A supercharger?!
Given all the Subaru componentry inside GT 86/FR-S/BRZ and the Pleiades-logoed carmaker’s long history of turbocharged rally-inspired go-fast sedans, coupes and wagons, it’s hardly surprising that everyone expects a turbo version as a future variant of the Toyobaru sports coupe. Yet, England’s Autocar, in an article by Andrew Frankel, reports that

Chief engineer Tetsuo (sic) Tada says that not only is a supercharged GT 86 envisaged, test cars have already been made and are being evaluated by Toyota Racing Developments (sic), the Japanese giant’s in house tuning division.

Tada-san favours the supercharger approach because it is simpler to achieve than increasing engine size and doesn’t wreck throttle response as turbocharging might. Indeed Toyota says that turbocharging along with four-wheel drive and wide tyres are what make sports cars boring to drive.

Supercharging is also a key competence for TRD which has been offering this kind of forced induction as an aftermarket kit for Toyotas since 1998. He would not be drawn on what kind of power a supercharged GT 86 might develop but Toyota is known to consider the car’s chassis could easily handle an additional 50bhp to go with the 197bhp already generated by its Subaru 2-litre flat four motor

TRD’s most popular supercharger conversion is applied to the American market Tacoma pick up, boosting its 4-litre V6 engine from 233bhp to 301bhp suggesting that a 280bhp GT 86 with, critically, a massive boost in the low down torque the car currently lacks would be easily achieved. Even in the unlikely event that all the modifications added 100kg to the weight of the car, its power to weight ratio would still at least equal that of the 326bhp Nissan 370Z, a car capable of hitting 62mph from rest in 5.3sec and recording a top speed of 155mph. The standard GT 86 needs around 6.8sec and does 143mph. It is not yet known whether, if approved, the supercharged GT 86 would be offered as an aftermarket pack or as a model in its own right.

Although this all sounds feasible and true enough, we should note the Autocar isn’t the most credible of sources, ranking just a bit above their compatriots Auto Express and the Japanese rendering mags such as Best Car in their rumormongering sensibilities. And, please note, Mr. Frankel, that Tada-san’s first name is Tetsuya, not Tetsuo. Also, the “D” in TRD stands for Development in singular, not in plural.

Toyota’s checkered history with supercharging
When looking back at Toyota’s boosted gasoline powerplants, the company’s history is akin to Audi’s, with a mix of turbocharging (Supra, 2nd-generation MR2, Toyota Celica All-Trac Turbo/GT-Four) and supercharging (1st-generation MR2, TRD aftermarket kits and Australia’s Aurion TRD). The new millennium, however, has seen nothing but superchargers. Besides the aforementioned blower for the Tacoma’s 1GR-FE 4-liter V6 (that also fits the 2007-09, single VVT-i FJ Cruiser), TRD offers superchargers for the older 1FZ-FE 4.5-liter inline 6 and 5VZ-FE 3.4-liter V6 truck engines, as well as a state-of-the-art Eaton TVS (Twin Vortices Series) blower for the 3UR-FE 5.7-liter V8 that is currently the most powerful engine offered in the Tundra and Sequoia.

The moderate, niche success of those truck applications, however, stands in stark contrast to Toyota’s luck with car superchargers. The first-ever application of the Eaton TVS blower was atop the 2GR-FE 3.5-liter V6 which, thus boosted, received the 2GR-FZE moniker. As installed in Australia’s Aurion TRD, an upmarket sports Camry V6 variant, it produced 323 hp, making it, by some accounts, the world’s most powerful front-wheel-drive car. That’s nothing to brag about, though, as prodigious torque steer, early blown engines and the worldwide economic meltdown saw Toyota shut down Aurion TRD production after selling barely 537 units in a 15-month period between August 2007 and November 2008. Similarly discontinued is Scion’s TRD supercharger for the 1st-gen tC and 2nd-gen xB’s 2AZ-FE 2.4-liter 4-cylinder engine, a victim of claims of questionable quality and reliability. And long-time 1st-gen Lexus IS and 2JZ-GE 3-liter inline 6 fans may recall rumors of a TRD supercharger for that engine that ultimately turned out to be vaporware, and current rumors of a blower for the current IS and GS’s GR-FSE V6 may well meet a similar fate.

A 2-pronged approach, with each brand going its own way on boost?
Even though the latest rumors on FT-86 pointed towards the barest of differentiation between the Toyota/Scion and Subaru variants, some were still surprised to see that the front bumper/grille unit, side vent inserts and wheels are the most overt differences between the two companies’ versions. Even the head and taillight insert variances are barely perceptible. Whether this was by deliberate design or financial cost-cutting needed to make the project happen in the first place is unclear, but we suspect that the two carmakers are banking on its success to allow for more differentiation in the future. It’s certainly difficult to envision Subaru giving in on its long history of turbocharging its boxer engines, while, if the Autocar account is true, Toyota prefers supercharging. Might this become an all-important point of distinction between the two marques?

Our thanks to the my.IS community, which inspired and informed our story via this thread.

Photo Credit: Autoblog still from a Toyota YouTube video.

Three months later, however, Peter Lyon, writing for Motor Trend, made a novel prediction that garnered scant attention at the time, and was dismissed as fanciful rumormongering by some:

Remember the drama around removing the “Skyline” prefix from the GT-R when the all-new supercar debuted in late 2007? Well, it looks like nomenclature surgery is about to happen again, only this time Subaru is doing the separating. That’s right, the Impreza and famed WRX — joined at the hip since 1992 — are going their separate ways…the next WRX will take a completely different path of development and will not surface until 2014. We know this because Subaru president Ikuo Mori said at a recent shareholder’s meeting: “We will launch a new sporty car in 2014.” The WRX is that car.

“Apart from a few nuts and bolts, every part on the WRX will be unique. Even the engine and body. Obviously the WRX’s platform will be inherited from the new Impreza, but it will be radically modified and significantly shortened,” says our source.

The WRX…will employ the very best from Subaru’s parts bin, starting with an updated version of the company’s rally-proven AWD system and a turbocharged boxer engine.

“The first thing you must understand about our all-new WRX is that we have developed it from the ground up to win in motorsports events. That’s why we have focused so heavily on weight issues, not to mention a shorter wheelbase that permits faster, more precise turn-in. Marry that to our proven AWD system, and we think we have a winner”.

On the short list for the WRX’s powerplant is a turbocharged 1.6-liter boxer pumping as much as 270 hp, and a twin-charger system involving a supercharger is being tested as well. The car’s body is rumored to be a little bigger than a Toyota Yaris, while its tread width is said to expand significantly. As for the STI, we are told that the flagship will also employ the WRX’s 1.6-liter boxer turbo, but that the engine will be reworked to generate upwards of 300 hp for motorsport competitiveness.

The notion of an STI with over 187 hp per liter in a street engine is one that strains credulity (why not use at least the 2.0-liter FB20 instead of the 1.6-liter FB16 boxer four?), and I wouldn’t expect a new WRX to look like that latest Subaru Legacy / Honda CRZ mashup by way of Hot Wheels rendering that Holiday Auto came up with. Sure enough, though, as Subaru announced its 2012 model year lineup, we saw the unprecedented offering of a 4th-gen naturally aspirated-only Impreza selling alongside 3rd-gen WRX and STI models. Then, in late October, Diana Kurylko of Automotive News’ story titled Subaru separates performance models from Impreza garnered more widespread attention, even though it was far less detailed than Lyon’s earlier account. Kurylko notes that

Subaru will begin marketing its Impreza WRX and STI performance models separately from the conventional Impreza when the car is redesigned next month.

The “Impreza” name will be dropped for the derivatives, and they will get their own platforms when they are redesigned in 2013.

The WRX and STI variants will continue on the current Impreza platform until the 2013 redesign. The two sporty versions account for 10 to 15 percent of Impreza sales.

(Senior vice president of sales for Subaru of America Bill) Cyphers said the change will allow Subaru to market the WRX and STI more easily as performance cars and to give them interiors and features more appropriate for models that start at about $8,000 more than the Impreza. Cyphers would not give engine or performance details for the 2013 models, but he said the STI will continue to have an engine with 300-plus horsepower.

In his commentary article on the Automotive News story Viknesh Vijayenthiran of Motor Authority takes a stunning flying leap of logic when he suggests that the new Subaru WRX and STI could use an all-wheel drive version of the upcoming BRZ (Scion/Toyota FR-S) platform. Sure, we’ve written plenty about rumored and hoped-for additional Toyota and even Lexus derivatives of FT-86, but never really thought that Subaru might want its own additional offshoots as well. They’re certainly entitled. At the same time, though, even as rumors persist of eventual all-wheel-drive FT-86 platform models, we should remind you that moving the Subaru flat-four engine 4 inches down and 9 inches back (for optimum rear-wheel-drive handling and balance) versus the current Impreza tends to complicate if not preclude adding back the all-wheel-drive.

Hoping for further clarity, this author chatted up Subaru staffers at the 2011 SEMA Show in Las Vegas. They told us that the next Subaru WRX and STI would remain all-wheel-drive, would not be a BRZ derivative and would arrive some time during calendar year 2013 as a 2014 model, thus essentially confirming Lyon’s and Kurylko’s earlier reports and putting the current-generation GE Subaru Impreza WRX Sedan, GH WRX Hatchback and GR WRX STI on a 6-model-year (2008-2013) cycle, just like its immediate GD/GG predecessors.

October 26, 2011 – Los Angeles, CA

Last year’s Scion Tuner Challenge paid hommage to our nation’s armed forces with an array of special build xB’s. This year, Scion will be showcasing seven projects in which .  four of these cars will be the all-new “Smart-er & Mini-er” iQ (3 of which will be featured in the Tuner Challenge and one trick chop top utility cruiser), two xB’s  a snowboarder’s dream ride & a VIP inspired Scion Canada Tuner Challenge Champ), and lastly one road race ready tC. You’ll be able to take a look at all these rides up close at booth# 20703 located on the northwest section of Central Hall at the Las Vegas Convention Center.

Tuner Challenge iQ by Michael Chang

Tuner Challenge iQ by Jon Sibal
 

Tuner Challenge iQ by Tatsu

iQ “Pit Boss” by Cartel

tC Gruppe S by Dynamic

Numeric xB by 686®

More photos can be found here: 10-26-11 Scion SEMA Preview GALLERY
Special thanks goes out to our friends at Scion USA!

Curiously, none of the otherwise detailed illustrations nor any of the Japanese text show any sort of badge or model name for this clearly hybrid Toyota, but there’s a 90+% likelihood that it’s Prius c / Aqua we’re looking at. Accurately described by Sebastián Blanco of AutoblogGreen as looking like a Toyota Prius / Nissan Leaf mashup with the barest hint of the original Prius c concept, the newest Toyota hybrid is attractive enough for a B-segment 5-door hatchback (except for the overwrought taillights), if lacking the absolute aero hybrid look of its big brother Prius.

Among the more intriguing bits to emerge is the trio of trim levels (G, S and L, from most basic to best-appointed) for the Japanese domestic market and a selection of exterior colors that includes new shades of white (082), red-orange (4V7), and a light aqua bearing either the 3V7 or 8V7 color code, plus the 2009-10 Yaris sedan’s 8T7 Blue Streak Metallic and the eye-popping 5A3 High Voltage yellow from the current Scion tC Release Series 7.0 (are you listening, ToyotaReference?)

Yet another image reveals specifications that include a 2550mm (100.4″) wheelbase that matches the outgoing Toyota Yaris sedan’s (as opposed to the 3rd-gen Yaris hatchback’s 2510 mm/98.8″), a 3995mm (157.3″) overall length, 1695mm (66.7″) width and 1,445mm (56.9″) height. Mention of a 1496cc 4-cylinder engine could be a tacit confirmation of this author’s earlier prediction that Prius c / Aqua would use the 1NZ-FXE 1.5-liter 4-cylinder powertrain from the 2nd-generation Toyota Prius, itself a hybridized version of the 1NZ-FE engine used on all past and current Toyota Yaris models sold in North America. Unless, of course, Toyota’s North America operations decide on a zippier Prius c powered by the current larger Prii / Lexus CT 200h’s 1.8-liter 2ZR-FXE powertrain.

As to the Prius c / Aqua’s debut, Carscoop is predicting a world debut at the 2011 Tokyo Motor Show this coming December (where it threatens to get lost amidst the expected FR-S / BRZ hoopla) an on-sale date of January 2012 and a North American debut in Detroit (a possible world debut for the Prius c-badged version) that same month. In an unexpected 180-degree turn from their January 2011 prediction, Autocar now believes that Prius c stands a chance of being sold in Europe alongside the expected Yaris HSD, and predicts a European debut at the 2012 Geneva Auto Show in March. Curious, given the potential for cannibalization from the cheaper (yet, probably, more profitable in Europe) hybrid Yaris.

The full Carscoop gallery includes more goodies such as interior shots, alternate wheel styles and even a couple of accessory body kits (perhaps to be sold as Modellista, TRD or G Sports items in Japan, and as a Prius PLUS body kit in North America)

Within eight or nine days of clandestinely listing the FR-S on Scion.com’s homepage, the brand received requests for information from 3,000 hand-raisers.

Intrigued, we headed over to Scion.com, where an FR-S concept link towards the top right of the page led us to a separate frs-scion.com page that, in addition to asking you to sign up for Scion FR-S communications, includes a 2-question microsurvey. Indeed, Scion asks you to “Help us design this car! If you were to buy a car like this, what color and transmission would you prefer?”

First, choose a favorite among 12 exterior colors: White, Silver, Light Blue, Green, Yellow, Red, Burnt Orange (this author’s favorite), Dark Red, Dark Blue, Grey, Brown and Black. The second question asks for your preference between Manual (definitely!) or Automatic (sacrilege!) transmissions.

As to the “Scion Slates First Detroit Show News Conference” part of the title, we’re not sure whether that means it’s the first press conference of the 2012 show (on Monday 9 January) or whether it’s Scion’s first-ever Detroit Auto Show press conference (we suspect the latter), but it unquestionably marks the North American debut of the production FR-S (technically the Scion-badged production version’s world debut).

By the way, we love the “Bringing the sport back to the car” ad slogan for Scion FR-S. Very apropos.

Most importantly, though, be sure to enter your color and transmission survey preferences by visiting frs-scion.com and join the 3000-strong and counting Scion FR-S fans that will be in the loop for news on this game-changing Toyota / Scion.

For a carmaker that has frequently been lambasted as an unenthusiastic maker of rolling appliances, Toyota has certainly been showing a lot of unconventional motorsports initiatives lately. Within the past month and a half Toyota has shattered the Nürburgring electric vehicle lap record, set a fastest production car lap of the Nürburgring with the Lexus LFA (albeit for all of two weeks before a tweaked Dodge Viper ACR came back to reclaim its old record) and even set a whimsical speed record for compressed air-powered vehicles (via its Toyota Industries Corporation subsidiary, the world’s largest manufacturer of automotive air conditioner compressors). And now comes word of the most exciting and long-awaited bit of Toyota motorsports news in a loooong time: the official return of the carmaker to the 2012 24 Hours of Le Mans race, as well as to several races of the inaugural FIA World Endurance Championship.

What Toyota has revealed so far
Besides the rendering above of “Toyota’s 2012 Le Mans Contender” (as yet unnamed), the Toyota Europe blog, as well as the company’s European Corporate, USA and Global Newsrooms and the Toyota Motorsport GmbH (TMG) site inform us that the racer in question will be built to LMP1 (Le Mans Prototype 1) class rules utilizing a chassis designed, developed and produced by TMG’s high-performance technical center in Cologne, Germany and powered by a gasoline-electric hybrid powertrain produced by Toyota Motor Corporation in Japan. This will certainly add a new wrinkle to the ongoing gasoline vs diesel battles of the most recent editions of the 24 Hours of Le Mans race that have seemingly made the latter the fuel of choice.

Further specifics will be revealed in the future, presumably upon the racer’s unveiling around the December 2011 / January 2012 time frame, followed by an extensive test schedule in early 2012. As Tadashi Yamashina, Toyota Motor Corporation Senior Managing Officer and TMG Chairman, informs us,

Toyota Motor Corporation has entered Le Mans before but by using our hybrid technology this time will be a completely new challenge. We want to write a new page in the history of the Le Mans 24 Hours, as well as in the FIA World Endurance Championship, through our use of hybrid technology. In addition, we aim to learn from the experience of competing in such a challenging motorsport environment to enhance our production car technology. Le Mans is a legendary race and I would like to thank the ACO and the FIA for their constructive and positive cooperation over the last few months.

FIA? ACO? WTF is up with all the acronyms?
To walk you through all those acronyms Yamashina-san was referring to above, FIA refers to the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile (International Federation of the Automobile, or International Automobile Federation), the governing body for racing series such as Formula 1, the World Rally Championship and World Touring Car Championship. Notably missing from that list is the 24 Hours of Le Mans and its related series, which falls under the aegis of ACO, the Automobile Club de l’Ouest, or Automobile Club of the West. Although Autoblog‘s motorsports guru Noah Joseph described “decades of rift” between the two organizations, a more collaborative picture is painted by Marcel Ten Caat of PlanetLeMans, who writes that

Five years ago the FIA and ACO started to work together to harmonise regulations. After Jean Todt, an avid endurance racing supporter, was elected as the new FIA President he realised that a great endurance championship was missing. Soon after (that) he sat down with (current ACO President) Jean-Claude Plassart and the result of those talks was more appreciation between the FIA and the ACO and the birth of the World Championship.

Other acronyms you’ll be seeing throughout this story are ALMS (not money or charity given to the poor, but the American Le Mans Series) and ILMC (Intercontinental Le Mans Cup), an endurance sports car racing tournament organised by the ACO with 7 European, Asian and American events that, in 2012, will be replaced by the WEC (World Endurance Championship). And WTF? I don’t think we need to explain that one, although that may be, precisely what you’re thinking after wading through this alphabet soup of acronyms.

The new FIA World Endurance Championship
The birth of the World Championship was first announced on Monday 6 June 2011 with a bare-bones press release. Three days later, Messrs. Todt and Plassart announced more details of the new series. To quote Noah Joseph of Autoblog‘s summary,

For starters, it would appear that the FIA World Endurance Championship will replace both the Intercontinental Le Mans Cup and the FIA GT1 World Championship in 2012, basing the new calendar on the ILMC’s current season now underway. The official calendar will be announced in the fall, and will consist of seven races of at least six hours each: two in the United States (likely Sebring [in Florida] and the Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta), two in Asia (probably in China and Abu Dhabi) and three in Europe (including Le Mans and two others – we’d guess Spa [in Belgium] and Silverstone [in England]).

Points will be awarded on the same scale used in all FIA championships, awarding 25 points for first place, 18 for second, 15 for third, then 12, 10, 8, 6, 4, 2 and 1 point for tenth place. The headline 24 Hours of Le Mans, however, will be worth double points towards the titles. The classes will follow the ACO’s formula, consisting of LMP1, LMP2, GTE Pro and GTE Amateur.

Just over a week after the second joint FIA/ACO announcement, Autosport.com reported that “Toyota has been testing an all-new LMP1 car since last year, and could return to the Le Mans 24 Hours as early as 2013″. As the rumor spread through the Internet, Autoblog‘s commentary suggested a more optimistic 2012 Le Mans entry for Toyota, a goal that, 4 months later, the carmaker has confirmed.

Speaking of confirmation (or lack thereof), it seems that the precise 7-race schedule is rife for speculation, as Gary Watkins of AutoWeek reports that

There remains uncertainty about whether Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta–where the ALMS (concluded) its 2011 season–will be a WEC round in 2012. The ACO wants to take its championship to South America, almost certainly Brazil, but (ALMS boss Scott) Atherton said he believes that there is still a strong chance that Petit will take a place on the WEC calendar as it has on the ILMC schedule in 2010-11.

“It is not dead; I would say it is 50/50,” said Atherton ahead of this year’s Petit Le Mans. “It will depend on how their schedule works out.”

On Friday 30 September 2011, however, ACO’s official Le Mans.org website did confirm that the 2012 FIA World Endurance Championship (as well as the 2012 American Le Mans Series) would kick off with the 12 Hours of Sebring on Saturday 17 March 2012. Will Toyota’s new endurance racer be ready to compete in that event? It’s too early to tell, but this author, who lives but a 3-hour drive south of Sebring, would certainly be ecstatic.

What are the current LMP1 rules?
Toyota has stated that their upcoming 2012 Le Mans Contender will be built to LMP1 class rules. But what, precisely, are those rules? As of 2011, either open or closed bodywork is allowed (with Toyota clearly choosing the former) with a minimum weight of 900 kg (1984 lb) and powered by engines no larger than 3400cc for naturally aspirated gasoline engines, 2000cc for boosted (either supercharged or turbocharged) gasoline engines and 3700cc for diesels, with no limit on the number of cylinders. Hybrid electric powertrains are allowed (surely the main factor that attracted Toyota in the first place), but, in an attempt at parity, maximum fuel tank capacity is capped according to powertrain, with a limit for the 2012 season of 75 liters (19.8 US gallons) for gasoline-powered engines, 73 liters (19.3 US gallons) for hybrid gasoline-electric engines, 60 liters (15.8 US gallons) for diesel engines and a likely 58 liters (15.3 US gallons) for hybrid diesel engines. More information on hybrid rules (such as a prohibition on “push to pass” buttons) appear in the Le Mans Series site’s Categories page. Biofuels are allowed, either gasoline with a 9-10% ethanol content or BTL biodiesel. Further information on the rules, such as bodywork limitations, appears on the Le Mans Series site’s Regulations page.

Almost a week ago, the ACO announced tweaks to the 2012 rules, primarily aimed at reducing the diesel powered cars’ advantages versus their gasoline-powered brethren. These are summarized by Anne Proffit of MotorAuthority and detailed by the PlanetLeMans site.

Will Toyota’s hybrid expertise be able to quash the Le Mans diesel juggernaut?
As followers of Le Mans-type endurance racing are well aware, the series is currently a battle between two diesel-powered juggernauts: Audi and Peugeot, with the former more often than not taking the upper hand. So, will a Toyota gasoline electric hybrid-powered assault on endurance racing ultimately prove to be as futile and quixotic a quest as its 8-year attempt to reach the summit of Formula 1 racing? It certainly won’t be easy, and further competition may well come from Nissan (which already tried its hand at the 2011 24 Hours of Le Mans in the lower-tier LMP2 class in conjunction with the Signatech team), Ferrari, Chrysler (with the next-generation Dodge Viper), Jaguar and a rumored expansion of Volkswagen Group efforts that would add to the Audi diesels with a gasoline-hybrid Porsche (which has officially announced its own LMP1 entry for 2014) and an E85-powered Bentley (provided the rules were amended to allow for this).

Yet, when it comes to the hybridization of motorsports, Toyota may have something of an advantage, given its prior experience with the Toyota Supra HV-R hybrid racer that won Japan’s 24 Hours of Tokachi back in 2007. And Alex Duff of Bloomberg reported that Peugeot on April 2011 abandoned plans to run a 908 Hybrid4 in an official test at this year’s Le Mans classic, citing reliability problems. Audi, meanwhile, has spent 2 years grappling with issues designing and testing hybrid parts while keeping weight down. Thus, Toyota’s strongest hybrid rival may well be Porsche, whose 911 GT3 R Hybrid has won a couple of shorter races.

Don’t expect a hybrid Toyota World Endurance Championship racer to be a souped-up version of your mom’s Prius, though. As Ben Timmins of Motor Trend astutely noted,

It’s highly unlikely that the car will use any variation of Toyota’s famous Hybrid Synergy Drive, since Le Mans regulations forbid automatic transmissions, which would exclude HSD’s continuously-variable unit. Our best guess is the car will likely use a Kinetic Energy Recovery System, in the form of a flywheel capacitor system (like the Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid) or a more conventional battery-operated system.

In yet another example of motorsports engineering advances trickling down to production cars, would a positive side effect of this be to help make the rumored manual Prius sport coupe a reality?

Toyota at Le Mans in the 20th Century…
As has been hinted at earlier in this article, this is hardly the first time Toyota has competed in Le Mans or other forms of endurance racing. We just touched upon the Toyota Supra HS-V, which itself was preceded by a race-prepped Lexus GS 450h. And some may recall the four years in which the Lexus LFA competed at the 24 Hours of the Nürburgring. Yet, Toyota’s history in endurance racing goes back much further than that, almost 30 years to be precise.

A collaboration between Toyota, their factory supported racing team and tuning shop TOM’S and Japanese-based racing car constructor Dome begat, in 1982, the first of Toyota’s Group C racers, the 82C. Both it and its immediate successor, the 83C ran only in Japan and, in the U.S., at the former Riverside International Raceway. The 85C shown above right, however, marked the company’s first foray into Le Mans, in 1985 (note that the model number matches the year of its release). By that time, the Toyota C racers also competed in the All Japan Sports Prototype Championship, the World Sports-Prototype Championship and North America’s IMSA Camel GT Championship. As Wikipedia informs us, 1988 saw a 2-pronged engine strategy emerge, with an 88C powered by a 3S-GTM 2100cc turbocharged inline-4 and an 88C-V powered by an R32V 3200cc turbocharged V8.

Although the C and C-V line of Toyota Group C racers extended all the way to the 94C-V shown at the top of this heading, rule changes announced for the 1992 World Sportscar Championship led to a clean sheet of paper approach and the TS010 racer shown at left. Powered by Toyota’s RV10 3500cc V10 in a new chassis designed by Tony Southgate (formerly of Tom Walkinshaw Racing), the TS010 actually debuted at the final event of the 1991 season at Autopolis in Japan. The TS010′s maiden appearance at Le Mans in 1992 saw a very respectable 2nd place finish, 6 laps behind the winning Peugeot. With the cancellation of both the World Sportscar Championship and All Japan Sports Prototype Championships in 1993, the TS010 saw its final racing appearance at that year’s 24 Hours of Le Mans, where the best of 3 Toyotas finished in 4th place behind a trio of Peugeots. Wikipedia has more information on TS010.

The 1994 end of the Group C era led Toyota to shift gears and focus on the production-based GT classes for 1995. This led to a couple of interesting efforts: The Supra LM shown above right and the SARD MC8-R shown below right. The Supra LM, also referred to as the LM GT is, obviously enough, a Mark IV Supra modified for endurance racing by Sigma Advanced Racing Development (SARD), a Toyota-backed Japanese tuning company and racing team. Even more intriguing is the SARD MC8-R, a barely-recognizable derivative of the 2nd-generation (W20) Toyota MR2, lengthened and powered by a twin-turbo version of the 4.0 liter Toyota 1UZ-FE V8 producing 600 hp. Alas, their Le Mans performances were unremarkable, with 24th place (second-to-last of the finishers) in 1996 the best the MC8-R could muster. The Supra LM did a bit better in 1995, finishing 14th overall. Thus, Toyota opted to regroup and skip the 1997 24 Hours of Le Mans altogether (save for a fruitless third attempt to enter the MC8-R that failed to make it past pre-qualifying) and put together an altogether new Le Mans prototype: the TS020. A true successor to the TS010, it would become perhaps the most iconic and moderately successful of Toyota’s endurance racers, rechristened as the Toyota GT-One.

A casual glance at the 1998-1999 Toyota TS020 / GT-One shown at left and then comparing it to the 2012 Toyota Le Mans Contender at the top of our story reveals an undeniable lineage and connection between the two. At any rate, 1997′s hiatus gave Toyota the opportunity to stand back and assess what the Le Mans GT1 class competition was doing. The results were a departure for the company in a number of ways. For one, development was entrusted to Toyota Motorsport GmbH (itself descended from the Toyota Team Europe World Rally Championship operation founded in 1972) in Cologne, Germany, and to Italian racecar chassis builder Dallara. As noted in Wikipedia, Toyota paid attention to Porsche and Mercedes-Benz’s creative interpretations of Le Mans GT1 production and bodywork rules, and convinced the ACO that building but 2 “roadgoing” GT-Ones (one of which is in a museum in Japan and the other at Toyota Motorsport GmbH in Cologne, Germany) with a fuel tank that doubled as trunk space (!) met homologation requirements. In May 1998, the Toyota GT-One publicly emerged at the official testing days ahead of June’s 24 Hours of Le Mans. Although quite promising during practice and qualifying (with one of the trio of GT-Ones qualifying in 2nd place), the race itself saw the #28 car suffered a high speed accident around the halfway mark and the #29 car suffer a gearbox failure within the closing hours, thus leaving the #27 entry to finish in 9th place overall.

The 1999 season saw the demise of the Le Mans GT1 class that gave Toyota’s endurance racer its name. Fortunately, the changes required to make the Toyota GT-One conform to the new LMGTP class were relatively minimal compared to its rivals. With its carbon fiber chassis and bodywork and powered by an R36V 3.6-liter twin-turbo V8 producing 600 hp through a 6-speed sequential manual transmision, the 900 kg (1984 lb) GT-One proved to be blisteringly fast in practice for the 1999 24 Hours of Le Mans, with a 3 minute 29 second lap that saw speeds as high as 351 km/h (217 mph), a record fast lap that would remain unbroken until 2006. Qualifying saw the trio of GT-Ones start from pole, 2nd and 8th positions. Unfortunately, all three cars suffered from blown Michelin tires, taking two of them out of the race. The #3 GT-One’s tire failure occurred during the final hour of the race as it was in the lead. And, even after the pit crew scrambled to replace the tire, the team of Ukyo Katayama, Keiichi Tsuchiya and Toshio Suzuki finished the race in 2nd place overall (albeit winning the LMGTP class) behind the #15 BMW V12 LMR.

The 2000 racing season saw a massive exodus of big name manufacturers from Le Mans, with only Audi opting to return to the French classic. As for Toyota Motorsport GmbH, their efforts were redirected towards their ultimately ill-fated foray into Formula 1. For those of you that want to see more of the cars that made Toyota’s 1982-1999 stints in sports car racing and, especially, Le Mans, so memorable, we invite you to check out the Dome Car Museum page and the Toyota at Le Mans gallery on Top Gear BBC.

…and in the 21st Century
There is, however, one more chapter in the runup to Toyota’s return to Le Mans in 2012, and this one took place just last year, well into the new millennium. On 3 December 2010, AutoWeek‘s Quentin Spurring informed us that

Toyota Motorsport will return to international racing…for the first time since quitting Formula One at the end of 2009. The German-based arm of the giant Japanese company will supply engines exclusively for two new LMP1 Lola sports-prototypes entered in the Le Mans Series in Europe by the Swiss-owned Rebellion Racing team.

Toyota has issued no technical information about the engine, which is believed to be a naturally aspirated, gasoline-fueled, 3.4-liter V8 developed in the company’s Lexus SC430 All-Japan Super GT race car.

The deal means that Toyota will debut in the Le Mans Series and will return to the 24 Hours of Le Mans for the first time since it almost won the race in 1999 with its GT1 racer.

A Swiss Rebellion? That sounds like the mother of all oxymorons, but, seriously, Rebellion Racing’s two Lola-Toyota B10/60 cars have done quite well this season, winning the Le Mans Series 2011 LMP1 Teams and Manufacturers titles, as the official Rebellion Racing website is justifiably proud to remind us.

As to their 2011 Le Mans outing, Rebellion Racing’s dynamic duo, powered by Toyota’s RV8KLM 3.4-liter V8 saw the #12 car qualify in 8th place, while its #13 stablemate started from the 10th position. While the #13 did not finish, the #12 car, driven by Nicolas Prost (son of legendary Formula 1 champion – and Ayrton Senna archrival – Alain Prost), Neel Jani and Jeroen Bleekemolen finished in 6th place overall, making it the highest-finishing gasoline-powered entry, ahead of everything at Le Mans that wasn’t an Audi or Peugeot diesel.

This is certainly an auspicious start for Toyota’s new venture into endurance sports car racing, but a pivotal question, among many currently unanswered, is whether or not the Rebellion Racing team and its drivers comprise the foundation for 2012′s efforts. All the TMG decals plastered all over the Rebellion cars in 2011, Rebellion Racing-centric press releases issued by the Toyota Motorsport GmbH site in December 2010 and September 2011, plus a passing mention at the end of their version of the 2012 return to Le Mans news release could be interpreted as favorable omens. On the other hand, the 2012 Le Mans Contender’s high level of Toyota involvement in its bespoke chassis and hybrid powertrain might have little correlation with Rebellion’s parts-bin Lola chassis and non-hybrid engine that is derived from the Lexus SC 430′s Japan Super GT 500 program.

What about the Lexus LFA as Le Mans racer?
Fans of the Lexus LFA will note its four appearances at the 24 Hours of the Nürburgring and wonder why it wasn’t the basis for Toyota’s return to Le Mans-type endurance racing. Indeed, back in August 2010 rumors were rife of a factory Lexus LFA team entering the FIA GT1 World Championship. And, soon after the early July 2011 announcement killing the FIA GT1 World Championship and Intercontinental Le Mans Cup in favor of the new FIA World Endurance Championship, the Internet was abuzz again with reports of a Lexus LFA GTE, complete with leaked photos taken at TMG headquarters in Germany that were quickly “removed per Toyota Motorsports request”. So, does the new Toyota LMP1 prototype effectively kill any hopes of seeing Lexus LFA racecars branch out beyond the 24 Hours of the Nürburgring? Maybe not, and the key is the three letters GTE.

As we noted earlier, the new FIA World Endurance Championship consists of 4 classes: LMP1, LMP2, GTE Pro and GTE Amateur. Beyond LMP1 (which we’ve already discussed) and LMP2 (a lower-budget version of LMP1 that is in clear decline) is Le Mans Grand Touring Endurance (or GTE for short). As Le Mans.org informs us, this class is for production-based sports cars with gasoline engines only, with minimum production runs of 100 models (25 for small constructors, and 300 for cars with a carbon chassis), 300 engines no larger than 5500cc and a minimum curb weight of 1245kg (2739 lbs). The Lexus LFA handily meets these criteria, and would be up against competition versions of such sales rivals as the Ferrari 458 Italia, Porsche 911 GT3, Aston Martin, Chevrolet Corvette and Dodge Viper. Car spec and production rules are identical for GTE Pro and GTE Amateur, the difference being that GTE Pro has no limits on model or driver eligibility, while GTE Amateur allows for only one professional driver per team and cars no newer than one year old.

Might a hybrid Lexus LFA racer be a viable supplement to the LMP1 Toyota? Back in 2010 Sam Abuelsamid of Autoblog noted that “It’s not clear whether hybrid systems will be allowed in the GT cars, although the ACO announcement seems to imply that they are.” Perhaps this has some bearing on the rumors from July 2010 and June 2011 regarding additional Lexus LFA variants. Realistically, though, much as we’d love to see a two-pronged Toyota LMP1 / Lexus LFA GTE Pro assault on the FIA World Endurance Championship, the sheer economic burden such a pursuit would entail might be a bit much for Toyota to take on in these difficult times. It wouldn’t bother this author one bit, though, if Toyota would stop running in circles in NASCAR and pursue this dream instead…

With Toyota’s stake in Subaru now doubled to 16.7%, and Toyota having licensed its hybrid technology to rivals Nissan and Mazda, there was widespread expectation that Subaru might follow suit for its first-ever production hybrid. Yet, in a surprising development, Dave Leggett of the subscriber-only just-auto site, reports that Subaru swerves Toyota HSD and opts to go it alone on hybrid tech. Indeed, it seems that Subaru has opted instead for a mild hybrid system reminiscent of Honda’s Integrated Motor Assist (IMA) and, to a lesser extent, General Motors’ current eAssist. Such systems lack the ability of Toyota’s Hybrid Synergy Drive to run solely on electric power at low speeds. Instead, their hybrid functionality is limited to restarting the engine when the car moves way from a stop via a low-power electric motor, adding supplemental torque to the engine output, and recharging the small battery pack of less than 1kWh via regenerative braking.

Just-auto further reports that the first Subaru hybrid will be a Japanese Domestic Market version of the Subaru Legacy sedan to debut during the 2013 calendar year as a 2014 model. This would be a variant of an all-new 6th-generation Legacy sedan if Subaru follows the pattern set by the 3rd-generation naturally-aspirated Impreza line and puts the current Legacy on a 4-year production cycle. For North America, however, Leggett claims that plans are less clear-cut, with not only the Legacy but its station-wagon Outback offshoot and the 4th-generation of the smaller Forester SUV all possible candidates for hybridization.

But why didn’t Subaru just go with the generally more fuel-economical Toyota hybrid system? John Voelcker of Green Car Reports suggests that

Subaru is a stubbornly independent company with a strong engineering culture. Aside from Porsche, it’s the sole company offering horizontally opposed engines, which are smaller and give vehicles a lower center of gravity than inline engines.

Fitting Toyota’s hybrid to a pancake engine might have posed its own challenges, but Subaru’s engineers developed their hybrid system internally, along with the lithium-ion battery pack. And so the Subaru hybrid that will launch as a 2014 model will be a mild hybrid–a technology that Toyota doesn’t offer.

Well, make that a technology that Toyota doesn’t currently offer. About 10 years ago, Toyota sold in Japan a mild hybrid version of the 11th-generation (S170) Crown Royal powered by a 3.0 liter 2JZ-FSE inline-6.

Illustration: Schematic of Subaru hybrid system as employed in 2009′s Hybrid Tourer Concept.

So what, precisely, is this enigmatic Aqua? This author suspects that it’s simply the Japanese domestic market’s badge for the upcoming Toyota Prius c, itself expected to make its production version debut at the Detroit Auto Show in January 2012. Keep in mind, though, that, beyond Prius and Prius Alpha (the JDM version of our new Prius v), Toyota’s Japanese hybrid model-only strategy is broader than ours, including the SAI (essentially a less luxurious version of the Lexus HS) and the new JDM strategy of Camry as their largest hybrid-only front-wheel-drive sedan. Thus, there is a possibility that Aqua will coexist with a JDM Prius c as an alternative for one of Toyota’s four Japanese dealer networks.

As to Europe, it is our understanding that neither Prius c nor its Aqua variant will be sold there. The expected plan is for Toyota to meet demand for a B-segment gasoline-electric hybrid with better-than-Prius fuel economy with an HSD (Hybrid Synergy Drive) version of the just-launched 3rd-generation Yaris, built in Valenciennes, France with hybrid componentry imported from Deeside, Wales.

The buildup to the launch and reveal of the final production versions of the Toyota/Scion FR-S and Subaru BRZ sports coupes (the so-called “Toyobaru twins”) has been one long, drawn-out, sometimes agonizing striptease or string of teasers and concept cars. On the Toyota side alone we had the original FT-86 Concept that debuted at the 2009 Tokyo Motor Show in October of that year, followed by the January 2010 appearance of its tuner-modded FT-86 G Sports Concept iteration at the Tokyo Auto Salon, and the 2011 triple play of the black FT-86 II Concept (unveiled in March at the Geneva Motor Show), the Scion FR-S Concept the following month in New York and the red/orange with Brembo brakes FT-86 II Concept revealed at the Frankfurt Motor Show just over a week ago.

Meanwhile, Subaru revealed two awkwardly-named variants on the same clear Lucite-bodied theme: the Rear-Wheel Drive Sports Car Technology Concept (shown above) unveiled at the 2011 Geneva Auto Show, and the BRZ Prologue Boxer Sports Car Architecture II (shown below) following 5½ months later at the Frankfurt Motor Show. At a glance, it appears that the two are the same except for changing the accent/border tinting from blue to gold. Some pundits insist, however, that the Subaru BRZ Prologue contains more whole mechanical parts and less cutaways than its predecessor. At any rate, an ft86club thread contains many excellent close-up pictures of its mechanical innards in all their metallic glory.

While most of were convinced that the next stage of the seemingly never-ending saga would be the 2011 Tokyo Motor Show reveal of the final production versions, Car and Driver‘s Erik Johnson begs to differ. He informs us that

Subaru finally will show a version of its new BRZ sports car—with sheetmetal!—at November’s Los Angeles auto show. It won’t look like the final product, however, and neither do Toyota’s two FT-86 concepts: The companies have an agreement not to show a single production body panel until the cars debut at Tokyo in December… Expect a crazy body treatment to apply to this new Subaru concept, too, as there’s a chance it will wear the brand’s high-performance STI badge. (Whether the actual car will get an STI version is still unknown, but this seems like a good sign.)

So, what will Subaru name this purported final BRZ concept? BRZ Preface? BRZ Preamble? BRZ Prelude? Forget the last one, if Honda has anything to say about it…

Special thanks to our friend Agent 001 of Autospies.com for letting us use his comprehensive collection of photos from the 2011 Frankfurt Auto Show. Check out the full gallery of FT-86 II Concept pics here!

FT-86 II Concept Overvew @ Frankfurt Auto Show:

New Toyota FT-86 Teaser:

Photo Courtesy: AutoSpies.com
Videos Courtesy: Toyota Motor Europe & Toyota Global