Cubdriver

Very hot car for the money, and my guess is Honda would have added a turbo option if it had not cancelled production due to the Wonderful Recession. What you seem to get with the 911 is a larger engine capable of making torque at a lower peak RPM, and about the same HP. You also get a price tag 3 times as much- but I digress.

wiki on the S2000

Any known problems/ weaknesses with this turbine installation?

JoeyMeatballs

The rear differential, axles and 2nd gear are like glass. Guys making over 400hp have broken 2nd gear mid pull. I don't power shift so I guess that's why I haven't broken mine yet, or just luck.

atr42flyer

that is a sexy *****!

JamesNoBrakes

911s have been engineered to handle decently, but it's not without cost. They are not all-wheel-drive, except for certain models. The fastest models are naturally two wheel drive, but can bite you very badly if you aren't apt at handling them. The all wheel drive models are better in this respect, but the biggest issue is the engine placement and they are always attempting to make up for it with that super wide rear end. Look at the rear tires on a 911, they are absolutely huge, and as the power increases, they get bigger and bigger. They are also getting to the point where other high performance cars are starting to cut seriously into their power to weight and handling advantages, if not totally surpassing them. They are hanging a 3.8L behind the rear axle these days, and the bigger the engine gets, the worse the handling gets.

They are never going to handle as well as more balance cars and those super-wide tires rear, especially on the turbo, S, RS and GT models are killers in terms of mileage (not huge by themselves, but when everything else is drilled down, there isn't much else left and again compared to competitors, it will be hard for them to outperform).

911s don't suck, but they are starting from a disadvantaged design, they've made up for this with more development and design, but they are reaching the limit of what that will do compared to others. It's time to take the cayman chassi, give it a 911esque body, and call it a "911". The cayman outhandles the 911 everything being equal, but porsche intentionally detunes the suspension and messes up the gear ratios to keep it slower than the 911.

The S2000 on the other hand places the engine behind the front axle, which is a darn good place, as is in front of the rear axle. Interestingly, subarus are kind of the opposite of a 911 turbo, all wheel drive with the engine hanging in front of the front axle, which is a reason for their horrendous understeer. It can be designed out with lots of suspension tuning, but again it's starting from something that is far less optimal.

The S2000s big advantage is usually on tracks, where it's power-to-weight and handling allow it to run rings around bigger cars with more power. They often make lots of cars like 911s and 370s look silly, as they hold a line and zip through the turns, gaining time.

As far as the engine, usually you have to revamp the engine and lower the compression to run a turbo, to avoid blowing it up. Also running forged pistons is usually necessary. It requires big injectors, proper cooling (intercoolers, fuel air ratio, radiator, etc), and most importantly, knowledge of how each part affects the other. Don't think that turbo engines don't make a lot of torque. Pressurized air and fuel makes a HUGE amount of torque. My dainty little 2.0L was pushing out 300lb/ft with pretty mild tuning features. This comes on as soon as the turbo hits hard, around 2800-3300rpm or so, and when this hits, it hits like god kicked the car in the rear. Some of these cars rev up so fast and easy that there's no real "turbo lag", but there is that acceleration that just can't be matched with NA engines. Turbos can do some pretty amazing stuff, and unless we are talking about a turbo 911, the torque advantage can easily be with the Honda, especially torque to weight ratio. He's got the NA 911s spanked for torque, even the S model. What you'd notice with a NA engine is that they generally have to rev to pretty high RPM to get max power and torque. Flatter is better, but it can't match how fast the torque rises with a turbo.

The only thing I don't really like is using an S2000 for drag racing, it's just not my cup of tea. Track is fun and it's where a car like that is the most fun. The most practically fun cars are the AWD ones, which can accelerate to usable speeds faster than many others, and they usually hug the corners like crazy in all weather conditions. Much higher HP cars usually get off the line slower and "run down" the slower AWD ones, but that's after you are well past legal speeds.

If you want a porsche because you've always dreamed of owning a porsche, you get a porsche. If you want to win track races and get good at race driving, you get something like a honda S2000.

Cruz5350

Egh it's not as bad as it sounds. I've autocrossed my WRX a couple times and a simple sway bar in the rear pretty much fixed all the understeer. I wouldn't trade AWD for anything and you see the AWD cars lapping much better times than the FWD and RWD classes. Each is their own skill set though and I dig this car a lot. I was on the hunt for a S2K or WRX/STI and just got lucky finding a real nice WRX. Good to see another Import guy on the forums.

badflaps

Outstanding wheels! But looks like a rough ride for mama...

JoeyMeatballs

Yea, looking back I wish I axctually went with a S/C and did HPDE, I dont know how I got this thing to where it's a Drag racing only car. There is now way 600+ HP would do anything for me around a track but kill me. In the future I may turn the boost way down and re-do the suspension and do some HPDE.

FYI, the internals are forged from the factory and you don't need to lower the compression. A few years ago, people would run 3mm spacers to lower the compression, but I run 25lbs on stock 11:1 compression motor , with race gas of course

Cubdriver

I run my all-stock Nissan Frontier pickup truck on pure 87 octane to the grocery store to buy tv dinners all the time, all the time. It's a beast, but somebody's got to do it.

Nice explanation of 911 design flaws, JNB. There was a time that 911s had the best design, but AWD and other technologies have made it obsolete. Honda has another hot car coming back, the Acura NSX. Gonna be expensive...

wiki on the NSX

JamesNoBrakes

I'm looking for a WRX in the next year or so to mod and prep for racing, but it's all a compromise. AWD is good, but sucks a lot of your top end acceleration, so lighter cars with better handling can often handle the turns better if it's dry, and cars with better HP to weight (or even the same or slightly less HP to weight) can out-accelerate them on the straights. In the most extreme cases, the fastest cars are usually RWD for several reasons, AWD drag and weight being the biggest. The handling can be compensated for, just getting stiffer bars will help, but at the extremes it understeers and changing direction with all that weight up front creates a situation that is less than optimal unless there is significant modification. The older Evos were much better "balanced" in this respect. And although I liked AWD handing, a decently low and wide sports car with independent suspension all around can be a blast and stick to the road just as good as AWD with the exception of when you mash the throttle in turns. Some people autocross, but sometimes it's fairly rare for them to get to the level where the machine matters more than the driver, so in this respect it often isn't a huge deal. I wish car manufacturers weren't so conservative in dialing in so much understeer, but it is what it is.

CirrusPilot

Seen your car on s2ki man, looks sick! Cool to see a fellow s2000 driver and aviator!