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 What's the first thing that you think of when you hear the name "Corolla"? Chances are, you think of "Mom's grocery getter", or a slow ass family car. Granted, most of them start out that way (coupe and Rx-i models excluded), they do have the potential to be extremely fast cars. Don't believe me? Think that 4 door Corollas are slow? Well, I guess that they are compared to say, a Civic Si, but that's not really a fair comparison, now is it? Comparing it to a Civic sedan is more like it. The 2001 Civic LX Sedan has a displacement of 1.7 litres, and it's peak torque is roughly 15.5Nm@4800rpm. That would put the output of that engine just a bit above a Toyota 4A-FE (1.6L). The problem here is that the design of the 4A-FE is about 10 years old. To make matters even more embarassing, the 4A-FE uses a block design that goes back to about 1982. Now compare this to a EG style Civic sedan. Kinda makes you wonder, huh? The first Corolla that my brother and I have is a 1994 Sedan. Powered by a 4A-FE (as described above) it's pretty slow. It was purchased for my brother to get from point A to point B and back. But there was a pretty big lack of power to it. So it all started out with a K&N air filter and escalated from there. Now, at first we knew that we could beat Civic sedans, but we were unsure about the hatchbacks. It turns out that we can probably beat most of those too (save the Si). The main factor that we were worried about was the difference in mass of the two vehicles. The hatchback doesn't have a trunk, or a lot of the things like that, which would suggest that it could accelerate faster. But when you saddle an otherwise well designed car with a sluggish SOHC engine, you get time slips of high 17s to low 18s. Basically what the Corolla ran stock as well. So now we've got a supercharged AE102. It's looks are kind of decieving. The fact it's a Corolla, and has a 5" tip suggest that it's just another wannabe rice-mobile. You get the funniest looks when you walk past a car that's supposed to be faster. |
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 I was luckier in getting my Corolla. Because my brother got his first, I had the chance to do some research about Corollas and Toyotas in general. At first, I wanted an AE92 GT-S, a 130hp coupe. However, as my research progressed, I found out about the AE86 GT-S Corolla. At first, I was put off by it's styling (which grows on you), but as I learned more about the car, I grew to appreciate the old school styling; Which is something that many import enthusiasts have trouble with. The AE86 has quite a following in the racing world, particularily in Japan, where it is still on of the top 'drift' cars. This is due to three factors: it has a FR platform, it is a light chassis, and there is already many performance parts for it's 4A-GE powerplant. This following has since grown again, due to the introduction of an anime called "Initial D". In this program, the main character races an AE86 on twisty mountain roads; often against challengers with much superior cars. This has exposed the AE86 to yet another generation of racers. I happened upon mine during the ride home from school with my friend. It was torture going past it every day before it was mine. Currently it's still in a state of restoration, since rust has eaten away at the rocker panels and fenders. Thankfully, I've got replacement fenders, and springs ready to go. Now the hard part is finding time to install them.  |
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Copyright 2001 Aaron Lee |