an older car thats been thrashed for the same money didnt gel well in my books. but for me the cars only pitfall being the suspension is actually a plus in my case. i like the softer suspension for day to day use. i got over the hard suspension in my skyline (also a daily driver). i had no intension for any track work at all with this new car. for the street the rex has rediculous performance both handling/engine. only notice its suspension/braking faults when you hit the track which will most likely never happen for me. dont buy one if you do intend on doing a lot of track work but its good to know it can hold its own. an evo X VS MY08 Sti comparison last year the 08 Sti with the same driver managed 1:09 in the DRY at Wakefield. so the soft wrx sedan can definitely hold its own if need be. not trying to defend my purchase just relaying the facts. but back on topic X 2 the yellow GTR seems very cheap. in the couple years i was looking for them there were some cheaper GTRs (and by cheaper i mean there was a 10 grand difference between stock standard examples with the same k's, year etc) but i would'nt be holding my breath for the inspection. my advice find one thats as stock standard as possible then have it inspected. a lot of imports are also dressed down (parts removed) during the importation process so the car's former life is very hard to read even with an inspection. i fell into this problem with my R33.

here is my old car fluttering and doing its thing. fluttered the entire two years that i had it. absolutely no damage to the car/turbo whatsoever. it fluttered so loud because of numerous induction mods and very high boost. factory blow off valve gave up but replaced with an aftermarket plumb back.