London Bill

Hi Guys; A Big Thanks to Steve LOC and the JAE Organisers for our invitation to JAE this year (my first), it's just simply Gob Smackin! We all had a great time and it was good to meet some "cross party" posters like Adi, I cant say anymore about the cars you saw them as well. The only downside to the whole weekend was the FKIN MUPPET with the MR2 revvin the stonks out of it at 3:15am on Sun morning. I heard from the organisers he is actually a club co-ordinator, not for long if he belonged to our club. Next year I will do the whole three days (and stay at a hotel). Bill Lewis - Toyota Imports Forum.

Good point Colin, very few wheels with the correct 50mm Offset fit a Soarer even fewer will fit the 4pot Supra TT brakes. Even my BSS 18"x8.5" front rims with 40mm Offset wont go over the Supra TT calipers without some mods to the mountings.

First of all I have to say big thanks to Steve, Claire and all the other organisers for a really good day from all the Soarer owners who turned up from TIF. It was a fantastic day (bugger the weather at least we never got wet), the turnout was beyond our expectations. I must also apologise profusley for the disgracefull exit from the car park, I had seen the request from Steve to behave when leaving but I FORGOT to tell the rest of them (Guilty as charged), I know the need to get to the pub was great (and none greater than mine). I can assure you this matter will be given greater consideration for any future events.

If you want to upgrade the Soarer brakes then you should be looking for the 4pot calipers and discs from the UK Spec Supra TT. I just got a s/hand pair of calipers from a Supra TT for my V8 which will need more stopping power once the supercharger kit arrives from Australia :winky:

I had to do 2 trips to brum in two days (from Camberley about 150mls), used three tanks of juice! That was not long after I first got it so it was toe to floor all the time.

If you drive it like you stole it a TT will be heavy on juice, long distance driving I was getting near on 35mpg at a constant 85mph (Hope, Derbyshire to Camberley, Surrey). If fuel consumption is an issue - Dont buy a Soarer :-)

So Piers's 1994 3.0Ltr N/A 2JZ Soarer (now owned by Mobius) never existed? 1994 3.0Ltr Calros, fifty lines; I will not dissemate false information about the Soarer. I will not dissemate false information about the Soarer. Repeat....

The part codes for the Blinkdash fix are available on my site, see sig.

For the soarer dip beam there is only one choice, PIAA Platinum 9005J - NO CONTEST ! They are brighter/whiter, fit without modification and are "capped" retaining the correct beam pattern unlike other 9005 bulbs which are uncapped and destroy the beam pattern, only problem is the cost :o In the main beam any uprated output bulb would suffice (NOT UPRATED, HIGHER WATTAGE bulbs, they will do damage to the wiring), again the PIAA are the best.

The Soarer single CD/Tape/Tuner unit will have probably an iffy CD player, aint seen one yet that did not skip or reject CD's which is why I had to take out the OEM unit and install a Becker Mexico on my TT. The boot mount changer is also likely to have laser/tracking problems, very few of these are in full working order.

The 4.0Ltr V8 Soarer was not available with a manual gearbox. The insurance is pretty much the same for either model (import loading & similar power outputs). At 25+ you can insure a Soarer fully comp for around £500/600 a year If you can live with mileage restriction (8000mls/yr) you can get Classic Car Insurance for about £300/yr There is a list of Insurers and actual premuims in this post; http://toyotaimportsforum.co.uk/forum/show...light=insurance I am based in Ash, Hants if you want to get intouch and look at some Soarers (I got two on the driveway). Yakuza - V8 GTL

Thought you might like to see the pics; Rest of them are on TIF

Dont know if you resolved this from October but the O/D flashing is the diagnostics warning you there is an issue with the autobox (the O/D is integral on the Soarer box). This can be as simple as a loose plug on the box or a failed sensor, the Soarer has a complex on-board diagnostic system, see my site for info on running the diagnostic routines - SoarerTT If you have any fault codes you will need to get back to me for interpretation. London Bill - Soarer 2.5 Twin Turbo

Buy a Soarer for £4 grand ? One of these days I will produce a "Soarer Buyers Guide", having owned the TT for four years and recently bought a V8 with Air suspension, spent more time at Powerhouse Garage than some of the staff, run the SoarerTT website, co-founded the Toyota Imports Forum and a member of every Soarer specific forum around the world I think I can speak with some authority on the subject. Many Soarers we see in the UK are early 91/92 examples having done well over 100k miles (they can do 200+k miles), even Lexus cars have issues at this age, this includes worn or failed; A/C pump, suspension bushes, valve guides, cam follower rattles, fading 3D speedo's, knacked turbo's, slack boot/bonnet struts, sticky rear calipers, leaking power steering pumps & faulty air struts/suspension sensors on V8's. This is in addition to the normal servicing items of cam belts, ancillary belts, brake discs, rotor caps/arms & leads on the V8's, not to mention oil & filter changes every 5k mls. Straight off you can see that owning a Soarer is not "cheap motoring" a big service on a V8 could set you back £600/700 (the plugs are £120 a set), as they have come down in price in the past few years we are now starting to see them in the hands of "boy racers", these guys will not spend the money to keep the cars up to scratch, run them (neglect them) for a year or two and then get shut when big bills are looming. Go through Loot, E&M ot Autotrader (use the search criteria of SOARER to pick up both Toyota and Lexus advertised cars), and you will see them as cheap as £3.5k why? because they are in need of some attention. Spend £4k on a Soarer and expect to spend another £2k putting it back into good condition. If you are looking for a Soarer then a good service history is crucial, very few arrived from Japan with any service history so it's the past years in the UK which is more important, expect to see several of the bigger items from the top list have been attended to and regular servicing. Servicing should have been carried out by Lexus/Toyota dealers or a specialist like Powerhouse, Intech or JEM and not J.Bloggs around the corner. Reading all this could make you think that an old Soarer is unreliable, that's the wrong impression. With regular servicing and prompt attention to any of the major items the Soarer is very reliable and one of the best sports coupe available. If my 1992 TT was up for sale it would be worth about £7k because of the service history and amount of rectification work. Looks like I have the start off a buyers guide now. London Bill - Soarer 2.5 Twin Turbo.

Tuning a Soarer TT is not unlike any other car but the complex on-board electronics and computer controlled systems make life very difficult. With the automatic box also being computer controlled so you cannot remove the factory ECU (or mod the ECU unless you send it to MINES in Japan). The Apexi S-AFC has proven to be one of the few electronic control devices which is usable on the Soarer, used in conjunction with higher boost levels but 14.5psi @ manifold on the standard CT12a Ceramic turbines is considered the safe MAX pressure before the ceramic wheels disintergrate. I convinced Giles @ Turbo Technics to build some hybrid Steel Wheel turbo's which can produce 2Bar boost (29psi), a bolt on replacement allowing a safe 17/18psi manifold (330bhp) but we are working on getting my TT up to 25psi (400ishbhp) with big exhaust, FMIC, bigger injectors, fuel regulator, stronger blow-off valves. The V8 Soarer is a different issue, not having the turbo's to improve like the TT makes modification difficult, exhaust & inlet mods help to push 300bhp which is a usefull increase but getting beyond that is very hard. Our counterparts in Oz have developed a low profile supercharger which fits under the V8 bonnet, giving 5psi boost on the standard 4.0ltr engine, this may not sound much when we talk of 15/20psi boost on a turbo engine but the supercharger develops extra power from tickover and right through the rev range without the inevitable "turbo lag" or tight power bands we get from the TT. More Tuning Info: Soarer TT Tuning - SoarerTT V8 Supercharging - Planet Soarer