I was in the right place at the right time. I saw a high 7sec Supra race a Turbo T. Both cars were in a 7-11 and the guy in the Turbo T was in his 50s and the original owner of the car. It served as a daily driver for him for 19 years. He bought it new in May 1988. It was gold color. It was a base model with just the turbo charged powertrain. He was there picking up a six pack, the guys in the Supra and his buddies ranged in age from early 20s to early 30s.
The Supra had a fully built race motor setup, price tag $54k. I'm guessing the owner, in his 30's still lives with his parents. Either that or he is single makes a 6 figure salary. He was all to eager to let everyone know, including a couple teenage girls how much he spent on it. The Supra had an 88mm turbo and when NOS for spooling the turbo when at the strip. Now I will say this, it was a beautiful setup and a beautiful car. First really nice Supra I have ever seen in MI.
The Turbo T had a stage 2, with fully ported GN-R heads and all the goodies. Now he told me that he was still running the stock trans and rearend. Of course the transmission had been rebuilt and he had a 3in steel drive shaft on it. Oh and he was running a 76mm turbo. No cage! Total investment, $17k. The owner of the car had at one time worked at Aggressive Performance and was a mechanic by trade and could do most of his own work. He was running a stock ECM and PowerLogger. He was ready to go home as he had it playing with early that evening.
So when the guy popped his hood on his Turbo T, we heard some laugher coming from the groupies around the Supra. Then with laughter one of the younger guys said you want to race? The guy in the T said how much, to my surprise. The Supra groupie said, the value of your car -$500 and everyone of them though it was funny. They never bother to walk over and see what the guy had under the hood. The guy said to them, put another zero on that and lets go. The only thing is, you can only use one power adder. No NOS. The younger guy said, typical POS v8 big block. He said that's not fair your engine has two more cylinders, probably 450ci inches compared to 183ci and plus your probably running a bigger turbo than the Supra. Then the Supra groupie looks at all the people and says see how these old farts are with their big block engines, even with turbos. Still afraid of the worlds most powerful car.
So I asked the question about the Supra's setup and that is when I was told it was a Boost Logic fully built race motor, bored and stroked to 3.4L or 206ci. The guy in the T pulled out the blueprint of his engine. It was a stage 2 3.8L block, bored stroked to 252ci.
So the Supra groupies took a closer look at his car and he started it up, it had a full exhaust and was not in the least bit loud. I said sure sounds like a Chevy big block to me.
So the owner of the Supra said, I don't need NOS to beat a 252ci v6. The guy in the T said, do you have the $5k? He said of course not I don't carry that kind of cash on me. The guy in the T said me either, but I can have it in 10 minutes. The Supra owner said, how about a $100? The guy said, it will cost me that much in gas to race you. So they agreed to $500 and from a dig and as close to a 1/4 mile as we could calculate.
So we found a road that was lightly used and about a mile long. I will say, I don't advocate street racing. I wish this could have taken place at a drag strip, but the Turbo T guy didn't have a cage and said he wouldn't even be able make one pass with his car at the strip.
So the arm drop was race was on, 1987 Turbo - T vs a 2000 Supra. They did their burnouts, the Supra had 325s and the T had 295s. I was a little concerned about the T hooking up. Well he had his suspension dialed in pretty well.
So the fun part. They staged and the arms dropped and that Buick squatted so hard in the rare and launched so hard it was amazing and off the line it wasn't even close. The T smoked him. Then at about 330' - 500' the Supra hit its power band and it took off like a rocket. He nearly caught the T, but the T beat him by 20' or so. It was a great race and an education for these kids who seem to know nothing about the legacy of Buick and their performance engines. I learned something to, a Supra without NOS takes a lot longer to get up and go. In this instance, I think the Supra would have benefited from 76mm turbo. It lagged pretty bad off the line, but the guy was so confident in his car and he honestly believes it is the world's most powerful car.
Great win for the 25 year old 200k plus miles Turbo T.
The Supra had a fully built race motor setup, price tag $54k. I'm guessing the owner, in his 30's still lives with his parents. Either that or he is single makes a 6 figure salary. He was all to eager to let everyone know, including a couple teenage girls how much he spent on it. The Supra had an 88mm turbo and when NOS for spooling the turbo when at the strip. Now I will say this, it was a beautiful setup and a beautiful car. First really nice Supra I have ever seen in MI.
The Turbo T had a stage 2, with fully ported GN-R heads and all the goodies. Now he told me that he was still running the stock trans and rearend. Of course the transmission had been rebuilt and he had a 3in steel drive shaft on it. Oh and he was running a 76mm turbo. No cage! Total investment, $17k. The owner of the car had at one time worked at Aggressive Performance and was a mechanic by trade and could do most of his own work. He was running a stock ECM and PowerLogger. He was ready to go home as he had it playing with early that evening.
So when the guy popped his hood on his Turbo T, we heard some laugher coming from the groupies around the Supra. Then with laughter one of the younger guys said you want to race? The guy in the T said how much, to my surprise. The Supra groupie said, the value of your car -$500 and everyone of them though it was funny. They never bother to walk over and see what the guy had under the hood. The guy said to them, put another zero on that and lets go. The only thing is, you can only use one power adder. No NOS. The younger guy said, typical POS v8 big block. He said that's not fair your engine has two more cylinders, probably 450ci inches compared to 183ci and plus your probably running a bigger turbo than the Supra. Then the Supra groupie looks at all the people and says see how these old farts are with their big block engines, even with turbos. Still afraid of the worlds most powerful car.
So I asked the question about the Supra's setup and that is when I was told it was a Boost Logic fully built race motor, bored and stroked to 3.4L or 206ci. The guy in the T pulled out the blueprint of his engine. It was a stage 2 3.8L block, bored stroked to 252ci.
So the Supra groupies took a closer look at his car and he started it up, it had a full exhaust and was not in the least bit loud. I said sure sounds like a Chevy big block to me.
So the owner of the Supra said, I don't need NOS to beat a 252ci v6. The guy in the T said, do you have the $5k? He said of course not I don't carry that kind of cash on me. The guy in the T said me either, but I can have it in 10 minutes. The Supra owner said, how about a $100? The guy said, it will cost me that much in gas to race you. So they agreed to $500 and from a dig and as close to a 1/4 mile as we could calculate.
So we found a road that was lightly used and about a mile long. I will say, I don't advocate street racing. I wish this could have taken place at a drag strip, but the Turbo T guy didn't have a cage and said he wouldn't even be able make one pass with his car at the strip.
So the arm drop was race was on, 1987 Turbo - T vs a 2000 Supra. They did their burnouts, the Supra had 325s and the T had 295s. I was a little concerned about the T hooking up. Well he had his suspension dialed in pretty well.
So the fun part. They staged and the arms dropped and that Buick squatted so hard in the rare and launched so hard it was amazing and off the line it wasn't even close. The T smoked him. Then at about 330' - 500' the Supra hit its power band and it took off like a rocket. He nearly caught the T, but the T beat him by 20' or so. It was a great race and an education for these kids who seem to know nothing about the legacy of Buick and their performance engines. I learned something to, a Supra without NOS takes a lot longer to get up and go. In this instance, I think the Supra would have benefited from 76mm turbo. It lagged pretty bad off the line, but the guy was so confident in his car and he honestly believes it is the world's most powerful car.
Great win for the 25 year old 200k plus miles Turbo T.