Does anyone know why the tC only came out with a 160 hp and with the choice of the Camry engine? Is it because the car's weight needs more torque out of a bigger 4 cyl engine. When it first came out I thought it would at least have more power than the Celica GTS or possibly would had shared the same engine. Instead, they came with a Camry engine. Not saying its bad, but couldn't they had tweaked the engine a bit more to get more power?

 

Yes. The only other choices were the Echo or the Corolla motor. Both would've made the tC as fast as a school bus.

The Celica GTS motor was only good for a "light" body car since without lift, it's as gutless as a Corolla. The Camry 4 banger also has a higher tuning potential than the ZZ. I think the stock internals are good for atleast 400hp.

Toyota could, but it would've cost you more money. Scion = best bang for the buck. Keep in mind that the cheapest Celica (crank windows, wheel covers) sold for the same price as a Scion tC (not Spec). The tC offered more for your money. To get a Celica with sunroof, power windows, 17in rims, ignition security (with a Corolla engine)... would cost you atleast $20,000.

The Celica was a great car, but it was severely overpriced. I was at Longo Toyota years ago and I saw a brand new Celica GTS with a sticker price of $24,600. For that price, I could've gotten a WRX, SRT4, RSX-S... cars that perform better for around the same price.

 

lol, I guess Toyota wanted to save money by using the Camry motor instead of spending a fortune trying to develope a newer and beefier engine. Which reminds me, the rumor that Japan was developing a brand new Celica with a 2.4 liter making around 250 hp. If that comes, then I wonder if US Toyota would think about switching to a higher performance engine like that on a future tC. I'm dreaming about that. Don't think it will happen though.

 

yeah right, heres a pic of the new celica!

 

i see nothing wrong with the 2az-fe. from a technical point of view, you'd be surprise how much engineering features that toyota crammed in designing it that would put it on par and on some aspects, others in its class to shame. lets take a look on some of these other engines (galant, accord, and altima).

on mitsubishi's 4g69, you get a very, very heavy engine for the displacement it has, partly due to it being made of mostly cast iron, and for being the second biggest of the four on this list. on top of that, it's SOHC layout has no variable valve timing on its exhaust side. The sirius engine just really loves to chug gasoline if you thought the tC's gas mileage bad, and it's actually kind of limited in making power for the latter two designs it incorporates. this same engine is found on the 06+ Eclipse GS, a car that its chassis is based off the galant. (surprise! and you thought the tC was alone in being related to a sedan relative. Avensis anyone?).

for honda, there are quite a few models of the k series, but we'll compare the k24a4 to the 2az-fe, which is found on 05 and older accords. this engine was built around for gas economy by a 4 valves deactivation for 1 valve on each cylinder below 2200rpm. so it does it gas mileage job fairly well but at the cost of having any real aggressive cam profile on its intake valves. it has none on the exhaust valve. so, you may ask, what's the gimmick? well, this all translate to slow power build up compare to the other two mentioned above. the 4g69 really starts to pick up @ 3500rpm. for you guys, since i don't have a tC (but i have sister who has a camry) and by reading some dyno charts on fujita and injen websites, you guy's vvt-i kicks in around 3500rpm as well? anyway what im saying is, there is no kick for the k24a4 (so don't worry about the i-VTEC since its not what it is). however, the accord's prettier cousin, the tsx, uhm... yah, i won't go there.

moving on

ahh.. the qr25de. you know, i'd really like to say something nice about nissan because they do have some really nice engines for their v6 models, but the qr25de just isn't that fun to have. although it's a 2.5L and it makes the most horsepower out of the four at stock form, it just isn't boost nor mod friendly. its the valvetrain that doesn't shine too bright because of the requirement to replace the valve springs and bucket in order to make decent boost before swapping out the cams, or else you run into having an unstable chunk of metal made into bomb. the cvvt cross over kicks in at 5000rpm. when the redline is at 6500rpm. so, i wonder, what's the point of a late power delivery if all any. you find this engine in a sentra se-r or v-spec, and oh yah, the fun thing about this engine is that it has a history of unreliability. *cough*pre-catalystinjestion*cough*

HrrmrRMrm, man i gotta stop cut back on eating those delicious kittens.

 

vvt-i doesn't kick in like vtec, it is always on and adjusting, but yeah, 3000 rpms is where the engine starts to wake up and makes alot of its peak torque there on the way to 4100 rpms where it makes 163 lb-ft.

 

well, nowadays, pretty much all of the newer engine designs from japanese car makers always adjust itself. the 2az-fe does it on both its intake and exhaust valves where else the others focus just on the intake. pretty much, the highly regarded "camry engine" flows better than its leading counterparts.

 

My reply as to not using the Celica GT-S engine is simply torque. If I recall it still had the same torque number as the Corolla/base Celica just the horsepower increase with the help of Lift. At least having the 2AZ-FE doesn't make the car that much of a punk on the street and the displacement is a good thing for forced induction.

 

no replacement for displacement.

 

Scion tC weight/hp ratio = slow.

The 2az has 33% more displacement than the 2zz, so of course it will be more powerful when boosted. You guys are lucky to have torque. We don't feel it until 7,000+ RPM's, right up until our 8,400 RPM fuel cut. But you have to realize that this is the nature of all high revving engines.

Too bad your cars weigh so much. If it weighed 2,500 lbs like my GTS, and you guys ditched your stupid emanages for ECU's that would allow you to tune VVT-i, tC's would SERIOUSLY fly.

 

well, we have the aem f/ic that can tune vvt-i, and there is also greddy v-manage and camcon and such, so we can tune vvt-i. oh, and the aem standalone ecu from dezod. yeah, we that that vvt-i thing pretty much down...

 

haha, you think scion tC is slow? you should see how fast the eclipse GS go. weighing in at 3325 lbs (for the 07+ with sunroof), they get a power to weight ratio of 0.0495hp per lb. if you look at the scion tC with its 2905 lbs, they make 0.0554hp/lb. that's really d*** good. and from speaking from experience, the other closest rival car before its ended production lifetime was the base rsx. it had a slightly higher p:w ratio at 0.0567hp/lb, but ill tell you, the poor torque really does show how much the car struggles and the only thing keeping an rsx barely on par would be its low 2734lbs WITH I/H/E. which is, unfortunately, does make me sad at times. so they say, the tC will give its run for the money it costs.

 

1) What percentage of you guys plunk down the money for ECU's that actually allow you to tune VVT-i?

2) How many Scion tC's have the v-manage? If I'm not mistaken...it's only available for the EVO and STI here in the US...

A lot of the boosters here I see use the emanage, or the AEM f/ic piggyback that doesn't look like it can tune VVT-i. I know the AEM standalone EMS, the Hydra, ad such can tune VVT-i for you guys.

 

AEM f/ic can tune vvt-i.

as for greddy v-manage, there is a dyno on here somewhere where a n/a tc netted 12 whp. depends on if that type of gain is worth it to you. tuning vvt-i without lift doesn't yield much of a gain.

that is why most just tune the fuel and ignition timing when boosted. it gets the job done.

 

Should've used the Echo motor! All 108 horses, hell yeah!

Seriously though, my Echo hauled áss because I had it down to just under 2000lbs. With 108hp base, that's an awesome power-to-weight ratio. It had essentially the same ratio as the tC.

 

hehe, now only t if it had an heart of a camry. it would be a serious beast and sleeper. i like to see the echo's victims expression when it hauls butt.

 

*watching

 

The Echo was fun. I could take Civics , Sentras, Corollas, other little cars. It had awesome torque in the lower range but it was lacking in the high-end. I was always first off the line but I couldn't keep up at high speeds.

 

it's only too bad they really look ugly. i have a friend with a tercel who gave me ride home one day. it wasn't the cleanest or nicest car, but it sure drove well. there was a stretch of road on the way, and he wot it to about 80. heh, much fun.

 

I had my Echo up to 105 but that's where it tops out - not because of a limiter, but because it just runs out of energy.

Pics: http://www.amecipizzaandpasta.com/echotint.jpg

Yeah, it does look kind of wack.

I'll take this one any day: http://www.amecipizzaandpasta.com/my_tc_1.jpg