If that what the MR2 is headed for, they should call it something else. The Spyder went way off course as it was. It was fun to drive, but seriously underpowered. 140 hp/125ft. lbs tq...phht!Thats what I imagine this new one to be.
I think Creeps228 said it best.
Grinding enamel a number of years, digesting endless number of things Toyota did on the Mk III MR2 variant, which really irritated us...
Playing ball with Ponch and John... Exposed taillights and headlights so gargantuan, the fattest, laziest patrol officer on God's green acre couldn't possibly miss with the Laser, from 600 meters with doughnut in one hand, and a six-pack tummy-full of his favorite beer.
Major oversight: Door-pull on the Mk III is fundamentally flawed... impedes the driver's left leg; impounds the driver's left pared appendage, in the wheel-whel; impossible for the driver to extract his feet from the foot-whel, penultimate to high speed frontal impact (e.g., highest femur rating in the MR-2 family).
Thing that bugged me most about the Mk III MR2 wasn't the big things; it was the little things Toyota did which put me off; put a sour taste in my mouth... Sequential boy-racer six-speed auto-tranny, they engineered the linkage ass-backward: forward pull for downshifts, backward pull for up-shifts... exactly the opposite what it was, on every single Lola or Reynard on the CART-PPG grid.
Why no cruise control with the 5-speed gearbox?
Fiat's transverse mid-engined X-19 was copied, for the MR2 MkI variant; Ferrari's transverse mid-engined 348, their Mk II variant. Key distinction, cheap facsimile of Porsche's Boxster, discernible architectural features inherently prerequisite only to engineering of longitudinally mounted mid-engined vehicles mindlessly imported, combination affected would become redundant, faux stylistic eyesores hallmark to the transversely mid-mounted Mk III MR2 ultimately evolved it up the wrong branch of the decision tree, to become the butt-ugliest bastard of the MR2 family.
Very reason coach builders specify a transversely mounted mid-engined monocoque, would be (1) low polar moment of inertia whilst (2) maintaining practical aspects of production and utility (e.g., minimal adequate space, for cargo), at minimum efficient scale. That the Mk III has absolutely no utility, proved a signal indication the guy who penned the Mk III variant had no regard with respect to intellectualizing any aspect of the evolution of mid-engined vehicles.
A designer merely copying.
Lack for utility the consumer is seasoned to otherwise correlate, with a high horsepower offering; low horsepower, low utility, to offerings inexorably effeminate. Egregious insult to its MR2 fraternity, so little horsepower for the Mk III variant in tandem with scant utility implied, beyond any inkling of doubt, the Mk III was conceived to be specifically intended, for 23 year old girls gone wild.
Not us...
Playing ball with the insurance industry: Lack for performance or utility, paltry 137 horsepower Mk III variant indicative of Toyota saying, "... here you go, Girls; come get your new MR2," guaranteed a gender specific slap in the face for every hairy chested level-5 driver who proudly boasted a heavily modified Mk I or Mk II variant, in their garage.
Clumsy aloof Toyota wonders why everyone in sports car culture harbors ever increasing contempt toward them? In spite of the 1.5 billion bux it pisses away every two years, on Formula 1, care to know why FiA's race stewards tee-off so eagerly, unremorselessly on Toyota, with penalties every which way from Sunday, every single chance they get? NASCAR -- likewise?
Care to know why Toyota is so unloved in motorsport, everywhere they go?
It is not what they do, on-track, so much as is, what Toyota ultimately doesn't do with their motorsport -- off-track. Why even be in Formula 1, laden corporation executives and mid-level enterprise managers who fundamentally disdain high performance automobiles? Why even be in NASCAR, when the very thing they fundamentally disdain is high displacement powerplants, in their production sedans?
Playing ball with everyone but us, nobody ever bothered admonish Toyota, during its formative years, to "dance with the ones who brung ya."
Humblemost apologies... call 'um like I see 'um: Outside-looking-in, even the most unseasoned of Toyota watchers would inevitably have no choice but concede the point, senior Toyota designers are likely yes-men, little clout, heavily rewarded for loyalty and observance of prescribed doctrine at the expense of fundamental scholastic automotive design principle. Transitive preference logic strongly implies Toyota likely constitutes an awful, bleak, frustrating, inhospitable environment for creative, independently minded people.
Antithesis of the very mentality prerequisite to success, in Formula 1...
The very people despised most in motorsport, Toyota has evolved to become an otherwise wonderful place to work for yes-men, dittoheads, copycats and intellectual frauds whom have no compunction whatsoever copying their contemporaries; sinning on their science.
I would highly recommend Toyota senior staff, with utmost impunity, toss that MR2 Mk III designer under the bus... take their generation four MR2 as seriously as they once did, my Supercharged MR2 of yore (e.g., a pure performance mid-engined hybrid; world's first driver discretion steering wheel activated KERS).
I don't see a significant, universally acclaimed, noteworthy MR2 in Toyota's future. Yet another whimsical, silly, faux MR2 I do -- Scion's.
Acknowledged,
~ Sammy
