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      10-05-2018, 11:07 AM   #999
Viffermike
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mkoesel View Post
You are not the first to make such comments.

So, the Nissan 370Z has been on the market for 10 years. It is a two seat Japanese sports car like the new Toyota Supra, is about the same size, makes about as much power, weighs about the same, and is in fact priced quite a bit less than the Supra is expected to be.

Have you ever considered one? Owned one? If not, why not?

I am trying to understand why the Supra is so attractive to someone who has an M240i while the 370Z has not been.
I'll answer this as best I can, since I've owned/own the following cars:
- 1976 280z
- 2009 370z Touring
- 2015 2 Series (228i)
- 2018 718 Cayman

And had friends when I was young who owned three different generations of Supras (including the original) that I had the good fortune to drive at one time or another.

First point: The 370z's aim was not to be a driver's car. It was to be a modern version of the original 280z -- which was a powerful and good-handling car for the time, but not a great one.
On its face, that would appear to fall in line with the 'like an old Supra' argument as inspiration for the upcoming one. But as is clear now, that is not a primary goal for the new Supra because the old Supra's goal was never to be a driver's car.
That the new Supra's benchmark is a Porsche -- and I bet BMW had as much to do with that as Tadao did -- and that the primary goal is for it to have world-class handling is an opposition to the stated purpose of all three cars mentioned above.

Second point: Handling frequently begets power. Yes, there are cars that have gobs of both -- but more frequently, the best-handling cars are not the most powerful cars. Why is this? Because lots of power has to be applied to the ground to be used, or the 'handling' suffers. This is particularly true of RWD cars, as many of us know.
So why should a car (the new Supra) that has a stated primary goal of being one of the best-handling cars available HAVE to have 400+ HP? Answer: It doesn't, and to many, it shouldn't. If it did, it wouldn't be using a ZF8, I can guarantee you that ... which brings me to my next point:

Third point: Those who talk horsepower and horsepower only in modern cars are simpletons. Why do I say this? Because it's torque that matters more in a street car. VW, Porsche, M-B, Audi, and BMW all understand this, as do many other European makers -- and the Japanese are coming around on it.
I bring this up for three reasons:
- Because one of the best things about the 370z was its torque output, not its horsepower output. Same goes with the 2 Series cars, 4-pot and 6-pot alike. Same goes with the 718. Simply put: In the right hands, torque frequently augments great handling. Horsepower rarely does.
- Torque is the biggest performance advantage of a hybrid powertrain. (Yes, there will be a hybrid Supra.) Horsepower, not so much.
- Torque can make a lighter car feel more powerful horsepower-wise than it really is. I can't tell you how much joy I felt outrunning P-cars in my li'l chipped 1.8T 2002 GTi way back when ... or outlapping motorcycles with nearly twice as much HP as my SV650 track bike.

The 370z is not a fair comparison to make to the new Supra. Yes, there are similarities. But the end goals for those cars were/are very different, IMHO.
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