John C

—by Jonathon Klein

Sometimes I love rumors, sometimes I hate rumors. It all depends on whether or not I feel that they actually have some sort of actual merit or grains of truth in them. Most do not, but then there are some that just offer the smallest shred of possibility in a whole mess of bull____. This rumor is definitely that, mostly bull____, but with a portion that’s actually possible.

Enter the next generation Toyobaru twins. Best Car, a Japanese publication have stated that their latest information on the next gen twins is that the cars will be powered by the STI’s 2.5L turbo charged engine and will deliver around 300hp. Also that the car will forgo the RWD only platform and become AWD sent to the wheels through only an 8 speed paddle shift transmission.

Let’s dissect this a bit, first let’s cut out all of the bs. It won’t be AWD. Akio Toyoda has stated in the past that the coupe will always be RWD. He likes it that way, and it’s more sporting that way. Then the whole automatic transmission. Again, bull____. It will never only be an automatic when more than half Toyota’s sales are stick shift.

Now here is where we get into the murky waters of what could possibly be true. While I doubt Toyota would drop the new STI’s engine into the car, just based on how old the design is, I could see the twins getting the new WRX’s engine. It’s about the same as the twins engine, just with a turbo charger attached to it. It still can be mounted super low in the car for better center of gravity, and is an all new power plant that the companies needs to use in order to spread out the R&D costs. 300hp also isn’t that far off from what the engine makes now, and with some small tweaks, that would be easily done.

I love my FR-S. It’s a brilliant car, but I will admit that I would love some more horsepower. I sincerely doubt that most of this is actually true, but there are small little kernels of possibility to be found here. We will just have to wait and see on whether or not any or some of these rumors actually come true.