The latest with my Green BRZ...

"Greenmobile Supremo Commando, BRZ Extrordinare" (jbezugs)
04/24/2019 at 21:40 • Filed to: BRZ, makegreengreatagain

First week back on the road was a rainy one, but the new wheels look ace.

After a long and snowy winter in Canadaland, I am free from the shackles of my trusty beigemobile-now-beater Camry and my BRZ is finally out of hibernation!

I took last week off from work as a sanity break. I figured I could use the opportunity to pull the car out of storage and get a few goodies put on it that I received over the winter break as well. This was a good idea.

Ever since I wrapped the car last year, I’ve been looking for a set of gold wheels to accent the gold colour. I considered plastidipping or powder coating the factory wheels; but by the time you go to the trouble of doing that, it’s almost worth buying a nicer, aftermarket set. Plus, since I am now storing the car for the winter months, it meant that if I keep my OEM wheels on crappy spare tires to store the car on, I can keep my summer tires warm in the house and sell my winter set that I no longer needed.

mmmmm... JDM wheel goodness

I initially found these Gram Lights 57C’s at a price much higher than what I wanted to pay. Eventually however, the seller and I worked out a solid deal and I walked away with them for a song. They were in excellent shape: recently powder coated in the original gold finish and had all new set of all the original stickers from Rays to boot.

Perhaps the best part was that they came with a set of old Falkens mounted: I now had crappy tires to put on my OEM wheels to have rollers for storage, while the still-in-good-shape OEM rubber could get swapped onto these new wheels. I originally was looking for a more aggressive fitting set of wheels (17x9 +35-40), but I’m a sucker for JDM wheels over all else. these in 17x7.5 +48 meant the car wouldn’t look out of place at stock height.

The other item I had on my list over the winter had to get checked off: dealing with the torque dip. The ACE A350 4-2-1 EL header is considered the best header for the FT86 platform. It sounds great, is made well, and provides very impressive gains, most notably in the midrange, where it has a fairly significant advantage in torque compared to 4-1 EL (good peak gains, but most still have a torque dip present) and UEL header designs (good peak gains and no torque dip, but not quite as much midrange torque). Unfortunately, it is ludicrously expensive compared to quality UEL header options (Tomei, Gruppe-S, JDL) that can provide 90% the results for half the money. Problem is, I did not want a UEL header on my car. On 4WD Subaru’s I’m all for the UEL burble, but to me, that sound does not fit the character of the BRZ, being a unique offering within Subaru’s lineup.

I had the self control not to unwrap it until it was time to install it... 4 months after this photo.

Lucky for me, JDL’s new 4-2-1 Long Tube EL header released just before Black Friday. Being a long tube 4-2-1 EL design like the ACE A350, it offered great peak gains, and great sound while having the most torque out of any header design. However, it was much more reasonably priced that the ACE, even with a Cerakote finish to help reduce the heat being radiated from the header into the engine bay. I jumped at the opportunity and picked one up, and had it wait in the box until winter had passed.

So damm pretty...

Well, of course the time had come, so I had the header installed by Touge Tuning and tuned by Sasha at OnPoint Tuning. You may recognize Sasha as the tuning guru from Speed Academy who also built an insanely fast electric Lotus Evora and a 530+ WHP N/A VQ 350Z race car. He’s known as one of the best tuners in Canada for Subaru’s and otherwise, bar none.

!!! UNKNOWN CONTENT TYPE !!!

After tuning my car with the new header, he said that it’s one of the highest HP NA BRZ’s he’s ever had on his dyno. Car pulls strong right to redline and the torque dip is all but gone. These numbers are with the stock overpipe and front pipe still in place, on Petro 94 octane.

For reference, stock BRZ’s/86's have typically made anywhere from 140 to 155hp on Sasha’s dyno whereas on most other dynos, they’ll put down around 165-170whp. Sasha noted that with the stock header and OEM tune, my car would have probably landed at the 155-160whp mark, noting that it was “a very healthy motor”. By my math where the stock 2017 BRZ makes 205hp and 151 lbft of torque, my car now makes 231 whp and 186 lbft of torque at the crank. Not too shabby at all.

As for sound comparisons, here’s my Invidia R400 catback with the stock header:

And now the JDL setup:

Definitely louder when you’re giving it the beans, but while cruising, it remains just as quiet as before (which is to say, almost stock levels of quiet which is where the R400 excels).

EDIT: Here’s some more sound clips, with a lav mic mounted on the rear bumper.

How does it feel? Well, the car feels completely transformed. I was never one to complain about the power of the Toyobaru twins, but the extra power along with the linearity of the power band without the dip is truly, truly life changing; the car feels so much faster now. If you have a BRZ/86 and have been on the fence about doing this, do it. You won’t regret it.

So um. Yeah. Think that’s everything for now! Feels great to be driving this thing again.

DISCUSSION (13)

bob and john > Greenmobile Supremo Commando, BRZ Extrordinare
04/24/2019 at 22:14

I will let the people know, that while the beige supremo Commando may be good at seeing gains, he is not good at seeing other people wave to him when We pass each other on our commute. I swear I’ve seen him like 3 times at the same intersection and he has only seen me once.

The Crazy Kanuck; RIP Oppositelock > Greenmobile Supremo Commando, BRZ Extrordinare
04/24/2019 at 22:27

Also the spectacular plan for Cars & Coffee we have planned. THAT WILL REMAIN A SECRET UNTIL IT HAPPENS.

Distraxi's idea of perfection is a Jagroen > Greenmobile Supremo Commando, BRZ Extrordinare
04/24/2019 at 22:32

Those are some nice wheels. The photos make them look more bronze than true gold, which works well with the green.

My white GT86 envies your polychromacy.

benn454 > Greenmobile Supremo Commando, BRZ Extrordinare
04/24/2019 at 22:55

Looks 90s AF. I dig it.

Greenmobile Supremo Commando, BRZ Extrordinare > bob and john
04/24/2019 at 23:22

This is true. I’m really bad.

glemon > Greenmobile Supremo Commando, BRZ Extrordinare
04/25/2019 at 00:46

Wow, always thought these were nice looking cars, but with the green and gold it looks great. Couldn’t the factory offer a version with that or similar exhaust and get people to quit complaining about the motor plus sell a few more cars? Anyway, you have made a nice package better, congrats.

Greenmobile Supremo Commando, BRZ Extrordinare > glemon
04/25/2019 at 08:47

I imagine they could have, but I’ll never understand why not. From what I’ve heard, its a mix of the engine’s cam phasing and how restrictive the stock header is in its design (emissions regulation limited apparently ).

Thank you!

Tapas > Greenmobile Supremo Commando, BRZ Extrordinare
04/25/2019 at 09:38

The car is Teal-icious!

Glad you did the tune. I had the same complain with Toyo-baru.

Khalbali > Greenmobile Supremo Commando, BRZ Extrordinare
04/25/2019 at 12:26

Love the green, I really want to wrap my next nice car. Did you do it yourself?

Greenmobile Supremo Commando, BRZ Extrordinare > Khalbali
04/30/2019 at 16:52

I’m decent mechanically but have no patience for bodywork. I brought it to Inzen Skin. Their price was very competitive and they did an amazing job. Stand behind their work as well, which is so important with so many crappy automotive wrap places around.

Greenmobile Supremo Commando, BRZ Extrordinare > benn454
04/30/2019 at 16:53

Thank you! Never intended it to be super 90’s but I’ve always loved the 90’s Japanese stuff... Between the wheels and the green colour I can definitely see the sub-conscious 90’s influence without me ever realizing it.

Khalbali > Greenmobile Supremo Commando, BRZ Extrordinare
05/01/2019 at 10:53

https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a27311756/2020-toyota-86-hakone-edition-photos-info/

Jelly?

Greenmobile Supremo Commando, BRZ Extrordinare > Khalbali
05/01/2019 at 15:26

Not jelly one bit; been able to enjoy my BRZ in its green shade long before Toyota took my idea ;)

OK, so maybe that interior makes me a little jelly...