One of the most puzzling cars at last year's SEMA show was a boosted Toyota Avalon. Yes, boosted as in relying on more than mother nature to stuff an engine cylinder full of air. The car was sporting a TRD supercharger with an Eaton Gen 6 TVS rotor assembly along with a slew of suspension and appearance modifications. Toyota apparently decided to leave it with the guys at Motor Trend to put through the tests. A couple of days ago, Motor Trend posted their tests and the numbers were.. interesting. Handling improvements are nothing short of impressive. 6-piston front brake callipers and 4-piston rear ones along with larger, cross drilled rotors help bring the car to a stop from 60 mph in 106 ft, which is sports car territory. Motor Trend was able to record an average lateral acceleration of 0.92 g. To put that into perspective, that puts it right in between two trims of an excellent RWD sedan, the Cadillac ATS. When tested by Motor Trend, the 2.0 litre turbo model was a
A few weeks ago, I made a post explaining mainstream AWD system types and how they compare , pros and cons, etc. including some simple diagrams to show where the power goes and how much. As promised, this post will focus on specific cars and what AWD systems they use, especially ones that that have more or less been defined by their AWD systems, and the best place to start may be with a bombshell; the Nissan GT-R. Nissan GT-R (R35) The GT-R has built a reputation around having monster traction and very approachable performance, thanks to its AWD system - Advanced Total Traction Engineering System for All-Terrain (ATTESA) - and what it can do for you. But the GT-R doesn't actually use the most mechanically sophisticated type of AWD systems discussed in the previous article, namely a "true" AWD with a centre differential. Instead, it uses a clutch pack to transfer power. RWD-based clutch-type AWD schematic - Rams Eye The Track Guy © The R32, R33, and R34 Sky