Forgotten Cool Cars of the 90s

[Dukeryder]

Originally Posted by Hardware02

Didn't those cars have a Yamaha engine?

From what I've heard Yamaha Marine developed the Cylinder heads from scratch and built the bottom end based off of a Ford V-6. The manual gearbox is Mazda.

It is a great looking Engine.


Another forgotten Gem of the 90s was the SE-R.

Nissan has kept the SE-R badge or revivied it a while ago but the Original SE-R was a hell of a sport compact for its' day and quite the sleeper. You could squeak out a 0-60 in 6.9 with just a little tuning and they came stock with an LSD in the gearbox pretty much un-heard of in a factory FWD car at the time.


The tuner kids have all but destroyed most of the CRXs and other hot sport compacts of that time, but there still might be a clean one or 2 SE-Rs out there.

[Dukeryder]

Originally Posted by kobudo28

I worked on the pit crew (12 and 24 hour races) for a team that ran a four car SHO team in the Firestone Firehawk series. They had sponsorship from Ford and the guy who created the teanage mutant ninja turtles. Each car was painted in the colors of each one of the four ninja turtles. We had quite a following with the kids.

The cars were not the fastest in class, but they did better on fuel than most of the otheres and were very reliable. They had a pretty good bark out of the race exhaust too.

Was the car team called "Team Mirage"?

A couple of guys a few years older than me from my home town raced Moto-Cross and one of the Ninja Turtle guys was their sponsor. Larry and Gerry never made it as career MX riders but they rode in the Nationals and even once in Belgium. I remember watching Dowd riding at their practice track when he was just coming up as a top 125cc rider. Team Mirage rode Kawi of course. iirc They sponsored a super bike road racing team too. The Ninja Turtle guys were also from our hometown. I worked in a resort owned by one of them while in High School.

[Tripod]

Originally Posted by Dukeryder

Nissan has kept the SE-R badge or revivied it a while ago but the Original SE-R was a hell of a sport compact for its' day and quite the sleeper. You could squeak out a 0-60 in 6.9 with just a little tuning and they came stock with an LSD in the gearbox pretty much un-heard of in a factory FWD car at the time.


The tuner kids have all but destroyed most of the CRXs and other hot sport compacts of that time, but there still might be a clean one or 2 SE-Rs out there.

My tuner kid dropped this stock 240 (before fauxtoe) so much that he gets hung up on spare change lying in the road. That's a fun little scoot. Forgiving car to wrench on.

[Toadady]

Originally Posted by Dukeryder

From what I've heard Yamaha Marine developed the Cylinder heads from scratch and built the bottom end based off of a Ford V-6. The manual gearbox is Mazda.

It is a great looking Engine.


.

my neighbor's son had one built into a racecar for the FWD class at the dirt track, i think i was the only guy on the block who enjoyed him loading and unloading that thing, with NO exhaust it sounded like 4 sportbikes running at the same time!

[kobudo28]

Originally Posted by Dukeryder

Was the car team called "Team Mirage"?

A couple of guys a few years older than me from my home town raced Moto-Cross and one of the Ninja Turtle guys was their sponsor. Larry and Gerry never made it as career MX riders but they rode in the Nationals and even once in Belgium. I remember watching Dowd riding at their practice track when he was just coming up as a top 125cc rider. Team Mirage rode Kawi of course. iirc They sponsored a super bike road racing team too. The Ninja Turtle guys were also from our hometown. I worked in a resort owned by one of them while in High School.

Woodstock Motorsports.

[Bueller]

Originally Posted by Dukeryder

Another forgotten Gem of the 90s was the SE-R.

Nissan has kept the SE-R badge or revivied it a while ago but the Original SE-R was a hell of a sport compact for its' day and quite the sleeper. You could squeak out a 0-60 in 6.9 with just a little tuning and they came stock with an LSD in the gearbox pretty much un-heard of in a factory FWD car at the time.


The tuner kids have all but destroyed most of the CRXs and other hot sport compacts of that time, but there still might be a clean one or 2 SE-Rs out there.

I bought a red one just like that brand new in 1992. It was a great car with very good performance (especially for a 4 banger). Red line was 7500 RPM, and my poor car lived there.

[Dukeryder]

Here's another one probably nobody remembers but it was the car that got Subaru into the forefront of Rally Racing the Legacy Turbo Sedan, the Impreza came out only a couple years later so it wasn't in the game for long.

Originally Posted by kobudo28

Woodstock Motorsports.

That's still cool that those turtle guys were involved with so many different types of racing! I never knew they sponsored an IMSA Firehawk race car too.

[seriousracer]

Honda crx Si...

mine lived for 21,000 miles on the race track.. we drove it to the races ...when we trailered the neon.

Ahh there you go NEON ACR cars... LOL we made 32k with one...

[Goggles Paisano]

Originally Posted by DriveShaft

I always thought these VW Corrados were pretty nice.

My buddy had a G60 Corrado which had the supercharged four. Still one of my favourite cars I've ever driven. Another buddy had the SC Thunderbird. That was also a hoot.

[soloyosh]

Originally Posted by Dukeryder

From what I've heard Yamaha Marine developed the Cylinder heads from scratch and built the bottom end based off of a Ford V-6. The manual gearbox is Mazda.

It is a great looking Engine.

When I first started with H-D I worked at their Florida proving grounds, FEC. The place used to be run by Ford and H-D leased to them during the winters. I had a 1989 SHO at the time.

One day I was sitting in the break room and a Ford guy came and sat next to me. He asked if the SHO in the lot was mine, then he proceeded to give me the whole history of the thing. He was the lead engineer on a project called GN34 that Roush was developing for Ford. It was basically a Ford Fiero. When Fiero sales began to tank, Ford pulled the plug. The problem was they'd already committed to buy the engines from Yamaha. He said they tried that engine in everything, Mustangs, Aerostars, Rangers, Merkurs, etc. The Taurus was tried because it was a huge seller for Ford and building a small run wouldn't hit the bottom line too bad. Then Nissan started pushing their 4DSC (4 door sports car) idea witht he Maxima and Ford marketing pushed for the Taurus.

At the time my car had 120K miles and the valve lash on the SHO engines needed to be adjusted every 60K. Ford had stopped selling the shims. He dug through his notes and found the Yamaha part number (from an FJ1200). The Yamaha dealer had them in stock.



GN34



A 90s favorite for me:

MR2 Turbo

[fuelish]

What is left of our cool nineties car. It was a 1991 Dodge Spirit R/T, DOHC, turbo, intercooled, five speed, LSD, ABS and heavy duty suspension. One of 1399 built, it only had 80,000 miles and not a single door ding. Unfortunately it was not up to a Camry making a left turn(Blind, across three lanes of oncoming traffic). My wife was driving, she broke her ankle and the steering column even tho the air bag went off. We want to rebuild it, with a donor Spirit.

[Dukeryder]

Originally Posted by soloyosh

When I first started with H-D I worked at their Florida proving grounds, FEC. The place used to be run by Ford and H-D leased to them during the winters. I had a 1989 SHO at the time.

One day I was sitting in the break room and a Ford guy came and sat next to me. He asked if the SHO in the lot was mine, then he proceeded to give me the whole history of the thing. He was the lead engineer on a project called GN34 that Roush was developing for Ford. It was basically a Ford Fiero. When Fiero sales began to tank, Ford pulled the plug. The problem was they'd already committed to buy the engines from Yamaha. He said they tried that engine in everything, Mustangs, Aerostars, Rangers, Merkurs, etc. The Taurus was tried because it was a huge seller for Ford and building a small run wouldn't hit the bottom line too bad. Then Nissan started pushing their 4DSC (4 door sports car) idea witht he Maxima and Ford marketing pushed for the Taurus.

At the time my car had 120K miles and the valve lash on the SHO engines needed to be adjusted every 60K. Ford had stopped selling the shims. He dug through his notes and found the Yamaha part number (from an FJ1200). The Yamaha dealer had them in stock.



GN34



A 90s favorite for me:

MR2 Turbo
[IMG]http://ettenw.org/cars/My-Cars/MyCars/1993%20Toyota%20MR2%20Turbo.JPG]

Ford should've made that instead of the Probe!

[Jimmy the Heater]

I am a RWD fan so my nominations would have to go into that camp

Lincoln Continental Mark 8


Last of the RWD Volvos...The V90. Either with the turbo 4 or an LS1 swap

[DriveShaft]

Originally Posted by Dukeryder

Another forgotten Gem of the 90s was the SE-R.

Nissan has kept the SE-R badge or revivied it a while ago but the Original SE-R was a hell of a sport compact for its' day and quite the sleeper. You could squeak out a 0-60 in 6.9 with just a little tuning and they came stock with an LSD in the gearbox pretty much un-heard of in a factory FWD car at the time.


The tuner kids have all but destroyed most of the CRXs and other hot sport compacts of that time, but there still might be a clean one or 2 SE-Rs out there.

That was my buddy's sleeper. It was pretty damn impressive for a daily driver. His baby, though...was the 3rd gen RX7...

[Bueller]

Originally Posted by fuelish

What is left of our cool nineties car. It was a 1991 Dodge Spirit R/T, DOHC, turbo, intercooled, five speed, LSD, ABS and heavy duty suspension. One of 1399 built, it only had 80,000 miles and not a single door ding. Unfortunately it was not up to a Camry making a left turn(Blind, across three lanes of oncoming traffic). My wife was driving, she broke her ankle and the steering column even tho the air bag went off. We want to rebuild it, with a donor Spirit.

You've got your work cut out for you! That's got a lot of structural damage.