Street/track car...Turbo Miata vs. MR2 turbo
 

I'm at a point where I am really lusting after a turbo car again. I went to a track event yesterday and rode in a turbo MR2 that was incredibly fast and still was on the stock turbo. I'm considering selling my car for one but there's always the option of just turboing the miata.

Here's how I see pros/cons. The miata is lighter and has a better suspension, and is a convertible. It isn't comfortable since I had to put in race seats and it will probably cost 3-4k to turbo it to about 200-225hp from what I can tell. Also it's a pain in the ass using the 3 point belts with the race seats, doesn't have cruise control, power windows, power steering, or working A/C, so getting to track events is sometimes painful.

The MR2 is pretty light (27##) and handles decent stock and has a good bit more power. It's probably only a 2-3k to get one after selling my car, and then upgrading at least the brakes for track duty.

I imagine things will be biased here, but I'm curious what you guys think. My car handles well but it's just slow on track and I'm ready for something a little quicker, yet still reliable and fun.

MR2s are porky little things. 2700lbs, jeez.

Do you have any fab skills? That's going to make the turbo Miata route better beecause it will be a lot cheaper if you can make parts.

I highly doubt you can leave an old high mileage turbo car stock without replacing and upgrading a bunch of things to reliably track it.

That said I love MR2's. Such a great car. Just not something I'd consider tracking over a miata. Miata is cheaper, has cheaper parts, lighter, and easier to work on. Getting 200hp out of one is a piece of cake.

I'd get an mr2 for street/daily driver use. Not track. Just my .02

For cereal. Miata for track whore :D

Miata by far. Cheapness, reliability, ease of work, and above all, SUPPORT! From what I've learned, there's not that many people tracking them, and a forum like this is a huge help which it apparently doesn't have.

clean turbo mr2's are hard to come by and expensive, at least they are around here

Lol @ the poll. This site is not biased AT ALL.

Seriously though, turbo mr2 are amazing. But imo, the turbo miata is a better track car in every way.

The way I'm looking at it is this. There's a MR2 nearby that's 6k, and it needs probably $500 worth of work I'd guess and has had a lot of maintenance done. Then there's turboing my car, which requires a good bit more money. Even if I sold mine for 4.5k I'd still be ahead and have a more comfortable car on the street, where it would primarily be used with only 3-4 HDPE's per year.

Looks like you've got your mind made up already. You're just looking for confirmation;)

I wouldn't give up the convertible aspect. Too nice during the spring and fall. Going fast costs money. Eventually you will see an MR2 at the track that yours could be like, and then it's all over. better brakes, suspension etc. etc. Basing this decision on money when "track" is involved isn't a good idea.

I vote miata. I think you can do a 200hp miata for under 2k if you watch the for sale thread and have patience. Leave suspension alone and get sticky tires.

Alternately, I still believe slow can be fun. Just be the fastest of the slow. Don't get a turbo, and put money into suspension and tires. Maybe a megasquirt to squeak every drop you can out of your naturally aspirated goodness.

Mr3

The miata already has coilovers and newer azenis on the stock wheels, and does well against other slow cars. Even being "king of the slow cars" doesn't do much for me. haha. I'll keep an eye on the classifieds though in case some amazing deal comes up.

Seriously, you are asking such a question on MIATATURBO forum? :noob:

Of course a turbo Miata, but in all honesty, a turbo MR2 has always been one of my "dream cars" in the affordable and realistic category. Nearly bought one once, but talked myself out of it because I knew it would be a money pit... so I bought an RX7 with 200k+ miles on it instead. :giggle: I would still to this day LOVE to own a clean MR2, but finding them like mentioned before is tough. I see this one guys dark grey MR2 turbo every time I go to a friends house. Always shined up nicely, not sure if he ever even drives it. Been tempting to stop and ask if he wanted to sell it and how much if so. More than I could afford, pal. MR2 styling is just so damn sexy, inside and out.

Yeah, I knew it would be biased but I thought I'd get some opinions of guys that have already been down this road and how it's working out.

em r not

Around here clean ones like that go for 7+. Fuck that.
Such a nice car, but like the supra, the clean samples are getting more and more expensive with every year.

3SGTE is a hell of a motor.

no one has brought up that 2nd gen mr2 have a tendency to snap and spin you around.

Try posting this on MR2OC or something and show us what they have to say.

Mr. too

Mr. Takes it in the 2

Turbo MR2 Spyder, yes. :D

This seems like the better option to me as well. I'm no expert, but they weight in at 2,195 pounds, come with a great motor for boosting(celica gts motor), and look pretty good with minor mods/hardtop.

I had a turbo MR2. Built motor running 340 whp @ 15 lbs. The engine bay area was so crammed though. I think it is way easier to do anything on a miata than on that MR2... at least if it is in the engine bay. Had decent suspension, though I must say... I would take the handling characteristics of my miata over it any day.

Though that MR2 was pretty darn fast. Way faster than both miata's. When that turbo spooled, it would put you back in your seat pretty hard.

Overall, I would take a turbo miata over a turbo MR2.

The MR2 I was looking at wasn't as nice as I was hoping it'd be. I'm at the point where I'm still not sure what to do since I don't know if I'll be able to find exactly what I'm looking for unless I build the car myself. I should really just buy a turbo miata that has the options I want that isn't an R package and swap over anything from my current one and sell it. Too much freaking work.

I've worked extensively on a few MR2's (full motor swaps, turbo upgrades, etc), and I would never buy one after having to work on it. Doing anything to the cars is a massive pain in the ass, and there really isn't that much support for them. You have to drop the whole rear of the car to get the motor out, and then you're also dealing with crappy intercooler placement, bad weight distribution, and a coolant routing nightmare.

I swapped my miata motor on the ground in a few hours. Everything is relatively easy to get to and easy to find. If you're into track you are also going to have to expect to do work like this. Make your life easy and don't buy an MR2. Almost any other car would be a better option in my mind.

you're going to hear endless opinions from people here, some dont have experience and others do


mr2 is a good car, but its going to be more expensive in every way. from purchase to tuning, its a more expensive car.. new or used, they've always been more expensive.

with that said, you need to think about what you want. the cars are completely different in too many ways. mid-rear vs front-rear layout, convertible vs t-top, build quality, power... the weight says it all. people spoke truth above though, the motor is fantastic, working on it is not easy and typically involves removal, and cooling and piping are all issues.. ventilation is tough with that car. highly skilled drivers needed to properly control an MR-layout car too.

the miata, we all know.. cheaper in every way, lighter, and therefore handling is also improved. spend some money on better tires (better than azenis).. ide recommend some bridgestone re11 or advan ad08, much better compound. but besides that, proper turbo setup will take proper time, money and engineering. i think people underrate the amount of work a truly reliable and proper turbo conversion really costs.

the way i see it, you're probably better off saving your money and putting it towards an s2000.. better than both cars in absolutely every way.

only reason i dont own an s2000 is because i dont care much for the high rpm powerband, digital cluster, etc etc.. the car just doesnt do it for me. great cars tho.

ps: dont try to combine a street car with a track car, or a daily driver for that matter. buy one car for comfort and reliability, another for fuckin around.

I thought they came with the less powerful 1ZZ? You can swap in the 2ZZ from the Celica easily though. I'd love a turbo MR2 Sypder/MR-S with the 2ZZ-GE. MR-S is also apparently a monster in the handling department. A black MR-S with hardtop and a turbo 2ZZ would be a ton of fun.

Most likely you are correct. Although if doing a swap I think a k20/k24 powered one would be amazing.

Fawk that. I had a '91 MR-2 Turbo and I hated it. That's when I upgraded to my Roadster and boosted that (which is quicker, more agile and stops shorter). The MR-2 is heavy and you can feel it. The suspension geometry it NOT AT ALL a friendly thing. The wheelbase is too short and it creates a snappy chassis. Because of this and the MR setup, driver input for correcting oversteer at speed is very difficult and VERY dangerous. If you can get past the natural instinct to correct like in an FR car then you will increase your chances of walking away inscathed. Correct the same way in an MR-2 as in an FR and you will snap around before you know it, slide out of control and destroy your vehicle. If you are not an experienced driver or have no prior MR platform experience you will not benefit in any way from purchasing an MR-2. We've got a Class-leading racer at our Auto-X/Solo Sprint events with a purpose-built C6 and he's getting walked on by stock RX-8's in his modified MR-2 at the track.

In any case, they are a pain in the ass to work on. The sensors are all crap (which is why everyone swaps to standalone's and GM sensors), as was stated above the intercooler is in a bad spot and that stops you from running high boost, the car is a TANK for its size and it does not handle as well as a Miata/Roadster stock for stock, even slightly modified. Trying to work on anything in the engine bay will force you to swear, bleed and hate yourself for buying it.

This idea reeks of Bad News Bears. Please don't burden yourself by purchasing one.

Have you looked into some of the threads of woe regarding turbo track miatas? In short, it can't be done for under $2000. I voted for slow stock miata track car.

so... tell us, what else do you like about the mr2? :-)

They look nice in my rearview mirror!

i dunno...

something about the motor being able to make 500rwhp without busting up sounds nice.

the sr20det is a good motor
the 3sgte is a very good motor
the bp.. well, its okay i guess

i dunno why people think the miata is such a great handling car. its okay, but i surely dont think its the greatest handling car ive ever ridden in. car flexes a lot and even with rollbar, swaybars and bracing.. a convertible will always be a convertible.

I've no idea where the hell you're getting the 500whp on stock internals claim.
Like those idiots that keep saying a supra 2jz will easily handle 1000whp on stock internals.


A few dyno queens may have hit that number, but that doesn't mean shit.
A miata has hit 400whp on stock internals before: doesn't mean it can run that power for any significant length of time.

I'm not saying the BP is a good engine. Its mediocre. And a 3s is definitely superior. but Its not godly. Neither is the sr or the 2j for that matter.

Who cares about making 500 RWHP? At that point it's completely useless on the street and you just break driveline components if you drag race. Unless you toss 300+ TW tyres on it and drift then it's wasted power.

There's a local guy that just showed up on the scene with a 1100+ RWHP Supra, gutted and caged. Sure, he smokes everyone at the strip, but last time I got to ride in it, WOT led to smoking the tyres and we were doing well over 220 clicks as it was.

The Miata is such a great handling car because of the suspension geometry. I mean, not many car manufacturers design a bumpstop to give you circuit-spec spring rates when you are driving aggressively. Also, how many other cars are unequal length A-arms on all four corners? Out of the box it is a very good handling car. When I got my Roadster (it was stock when I got it) I had faster times on our Auto-X course than in a friend's stock AP1. The only other car that is cheap that I was impressed with (stock for stock) almost the same as my Roadster at the track was an SE3P, which is why I'm on the hunt for one now. Then again, it's been a long time since I've my car has been stock... maybe I just like the sound of the rotary??? Ha ha... don't hate.

The 2JZ would be my engine of choice. If this build goes south I fully intent on forcing a 2JZ-GTE and a GETRAG into my toy car. It will be epic.

That Miata was a 1.8, right? Wasn't that car featured in a magazine and paved the way for the NA-chassis performance scene? That was a long time ago...

Also, the 2JZ was engineered (thanks to the Germans) to withstand 600 hp without any modifications to the bottom end, which includes a very minor buffer zone for cylinder pressure spikes from detonation. The most power I've seen a 2JZ with stock internals make was somewhere shy of 800 BHP. I'll assume it broke because I haven't heard anything of it since then and that guy moved.

im getting it from the various customers of mine over the years who have built up their cars, thats all. im not saying the cars are concrete solid, but in comparison.. toyotas are stronger vehicles than nissans, and i think both are stronger than mazda. i think in terms of build quality, the mazda has to be my least favorite with much left to be desired. does that mean i should sell the car? no, i like the miata because all in all, its a cheap car and the least to worry about when things break. the thing that sucks, however, is that parts are fairly more expensive.


dont look at me, im not a peak HP lover.. all of the cars ive built have been geared toward good response over peak hp, balance being most important.

either way, i think its safe to say that we can all agree that the mr2, supra, miata, 240sx, etc etc.. they're all great cars and all have good capabilities. i'de say its more a matter of preference than anything.

Your simplest reliable forced induction for track use for the miata will be a rotrex. But, I'm biased.

What? Really? No way, man... I thought spending $30K was normal.. bah ha ha ha ha ha.

Balance is by far the most important aspect of any built car, whether it's strictly track or a weekend warrior. This isn't related, per se, but I remember an interview of 2WD off-road trucks and the guy says, "Balance is the most important thing for our trucks, and that balance is heavily reliant on suspension. You can have a 2WD 1500 with factory power and the proper suspension and he will walk all over the 800 HP trucks with OEM suspension all day." Reminds me of the drag racing (gay) vs. Auto-X arguments that are ever apparent where I live. The MR-2 shouldn't be in your list, however, as they require advanced skills and dedication before you will be as efficient in them as any of the others.

Pft! BS. I just enter my car as a GP3 racecar. Guaranteed first place... as long as I complete one lap. Ha ha ha. I would think any FI would be reliable if you can keep your charge temperatures down. If you're going turbo with one of those shitty, threaded manifolds (who invented those?) then all you need is ample support brackets to help decrease the chances of your turbo falling off.

is that USD or canadian? you guys get hosed on everything you buy :-)



you've got your gripes with the mr2, thats all. i have a customers FD at the moment, and while it may handle and look nice, i wouldnt touch the motherfucker. v-mount + rotary turbo + mazda quality? jesus... no thanks.

It's CAD.... and yes, we get hosed... and fisted with both fists without lube... we don't even get a damn wrap around!!

And I like MR-2's. I just don't like working on them and my skill level isn't high enough for me to be efficient on the track behind the wheel of one. I'll stick to FR platforms, ha ha. Ah yes, the rotary..... I'm going to pick up an RX8. Ha ha ha. Don't hate, I've already heard it all.