Not Impressed

[Driftit]

I got my new Altezza a week ago. Freshend it up from its trip from its Homeland and had it complied. Been driving it around a bit and I have not much to say really. It is a great looking car and very comfy to drive. But where the hell is the 220BHP???? Over rated if you ask me. I was expecting alot more. Prob my fault as I think I expected to much from the Family sedan.

Such a shame they didn't come out with a 2ltr Turbo 3SGTE motor. Would make it a much more exciting car. I am now going to sell it and buy another 180SX. Wouldn't mind another Altezza to get to work and back though. They give such a nice ride making it great to head from Town to Howick each day. Would get an Auto though.

[frylai]

I got my new Altezza a week ago. Freshend it up from its trip from its Homeland and had it complied. Been driving it around a bit and I have not much to say really. It is a great looking car and very comfy to drive. But where the hell is the 220BHP???? Over rated if you ask me. I was expecting alot more. Prob my fault as I think I expected to much from the Family sedan.

Such a shame they didn't come out with a 2ltr Turbo 3SGTE motor. Would make it a much more exciting car. I am now going to sell it and buy another 180SX. Wouldn't mind another Altezza to get to work and back though. They give such a nice ride making it great to head from Town to Howick each day. Would get an Auto though.

The car that you had might had a hard life from the previous owner, its 210bhp for man and 200 bhp for auto...a litre litre turbo twin vvt-i has never been and will never be a Toyota Thing, it will give the engine too much pressure IMO, good luck on selling because you were going to sell it anyway...

Matt :D

[4ROLLN]

yeah i was exactly the same as you as I had previously owned a 1997 evo 4 running 15-16 psi, i was intially disappointed with the altezza untill one after noon me and a mate went out for a spin on some long straights and after redlining it through every gear, we both were shocked to just how damn quick it was!!!!!

I myself find it pretty slow around town as you cant really rev it out, and the real power is in the 5500 - 7500 rev zone and particularly the 7000 rpm zone. So my advice to you is that they are a nice car to drive around but you need to drive it on the open road to find out what everybody is talking about.

In general I would say an altezza's place is on the open road, not around town and as most people drive it around town, people dont understand why they are so highly talked about for their power.

.......Hayden

[Jase]

i agree with hayden..

drive it like a integra typeR, rev it hard man

going down in power from a turbo car to a NA car, takes some time to get used to and to "forget" what turbo power is like, i guess, hahah

VVTi kicks in at around 5000 ay? maybe you should only change gear after that point :--p

[Gavin_S]

I'm pretty happy with my humble 6cyl,really.....

[Hoon]

I got my new Altezza a week ago. Freshend it up from its trip from its Homeland and had it complied. Been driving it around a bit and I have not much to say really. It is a great looking car and very comfy to drive. But where the hell is the 220BHP???? Over rated if you ask me. I was expecting alot more. Prob my fault as I think I expected to much from the Family sedan.

Such a shame they didn't come out with a 2ltr Turbo 3SGTE motor. Would make it a much more exciting car. I am now going to sell it and buy another 180SX. Wouldn't mind another Altezza to get to work and back though. They give such a nice ride making it great to head from Town to Howick each day. Would get an Auto though.

I also hear what you are saying. My last toy was a S4 Rx7 with TO4B turbo and stage 2 porting etc and going back to any N/A car was a real dissapointment.

I first went for the Altezza for the good looks and comfort .

I found it took a while to learn how to drive it properly to get the power out of it with the 6 speed, with the power characteristics of the 3SGE theres no way I would want an auto.

you are right, I also think they should have come with a 3SGTE. Im going to look into a MR2 engine for the rods, crank, pistons, turbo exhaust manifold and turbo etc, if it will all fit in nicely then hopefully it may save some money. Has anyone else looked into it?

[franco]

Agreed - it took me a few days to "learn" how to drive it (harder, harder). Around town in does seem meek, though I'm guessing this is probably a torque thing. I ride motorcycles and the torque and power differences between two simarly displacement motors (ie a 600cc inline 4 vs a 650cc V-twin) is huge. The inline 4's have to rev quite high before the performance sings (and man, they DO sing). Whereas the V-twins have heaps of low-down and mid-range grunt. A whole other bunch of factors contribute to these characteristics (weight and balance, gearing etc etc).

On the open road, I discovered my 'tezz liked to sing in the high RPM's, with it's low and midrange performance being fairly ordinary. Above 4-5K RPM it like picks up it's skirt and goes like stonk, and I generally enjoy it more than my previous ride (Legacy GT). And being n/a I also find it's not as thirsty as my previous gas guzzling twin turbo.

Horses for courses as the 'ol cliche goes...

[Driftit]

Ah good. So it isn't just me. I think I will give her a good rev out. I haven't been on the open road or anywhere that I can really give it some safely.

[greeneyes]

Come out to Beachlands for the Waitangi day meet and maybe we could slip off to Kawakawa Bay for a quick try of the twisty country roads...

or we could go out from Howick to Miranda and across via Hunua to set out a nice rally for Lexus Club members...

or you could pop down to Rotorua with me for a day via some roads you have never seen, ones with no white lines and the speedo needle hanging off the end of the dial...

[Turbo tezza]

I got my new Altezza a week ago.  Freshend it up from its trip from its Homeland and had it complied.  Been driving it around a bit and I have not much to say really.  It is a great looking car and very comfy to drive.  But  where the hell is the 220BHP????  Over rated if you ask me.  I was expecting alot more.  Prob my fault as I think I expected to much from the Family sedan.

Such a shame they didn't come out with a 2ltr Turbo 3SGTE motor.  Would make it a much more exciting car.  I am now going to sell it and buy another 180SX.  Wouldn't mind another Altezza to get to work and back though.  They give such a nice ride making it great to head from Town to Howick each day.  Would get an Auto though.

I also hear what you are saying. My last toy was a S4 Rx7 with TO4B turbo and stage 2 porting etc and going back to any N/A car was a real dissapointment.

I first went for the Altezza for the good looks and comfort .

I found it took a while to learn how to drive it properly to get the power out of it with the 6 speed, with the power characteristics of the 3SGE theres no way I would want an auto.

you are right, I also think they should have come with a 3SGTE. Im going to look into a MR2 engine for the rods, crank, pistons, turbo exhaust manifold and turbo etc, if it will all fit in nicely then hopefully it may save some money. Has anyone else looked into it?

Yea, i'm currently in the process of rebuilding my engine.

It has a td04h greddy turbo kit.

Putting 3s-gte pistons in it to drop compession down to 9:1.

Only gonna be running about 7 psi.