In this deep dark time of austerity, where street lights are switched off at night and bins are only collected every second millennium because no one has any money, merger between two companies makes financial sense. No more so than in the motoring world, were the increasing cost of driving is making it impossible for manufactures to shift any of their new cars. Combining forces and ultimately assets, to work on joint projects in order to make an extra bit of cash is a jolly good idea. The latest company or should I say companies to join the likes of Fiat, Chrysler, Nissan, Renault and the whole of the VW Audi group in a joint project is Toyota and Subaru with the long awaited FT-86 and BRZ concepts.
Toyota FT-86
Toyota and Subaru in recent years have had a pretty dismal track record when it comes to exciting new cars. Toyota killed off the MR2, Celica and Supra, opting instead to produce stuff like the clever but utterly lacklustre Prius and totally un-urban Urban Cruiser. Subaru also seemed keen to kill off any macho reputation they once had, by turning the Impreza from burbling rally legend into an awful hatchback to try and take on the might of the Focus and Golf. So I think it goes without saying that the motoring world gave a collective sigh of relief when it became clear that the fruits of the Toyota/Subaru partnership would be a sports car, not a hum drum eco box.
So on to the sparse but very intriguing details. The Toyota FT-86 and Subaru BRZ will essentially be the same car in different states of tune with differing badges and wheels to distinguish between the two. More is known about the Toyota thanks to the link on their website, and its appearance in the Gran Turismo 5 Playstation game. The engine is a Subaru developed boxer unit mated to a six speed manual sending power to the back wheels through a limited slip differential (good start in my opinion). All the oily bits will be set as low and as close to the middle of the car as possible, so it should be quite an agile and well balanced little coupe. It will develop roughly 200bhp and weigh not much more than a postage stamp, adding to the speculation that it should be quite handy when confronted with a nice piece of tarmac. In terms of cost the Toyota will be the cheaper of the two sister cars at around 20k, not bad value for what sounds like an awesome little package. The Subaru BRZ is the more elusive of the two cars, all that’s known is it will cost a little bit more, probably 25k and for that money it is likely to come with a horsepower figure closer to 300bhp. However one thing that is certain is that there will be no fabled Subaru 4WD system, like the Toyota it too will be RWD.
Both cars get there official release at the Tokyo Motor show in November, so we don’t have long to wait to see what the production versions of both cars will look like. However, we can presume the Toyota won’t change much from the FT-86 concept. It has a classic coupe profile, long, low nose rising to a higher wide rear. A wide air intake and what look like gills with running lights at the front combined with flared arches make it look particularly aggressive. At the rear twin exhausts, boot spoiler and a rear diffuser help set the car off.
The world awaits the official release of both the Toyota and Subaru, however based on what we can see of the Toyota and read about both cars I think they will go some way to resurrecting both companies rather bland brand image of late. It is also superb that in a time of little money and avid environmentalists two companies can come together, disregard current ideologies and build a fun, good looking, petrol powered, manual, RWD sports car. Well done “Tobaru”!
