Ep. 305: We Just Bought Toyota's First Ever Sports Car... And We Promise You've Never Heard Of It!

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Hunter, we did something. All right, it's something crazy. And that is I bought Toyota's first sports car. Get out of here. Yeah. Yeah. It's the Supra. It's not a Supra. Oh, 86. It's not an 86. It goes way back into the 60s. It's a car I bet most people know nothing about. And yet the world's biggest auto manufacturer has

a sports car that they built back in the 60s. That was actually, well, they tried to potentially import it to America. And this car has not one, not two, but three firsts. But did they actually important. They did import it here. But then the dealer thought that it was too small. And so the story goes that they just basically like somehow got rid of the ones that they imported. But I'll go into that in a second because this is a fascinating car.

And I'll tell you the entire story because there's a long story on how I got to because I had never heard of this car until this year, either.

But before we do that, people may be wondering, where's Tommy? Because you're the truck guy. Yeah, that's what I want to know. This is a TFO car chat. Where is Tommy?

Tommy just recorded car-ish with the team. And he's kind of he's kind of burned out on podcasts. So he wanted to go get some lunch. And so you were kind enough to step in here and take his place.

And when Tommy does the car-ish, he leaves nothing else on the table.

Those guys are 100% like the rest of the team. And we're really thankful to have Cole here. I mean, he's been podcasting all day.

He's looking a little little little weary as well. He's beckish.

A little worse for wear. Thank you, Cole, for coming in here.

So besides to his first sports car, we're also going to be talking about what we did this week, what we did in cars.

A lot happened, actually. Yeah, we did something crazy. We took Tommy bought a classic Jeep.

That's another reason why he's tired. The CGA too. Civilian Jeep 2A, I believe. And we took it into the TFO mud pit, which was an adventure because we had some guests here from out of state.

Yeah, thank God, because they had to rescue him. And then we did a whole bunch of drag racing. So all that is coming up on this episode.

This is pretty cool of TFL car chat. And by the way, we thank you, our Patreon supporters, patreon.com slash TFL car.

We're also live streaming this podcast. So it's also an opportunity for you to join. Ask us questions in the chat room real time.

Live. Yeah. Yeah. So thank you for joining us. Thank you for making this possible. We couldn't do it without you.

And we're really grateful that you take the time to watch or listen to our podcasts. All right, Andre, so let's get to the Yota Hachi.

That's that's what the Japanese call this car. The Yoda Hachi.

Okay, what do I mean? Toyota Yoda. Okay. It's like it's a Yoda, but I guess the Japanese say Yoda. Yes, we say Toyo. I mean, I guess the Japanese say Yoda.

Hachi means eight because eight. Why eight? What's so first of all, when you first told me this this week, I had no idea about this car.

And I consider myself an enthusiast and, you know, car and truck person. And I didn't know anything about this. So let me take you back in time to the spring.

I was in Japan rewind rewind. And I got to go to Toyota City. I see the headquarters of Toyota. And they have a sort of classic center.

It's not owned by Toyota, but it's kind of adjacent to Toyota. And they showed us some of the cars that they were. Is this the Yota Hachi?

This is not the Yoda Hachi. This is an interesting story. This is the Toyota crown. Okay, I know the crown name. I believe it's a crown. If you go to the next picture, I think it'll say crown.

So it's a Toyota crown. Okay. And this has a dubious distinction of being one of the first totas imported into the United States. And if you go back to the other picture, you can tell it looks kind of like an old American Buick or Chevy maybe something.

And that's on purpose because at that point, Toyota was kind of, you know, we had obviously won the war. So there were a lot of American servicemen in Japan. And so there was a lot of American car industry that influenced the Japanese.

We thought that this car could actually do well in America. And, you know, Toyota has always been known for reliability.

Yeah, they have an eye for it. Yes. And so when this car was made, I believe this was like back in the 50s or early, very early 60s, they had this idea to bring it to America and actually sell it in America.

And they had a publicity stunt. I think the ad agency came up with this crazy publicity stunt where they were going to drive this from Los Angeles to New York.

Great idea. Great idea. Just to show you, you know, everybody knows Toyota today is, was this in the 60s as well? This was like late 50s or really 60s.

Everybody knows that Toyota has, like I said, this incredible reputation for reliability. So they brought the car over. They got the news people together us, the version of us.

We weren't there personally. No. And they said, we're going to launch this thing from LA and next stop is New York. They made it to Vegas before it broke down.

Really? That's a good place to break down actually. No, I mean, it broke down before Vegas. But that's as far as it got before it, like, terminally broke down where it couldn't go any farther. Wow.

Yeah. So, so if you're thinking of Toyota, you know, is known for its reliability. Well, this was like 70 years ago. Yeah, back in the day, not so much.

By the way, looking at the rear of this car. So we were looking at the picture of the kind of the tail lamps and the trunk and the rear section.

It reminds me of a couple of things. Reminds me of something British. Also, the Soviet, there is a Moskvitch. Remember those old Moskvitch with vertical tail lamps like that?

I think there's a lot of designs that were very similar in those years, where somebody, people kept copying each other. Right? It was still doing that today. Yeah, we still do that today.

But it was probably more obvious back then. I like the rear glass. It's kind of interesting the way it really curved. Yeah, the way it's really curved. So this did not sell very well. Yeah, that was not a success. No, it was not a success. And many people out there, if you're classic car, aficionados, especially JDM cars, you may know about this car.

Of course, talking about the 2000 GT. I know this. Yes, 2000 GT. Even I know this. Let me show a picture of that. So that is gorgeous. So what makes this car famous? You know, what brought this car to worldwide attention? This was built in I think 65.

I want to say, is it aerodynamics? Is it amazing design? No, no. Is it the powertrain? No. Is it the lights? No.

I'll give you a hint. They chopped the top off of it because the person driving it was too tall and couldn't fit in it. Oh, is that give you a hint? Call any hints? Nope. It was never built as a convertible, but they, but they chopped the top off of it related to a person who would drive it. It's related to a person who would drive it. It's related to a movie.

What's the most famous movie franchise where cars play an integral role? I'm not talking about fast and furious 007. Exactly. James Bond. So this car was featured in a 007.

Can you Google it call which 007 the 2000 GT was featured in? I think it was what's his name? There you go. Sean Connery, you never lived twice. And there is a car. Oh, Sean.

Yes, you can make a bigger one of the pictures. You'll note. There you go. That's a good picture of it. You'll note that it's a convertible. It's a very attractive car fit for James Bond, except it was never built as a convertible.

I see it. He was too tall. He couldn't fit in it. So he had some. So yeah, well, him or the car him. Sean Connery, I'm talking about it. So they chopped the top off so that he could drive it. And that's how the car became worldwide. No.

No, really known and famous. They only built about 300 of these. And it is said. And if you know better than me, please correct me, but it is said that Akio Toyota, the CEO of Toyota or the chairman of the board now, actually owns two of these cars out of the 300 in the world. And he keeps one here in America. And he has one in Japan. So he has two of them. And they sell for around, you know, a base one like a million dollars.

And more expensive one, probably 1.5. So, you know, scarcity. And of course, movie fame. And of course, being a Toyota. So people think that this is the first Toyota sports car. Sean, there's a picture in the bottom of the front headlights. Cole, can you, can you see my? Oh, pop up ad lamps as well. Yeah, but go go to the one where they're not popped up. Go to the one. Yeah, that one. So look, look, look at the front headlights on that.

And hold, hold that thought. Now, now go back to that. His story. Wait, before we move on. This almost looks also British to me. You know, almost like a Jaguar. You know, I'm saying like, why are we meant to compete with the Jaguar E type? Yeah, it looks very of the same kind of flavor.

And actually, I did some research on this car and back in the day, the Jaguar, I want to say sold for like $6,000 US dollars. This sold for about seven and a half US. And then the Porsche 911, which had competed against as well, sold for like 9,000. So if you were buying this in the 60s, the Jaguar would have been the cheapest.

The Toyota would have been in the middle and the Porsche would have been the most expensive. And if you look at Porsche prices and Jaguar E prices today, you should have bought the Toyota because that by far exceeded the value. Well, it was not many main. Yeah, only 200.

So I mean, any type a good one probably sells between 40 and 60. I'm not sure what like 60s 911 prices are, but they're not 1.5 million. I promise you, they're probably in the hundreds of thousands or, you know, maybe top out at 100,000.

But this would have been the one you should have bought back in 65. If you want, hold on to it and have the most valuable car. Now keep in mind those headlights. Now, now call go back to that picture of the classic restoration center in total city.

Okay. There's another car there that I saw. And it's this car. Did those lights look familiar? Yeah, very similar. The lower part of the 2000 GT looked very similar to this. And then there's another picture of one.

There you go. So this is called the sports 800.

Okay.

And it is Toyota's very first sports car. So this came before 1960.

Yeah. Okay.

And the 2000 GT about 65. This was built from like 60 to about 65. And it has three distinctions. Now this is the first time I saw the car.

First and foremost, these cars are tiny. You saw the one we bought. Yeah. And I walked up to it. This was just yesterday.

And like we've recently had the original mini, right? We have a Fiat 500. And this in my mind looks almost because it's shorter.

It's shorter than the Fiat 500, Cinco Cento. It's it's tiny. It's tiny. And so there's three distinctions that it has. And we'll show you ours a second.

The number one, I've already said, it's Toyota's very first sports car, which I think is significant because you know, world's biggest car manufacturer.

This is the the genesis of the beginning. Yeah.

The taproot of where to, you know, where everything that is today's Supra, that is, you know, the Lexus LFA.

This is where I began right there. This is the start of like, I'm now afraid because did you pay a million dollars for this car?

No, I'll tell you how much we paid the second. I'll make you wait for that. They're not as expensive as you think, especially given that they've built only about 3000 of these.

Okay. And it's estimated they're only about 300 left. And that was actually the scary part of buying this because you cannot get parts for this.

You cannot go to your local Toyota dealer. No, there are no parts for this. I mean, none. You have to either fabricate them. And I'm talking about everything.

I'm talking about glass. I'm talking about vendors. I'm talking about engine. Oh, skip the head there, Cole.

Oh, give him a little peek of what's coming. Yes.

So I'm a little worried because if it breaks, we ain't fixing it.

Well, we know some good people. Mechanics. We don't know fabricators.

We could probably fix the mechanical part. David can fix anything.

Okay. You can buy anything. Okay. I'm not sure he could fix this because this has got to be fixed right. Anyway, so that's number one.

Number two, if you look at that top, that is a target top. Really?

So it's the world's first target top. People think it's the Porsche 911 Targa. This beat it by about a year.

So James Bond should have driven this car. Well, I sat in it. And we don't have the top on ours.

Yeah. And that's because I don't think I would fit with the top on.

So first target. And then it's got a third distinction. And that is it's the first Japanese sports car ever to be sold both in left and right hand drive.

Really? Okay.

And the reason for that is at the time, and still today, I believe there was a large contingent of American soldiers on Okunawa

and two to thought that this would be a car that they could sell to them. So they built it in both right and left hand drive.

So is ours left and drive? It's a JDM. It's a left hand drive model. Sorry, right and right.

The left hand drives are more valuable because there's so few of them, even though there's only like three of these 300 of these left.

All right. Shall we go and show them the ones that we bought?

Yes. Let's show you guys what we end up buying. So this is the one that we bought.

I've got three pictures of it. Oh, there it is. There it is. Yes. So there's there's a front of it.

I like the little yellow light in the grill. Oh, yeah. I can see that now.

How cool is that, huh? It's almost like a rally, little rally car. Yeah.

So this doesn't have the original tires and wheels. Original wheels were so tiny. I think there were 13 inch wheels.

So a lot of people did the swap where they put the Mazda Miyada wheels on it.

So those are Mazda Miyada wheels for, I think the NA wheels.

And then the previous owner, a Charlie friend of mine here who runs a Toyota garage, who sold it to us,

actually took the little bumperettes off. So if you remember the red car, these look like bumperettes.

We're missing those bumperettes. Charlie's still looking for them. So I want them because obviously this is such a unique car.

But you can see the target top there. Yeah, because the top is removed.

And I haven't gotten inside of this car yet. I haven't been able to, you know, to start it or anything like that.

But it just looks super cool. By the way, if I saw this at like a car's and coffee from a distance,

I would have no idea it was a Toyota. Yeah, I wouldn't. I wouldn't know.

It doesn't. It just does what you see the T on the, on the, yeah, on the steering wheel.

But I'm not used to seeing that symbol per say.

And then there is the back end of it. And you can see that glass is really cool.

Why is everything looks like a fisheye picture?

Maybe Tommy took it with the fisheye lens. I don't know.

But this is a running and driving example. Now it's interesting because it is a two cylinder box or engine.

Okay. Isn't that crazy? Back in the day, this would have been like a Porsche two cylinder boxer puts out a total of 44 horsepower.

Now when Toyota did this car, Nissan also had a sports car and so did Honda.

And so they were competing against the Nissan and the Honda except Honda had an engine out of one of their motorcycles.

So they did not have an engine that produced enough horsepower.

Like I said, this thing, you know, knew was making 44 horsepower. By the way, get so much of ways.

2,000 pounds 1300 1300 pounds. Yeah. And so one of the things that Toyota did to try to keep it competitive with the Nissan.

Actually, Datsun at the time, if I'm being precise, which it should be, was they wanted to lightweight it.

And so the hood, the targa and the trunk are all made of aluminum.

Okay. Now because it's aluminum, it would be harder to fix.

Yes. You know, steel, you know, most people know how to weld steel.

Aluminum is a little bit more involved. I mean, now you're working with a softer metal basically.

And there's some of the cool things about this car. So the designer came from Datsun.

Okay. And the engineer who did it, like the chief engineer was a Toyota engineer and he was from the aerospace industry.

At that time, he was a plain engineer. And so if you look at it, you can see that it's super aerodynamic.

And that's why there's aluminum used in even the seats.

There's aluminum used in the construction of the car because that came right out of the aerospace industry.

So even though they didn't have a motor that was powerful enough to compete with the Datsun at the time,

they did have the aerodynamics and lightness on their side.

Now they borrowed the designer from Datsun at the time.

So this was actually designed by a Datsun designer.

And then I believe eventually he went on to work at Toyota for a long time.

And he has another distinction. And that is he also designed the world's most popular car.

You know what that is?

People think it's a beetle. It's the Corolla.

Exactly. Really?

Yeah. So he did this and he did the first Corolla.

And Corolla has sold something like, I could be wrong.

We could be wrong. But it's in the 30 or 50 million Corolla's in the world.

Yeah.

Which way out souls the beetle.

And so that is by far the world's most popular car.

So he did that as well.

That's amazing. That's very cool.

Have you driven that already?

I have not driven it yet.

Wow.

We just picked it up.

Tommy just brought it over. So I have I have yet to drive it.

But I have sat in it.

And I fit.

I thought I'd be looking out the top of the A pillar.

But actually I'm looking through the glass.

The only problem is it like my back of my head hits the back of the.

Oh, the target section there.

The target section there.

Yeah. So I think in a car accident, it might come my head.

Well, if you are facing a super duty in this car, you don't have a lot of choice at chances.

Yeah, it's hard to describe how I'm how tiny it is.

Yeah.

So I think it's a K car.

I'm not sure it's a K car.

It's not as tiny as that.

No, it's not as tiny.

Or maybe I don't think it's close.

I don't think it's as tiny as I don't think it was I don't think that they were K cars around yet when this was done.

So now 800.

I'm assuming now it refers to the displacement of the exactly 799 cc.

Okay.

Because K vehicles, K cars, K vans, they I think are usually 660, right?

CC.

So this is a little bit larger engine than a K vehicle was he.

So we put, we did a little time, we did a little like TikTok video a little short.

We put it up there and people are saying it's a K car.

It's not a K car.

I think this, like I said, it precedes the K cars in Japan.

And the engine is too big anyway.

It's 800, well, 799 cc.

It's a huge displacement engine.

You know, we also have a Viper with 8,000 cc's.

It's the exact opposite.

We've got the Ying and Ying of course cars.

The other cool thing about it is it will apparently cruise at 100 kilometers all day long.

So 60 miles an hour is not problem with the top speed of 100 miles an hour.

Okay.

So it'll get up to 100 miles an hour, which and apparently what I've read about it and what I've seen in some,

there's not a lot of videos on it because it's such a rare car.

They will, you know, go up to about 100 miles an hour and they're pretty rock solid.

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The problem with them is that, you know, they only built 3,000

and it's estimated that there's only 10% of them left in the world.

Because, of course, the steel at that time in Japan wasn't exactly galvanized,

it wasn't exactly thick, and so many of them rusted away,

and then the ones that didn't rusted away were used as parts for the ones that were still alive.

Because, like I said, you're not going to find that boxer.

It's not going to be easy to replace.

In Japan, they're much loved.

Like I said, the nickname for them is Yoda Hachi or Toyota 8,

even though it's a sport 800.

So, I am over the moon, my man, that we've got this,

because I feel like out of all the cars that we bought,

this is the first real classic car that is real history.

That is significant.

Do you know, does it have a Venn?

Does it have any like a serial number that you could trace back?

It's kind of in, but it's very short.

Four digits.

I think if you're thinking about doing a car fax,

you're probably barking outside of our tree.

So, it came from Japan.

It was imported from Japan.

Charlie, I think that there's maybe a dozen of these things in America,

or more, but not a lot.

Like I said, it came from Japan.

Charlie, who we used to fix our Toyota mechanic,

this was kind of his dream car.

And we end up trading.

He loves quirky cars.

Charlie loves crazy cars.

Well, this is also kind of quirky.

This is quirky.

So, we end up trading our two CV or douchey-vote two CV.

So, the Citroen is gone.

The Citroen is gone.

So, we traded that plus some cash.

We basically paid 27,000 for it,

which is what the last one sold for on Bring a Trailer,

which was a right hand drive.

The last left hand drive that sold on Bring a Trailer,

and there's like three of these that have been sold

in America on Bring a Trailer period.

That's sold for 40.

So, it's worth anywhere from 27 to 40,000.

But I think over time, this being...

It would gain value.

Yeah.

So, the coolest thing are those headlights.

There's like glass.

There's glass.

Oh, it's aerodynamic.

Yeah.

It's covered.

I'm just thinking to myself,

if you break that glass, good luck.

Right, because you're never going to get that glass.

What about like a windshield?

I mean, that's another...

I mean, I know people, you know,

you can order custom windshields, you can order custom...

I mean, now you can make anything, right?

You could 3D brand things.

Well, like when we were trying to insure it

with our friends at Haggerty,

Yes.

And we went to put it in there,

and usually they have all the classic...

No.

That wasn't one of the things, you know.

No?

There wasn't a choice.

No, for sports 800.

No, there's no sports 800 in the Haggerty.

Like I say, there may be a half a dozen of these things

in America.

You know, Haggerty eventually...

Well, now I also ensure this is not a Haggerty commercial.

No, it's not.

We're not a Haggerty company, so...

But I'm just being sure that my Buhanka,

my low-fit bread, with them, too.

Did they have...

No, they did not.

They had the SUV version, you know,

the little Jeep version of it.

But now they have also a van version of it.

So there you have it.

There is TFL's newest classic,

and I think this may be a truly significant classic

where...

I can't wait to hear it run...

It kind of sounds like the 2CV.

It's got that very similar sound.

It's very quiet.

It sounds like...

But it's four-stroke, right?

So it's not like a...

It's a two-stroke.

No, it's a four-stroke.

Sorry, it is a four-stroke.

Yeah, four-stroke.

So it's not like...

And it's a boxer.

It's a boxer.

It's a boxer, two-cylinder, four-stroke.

So basically, the cylinders are horizontal, right?

And they're just kind of pushing.

Yeah, they're low in the body to keep your...

You know, your center of gravity low.

I don't have a picture of the engine bay,

if you were to look at the engine bay,

it looks like you could fit like a Chevy LS in there.

Because that engine looks...

It's teeny tiny.

It's also manual, of course, which is great.

And yeah, I mean, if you zoom in on the gauges,

it's very basic.

So you can tell you've got a kilometer meter there for kilometers.

Oh, I see like a 5,000 RPM red line.

Yeah, starting at one.

One seat belt for the driver.

The passenger doesn't need one, do they?

No.

And this being Japan in the 60s, of course,

the most important thing is you do have an ass tray

and a cigarette lighter.

Absolutely.

Of course, absolutely.

And then you've got all your temperatures there.

You can see them in the middle.

So a techometer, a speedometer.

And I think that T was to it as old, like logo.

Logo, yeah.

Because it says...

It doesn't say to it anywhere on the car.

It just...

Yeah, it's just a sports 800.

Like I said, I would not recognize Toyota.

If I came up to it at first.

And if you look, like at the door there,

you can see that it's a little wonky.

All the seals are pretty bad.

So we bought it, we bought...

Charlie has a new seals for it.

So we're going to have to get some seals.

So it's...

I think it's been repainted a bunch.

I mean, these cars have not had...

This is a driver, this is not...

This is not a trailer queen.

And I forget how many kilometers it had.

I think it was around like 90,000 maybe,

or 80,000, so about 50,000 miles.

That's quite a lot, actually.

That's...

Yeah, I think so.

I could be wrong.

I don't know if you can see it on there.

But I see eight something.

But I don't think that...

I think that maybe a trip, a dominer?

Not a total dominer?

Yeah.

So yeah.

So it's...

You know, it's...

It's kind of rough in some ways.

But, you know, for being such a...

Such a significant car for Toyota,

I'm just...

Like I said, over the moon to actually have one.

And it's got a connection to the 2000 in the way.

A little bit of the styling connection.

Yeah.

Kind of, yeah.

Yeah.

You can Google Pro...

You know, it's called the publica.

The Toyota publica.

I think it's publica.

Concept.

That's where it came from.

Concept.

Oh.

So go...

So yeah.

So go...

Wow.

So the publica...

Go to the one, the black one.

Wow.

It looks like a little cartoon car.

Yeah.

So that...

So the publica was Toyota's kind of like basic run-around car.

So it had the same engine as this.

And when they built the concept,

you could see that they did like almost...

This isn't the 60s, right?

They did like a sliding top.

Yeah.

That kind of moves backwards.

It kind of moves backwards as I see it.

Yeah.

And that's where the sports 800 came from.

But because they only had the same engine that was in the publica,

which is this little tiny boxer, 44 horsepower,

then they decided that the sliding top was going to be too heavy.

And the cars that wasn't going to be very fast,

if they kept that mechanism.

So they created the target top.

And that's where the target top got started.

I gotcha.

Yeah.

It's got kind of a cool sort of sense.

Yeah.

So that...

What you was an auto show?

It was just like in 1960.

I think that was like the Tokyo Motor Show in the 1960s.

And that's where it came from.

Does it tell you it should say in the Wiki page?

First sports car.

Yeah.

I love the grill, too.

It also has a little bit of character to it as well.

So anyway.

Oh, look, it says the publica was inspired by the Citroën 2CV.

How crazy is that?

Yeah.

Which also used the 2 cylinder.

Yeah.

Oh.

So now I see where Charlie is coming from.

Yeah.

And our 2CV also had...

Yeah.

Most TVs were 600 TCs.

The ours was also the bigger 800.

So...

It was a Charlie trade at this...

Yeah.

He's the same engine for the same engine.

Yeah.

Exactly.

Except the 2CV is ginormous compared to the Yodohachi.

Yes.

Very cool.

So Tommy's...

I guess there's one guy who lives in Northwestern America who knows all about these cars.

So Tommy wants to get some more information from him before we do the video.

And that is coming soon to TFL Classics.

But let's talk about the video that's on TFL Classics this weekend.

So if you're listening to this over the weekend, you should head over to all TFL and check out this video

because Tommy did something crazy.

But wait.

Yes.

Jonathan is here in the chat room.

Thank you, Jonathan.

He was asking you a little bit more about the car.

What year is our...

I think it's a 65 maybe?

I could be wrong.

65.

Or yeah, I think.

I don't know.

That's a good question.

So Tommy's going to do a full video about this.

Yes.

So no worries.

You'll get all the details and with the experts and everything else.

The good news.

Being a 65, we don't have to smog it.

Same goodness.

Seven, 1976 is the cutoff.

So we don't have to worry about that.

Thank you.

Yeah.

So this weekend, we're going to publish a really fun video that you were part of as well.

I was there.

So Tommy went and did something crazy.

He went and bought a 1946 CJA.

I think it's a 2A.

So CJA stands for civilian jeep.

And we did something that...

Or he did something that...

I was very proud of him for doing it because it's very difficult to do this.

And we did this with a guest who came up from Texas.

Thank God.

So you want to tell this story because I just...

Sure.

Why don't you tell the story of what Tommy did and what the guest did?

Well, first of all, I was a little bit surprised by Tommy's purchase.

Because...

There's a picture of it there.

I think I'll start it to you.

I was a little surprised about the jeep because I mean, we have another Wheeler's jeep.

We have a 1945, right?

Which is pristine military spec, amazing, amazing machine that we have.

And then also what happened about the same time.

Is a very nice gentleman, Charlie, reached out to us.

A different Charlie, Charlie from Texas.

And he said, I have some cool trucks.

Oh, wow.

Yeah, this is coming up.

And he has a supercharger from 150 and he has a recovery truck.

He owns a towing business, towing and recovery Miller.

We're showing that right now.

Yeah.

So the red truck, if you're watching us, you can kind of see a super duty.

This is an F350 pickup truck.

But it's also modified as a tow vehicle.

So he's got a giant hydraulic crane in the bed.

It still has the bed.

And it's got many different winches.

And Charlie and his wife, Cindy, came out all the way from basically Houston,

which is a thousand miles away.

I just air dropped you that little video that we cut.

Cool.

So you have it.

Yeah.

And we were gonna do some videos with Charlie, right?

But then at the same time, Tommy says,

I want to take my new Jeep CJ2A into the mud pit.

And I was wondering if that was a good decision because it's deep.

Very deep.

Yeah, let me give you some background on this.

So we also have, we have a military Jeep, right?

We have a World War II Jeep.

Yeah.

So the last year that the military Jeep was built was 1945.

Yes.

And so we have a completely restored World War II.

We'll use it.

And you've seen videos with this.

You've seen videos with this.

And obviously that one being completely restored is very nice.

And we don't want to put it in harm's way.

These military jeeps are getting rare.

And that's a true American classic.

And so out of the blue, Tommy decided to buy the next year of production,

which is the first year they built the civilian Jeep.

I think that's the first year.

I could be wrong.

But so they built obviously this Jeep,

which looks just like the military Jeep and has basically the same powertrain.

It's basically the military Jeep without, you know, all of the military stuff.

Yeah, like the headlamps are slightly different.

A little bit bigger.

And it's a different color, right?

So it's not the same military color, basically.

Yeah.

Like they move the gas filler from under the seat to the sides.

We'd have to lift up the seat because the gas tank is still in the seat.

So he bought this thing from a guy who bought it for a farmer in Colorado.

And I got to say he paid 5,000 for this.

And he'll say this himself.

He did not get the best version.

He bought it as a project.

But I don't think that what I don't think he was looking for a pristine example.

Uh-huh.

Was he?

I don't think he was looking for a pristine example.

I don't think he was looking for a vehicle that had this many issues.

So the guy converted it from 6 volt to 12 volt, which is nice.

But it almost start down fire because apparently the fuel gauge,

time he said he touched the fuel gauge and he was burned his fingers.

Because apparently the fuel gauge does not work with a 12 volt system or the way it was set up.

The engine was kind of running on three cylinders sort of kind of.

And then case was there too, filming with Tommy.

And case told me that he touched one of the spark plug wires

and felt electricity running through it.

So it was like arcing basically.

And then the transmission pops out a second, which is a common problem.

So that's bad.

But perhaps the worst thing about it is there's just a lot of rust in the tub.

Okay.

I kind of feel like Tommy wants to do this as a project vehicle

and spend the winter restoring it.

But you know a new tub for this cost about $3,000 give or take.

I think the engine is sort of solid but he's going to have to get a new transmission

or have that rebuilt.

But then he put it underwater too.

Well then we're getting to that.

Yeah.

The tires are kind of bald.

I mean he's got a Jeep here that he could put easily $10,000, $15,000 into.

That's going to be a $10,000 Jeep.

But don't tell his wife though.

No, I'm going to do not tell his wife.

He's now working.

Never mind.

You put $2,000 into it.

It's a $5,000 Jeep.

It'll be worth $20.

He's not listening.

No, I hope not.

Okay.

Anyway, so he bought himself quite the project.

And he was brave.

But case was brave to take it through the TFL model.

Should we show him the video?

Yeah, let's show them a little taste.

He went through all the videos.

So there they go.

First of all, they go sideways a little bit.

Yeah.

And then this does not have locking differentials.

Open diffs.

But these CJ's are known to be absolute monsters.

So if you're not watching this on YouTube, Tommy is in this giant mid-pile.

And now case is driving.

And he got out of the first hole.

And there they go into the second hole.

And keep in mind that this is now up to like the open doors of the Jeep.

And actually case makes it through.

And Tommy had...

He's wearing waiters on purpose because he knew this was happening.

And then they go into the third hole which was very deep and the thing goes...

And it kind of dies.

Well, it's still running there.

You can see that.

Yeah, it's running.

The water.

And I had flashbacks to my experience in Utah from a decade ago,

where I kind of almost drowned in a humvee.

Now case, just put his speed up because he's...

Tommy's driving in cases, past and during.

And water is now filling the...

Filling the inside.

Yeah, because we're up to the top of the wheels.

And then they're wondering what they should do.

And we're like, you know what?

Just turn off.

Don't get water into the engine.

And then this is where your friend comes in with this record.

Yeah, Charlie and his F-350 and his winches and his cranes.

Well, this is not very heavy, right?

The CJ-2A was about 2,000 pounds maybe.

Yeah.

So they were able to easily winch it out.

And there's another thing that I kind of forgot about when we were kind of doing this.

When you stop the engine and the exhaust pipe is underwater,

water starts to come in the exhaust system, right?

So now the exhaust system is fully filled with water.

So then when they restarted the Jeep,

now, well, you could see the water leaking out of the little pipe.

Exhaust pipe.

But that may have been water getting in.

I think a lot of the exhaust doesn't come out that little hole at the end.

I think that exhaust system is so rusted through that it may have gotten in underneath,

you know, from like what was left of the muffler.

So I'm not sure that was actually getting into the...

And so we did not improve the Jeep by doing this.

No, and what makes these Jeep so incredible off-road,

they're flat fenders, right?

Because this is...

There's a whole flat, Rick Payway is probably the best-known flat fender guy.

Yeah.

He goes to Easter Jeep Safari, good friend of the channel.

He has a bunch of these.

You know, they've got these little hurricane.

No, sorry, gold devil.

Hurricane.

I think eventually got a hurricane.

Eventually it was called hurricane.

Okay, but these were the gold devil engines that were from the military Jeep,

so they're not very powerful.

They're four cylinder engines.

But they're tough.

Really supposed to be tough, right?

But what makes these things so incredible is that they're so light.

It's like when you're, you know, in motorsports, lightness makes for better performance.

And these are about as light as a Jeep as you can get.

Now there is no roll bar, so God help you if you roll it.

Yeah.

You know, it's still...

You've got to pop out.

You've got to jump out and run away.

Yeah, hope you could run away from the rolling Jeep.

Yeah.

So that was our kind of our misadventure.

And both we did two videos at that.

You want to talk about the second video because that was kind of your video.

Yeah, yeah, because Charlie and I, Charlie Miller and I were driving the F-350,

which is a pretty massive truck.

And we did the whole video.

You know, I wanted to learn about his truck and also take it through the same obstacle, right?

And his truck weighs almost 10,000 pounds.

If that Jeep weighs 2000, this F-350 with the crane inside of it weighs five times as much.

And actually, we got a little bit hung up in one of those obstacles in the mud pit.

But we got out.

I mean, he's got, of course, four low rear locking differential.

But this Jeep is small as it is, Roman.

And as light as it is, it just made it look simpler.

You know, going up and down until it, of course, stopped.

And of course, the Ford was able to go through all this stuff and pull out the Jeep.

And Tommy, if you saw in the video war, waiters, because he knew that the Jeep was going to get wet.

And he knew that the thing didn't have any ground clearance to not get water into it.

The problem was he didn't wear like the traditional waiters, which were like overalls.

Right.

Well, there were the go up to his waist kind of crotch area.

Yeah.

And then at the end of this, he took him off.

And basically, they're filled with water.

Because when he was pushing case up, you know, through that first mud pit, he managed to fall in.

Well, it was really slick.

Yeah, it was.

Of course, yeah.

So it was quite the TFO misadventure.

And then if you guys out there have any tips or a CJ2A transmission,

or an exhaust system, or a tub, or you know, or donor Jeep, because these things aren't that expensive.

So he got his for five.

But you know, there's a pristine one that somebody, a lot of people converted these into military Jeep.

So they made them look like a military Jeep.

There's one I create just right now that someone's selling for 10.

I was almost tempted like Tommy, just buy the $10,000 one.

But I think that's not the point.

He wants the tinker, right?

He wants the tinker with it.

So this case, so they're both super excited.

I just have, I just have a hard time wrapping my head around, you know, doing this one,

when you could buy one for a lot less that is already done.

But that's just me.

So I can't blame Tommy.

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Well, they have time on their side.

Youth on their side.

Youth and time.

So they can do a lot more without thinking that they're missing out on stuff in life.

A lot of life still that they can enjoy.

So let's go to the other video that we did.

And that is we went and did three drag races this week.

One of them will also be up on it.

And the week is not done yet.

It's the first one and then we'll tell you what it is.

So let's just roll that drag race.

So as you can see, we've got two vehicles.

And unlike most TFL videos, these two cars actually compete.

You want to tell them what they are?

So, unloan this week we had a new GR Corolla, which is a hot hatch.

Which is very exciting.

Really sporty car, three cylinder engine, 300 horsepower, very, very sweet.

And our producer Zach recently purchased a Subaru WRX.

Which is not a hatchback per se, but kind of in a similar vein in a similar class as this GR Corolla.

Now they compete, right?

Because they're both hot hatches.

So it's pitch.

They're both all will drive.

One's a three cylinder.

One's a four cylinder boxer.

Yes.

And I believe that the Corolla has more horsepower than the WRX.

Yes.

And I wasn't there actually.

So I have no idea what happened as far as racing is concerned.

Well, let's roll that video and show them what happened.

So you can see it was a surprise.

I keep in mind we're mile above sea level.

But they're, I think they're both turbos, right?

Yep.

Yeah, so three.

Okay, so there they go.

I see the GR Corolla jumped ahead.

But the Subaru is keeping up.

Let's horse power.

I see.

Okay.

All right.

It's hard to tell from this angle.

And luckily, Andre, just because of that, I have another angle.

So Cole, if you go to like the third one, we have another angle at it.

I think it's that one.

Okay.

So that's me shooting it from the finish line.

No, this is a roll race.

I'm trying it.

Okay.

I think you want one too many.

Go back one video.

This is a roll race.

It might be that one.

Yeah.

Oh, that's what I see.

I see.

So that's the, that's it from the finish line.

So here they are.

Okay.

They're coming towards you.

Yeah.

I gotcha.

Yeah.

Wow, it's close.

No way.

Are we allowed to say what happened?

Yeah, sure.

Subaru one.

Yeah.

I'm surprised because Subaru has less power.

Yeah.

I know.

It's a shocker.

Okay.

And I think the reason.

Yeah.

I want you to roll back just a little bit and you can kind of see.

So there goes the Subaru.

It's pretty close.

Maybe by a couple of carlinks.

Yeah.

Maybe a couple of carlinks.

There's the Subaru crossing the finish line first.

Uh-huh.

And here comes a GR3.

Two.

Three.

Three carlinks.

Maybe three.

And the reason for this is because it's almost impossible to launch that GRCrola.

It just always bugs.

Okay.

It doesn't matter how high you're revving it out.

It won't allow you.

It won't.

No, you can't rev it up.

So we did a race with this last week.

I forget what I raced now with it.

You raced me in the Viper.

In the Viper.

Yes.

And I, Kay said you got to just be cruel to the car.

You got to drop the clutch.

Which is hard for us to do.

Which is hard.

I have a lot of mechanical sympathy.

But I did.

I took up the RPM to like 5,000.

And then we dropped the clutch.

And it didn't take off.

It just bogged.

And so once it gets going, it starts to like, starts to walk on the Subaru, but it's too late.

But if the race was another half a mile, the GR will be ahead.

But I think the point of the GRCrola is really not straight line speed.

Really the point.

And also the WRX to some extent is curves.

Right.

These cars love going around curves, being on maybe on a track.

Or a mountain road as well.

So that's the strength of that.

Now we had a previous GRCrola office.

And Kayce was able to drop the clutch on that one.

And so we did some digging.

And people in the comments are saying these newer ones you can't like drop the clutch on.

Or there may have been something wrong with the one that we have.

Because it really did seem to underperform compared to the previous one.

So I don't know Andre.

We'll publish that video.

But I just don't know.

Now the other race we did, and I think there's another one there, Cole.

I think I shot that one too.

The last one.

Because the Supra was also there, right?

Yes.

So we also had a Supra.

So we did another race.

This is a final addition, Supra.

Because the Supra as it is now is basically going away, right?

Yeah.

So stop it for a second.

Go back again.

Don't show the finish yet.

So what we wanted to do was race to GRCrola against the Supra.

Uh-huh.

Which we did.

And you could probably guess which one won.

I'm guessing the Supra because the Supra has way more power to what?

382 horsepower, yeah.

Yeah.

You know, that's a lot more.

And then we brought our C8 Stingray.

Did you have to?

Yes, we have to.

Okay.

And we wanted to race the Stingray against the Supra.

It kind of makes sense because on paper, both of those cars are kind of under four seconds here to 60.

Yes.

And they should be pretty comparable.

Well, okay.

They're not that comparable because the Stingray has at least a hundred horsepower.

Yes.

But we are at a mile above sea level.

And Corvette does not have a turbo.

And the Stingray is naturally aspirated, like you said.

Whereas the Supra is a turbocharged, you know, three liters.

Straight, straight, straight.

And it's blindingly fast.

So going into it on paper, we thought that the Supra could potentially take the Corvette.

Yes.

I think weight wise, it's also a lighter.

They're similar.

Or maybe lighter.

It's just a tad lighter than the Corvette.

So we thought, well, let's give it a shot.

So this first race, I believe, was the one where we didn't use launch control.

We just floored it.

So roll the video call.

Let's show them what happened here.

So the roll super close to the camera.

Here they come.

Cross the line.

It looks like Corvette is ahead.

Quite a bit.

Yes.

But once again, like two or three links.

Two or three links.

Let's roll it again slower so you can kind of see the finish line.

So we did the non-launch control.

Like I said, they both have launch control drag race.

And the Corvette.

Just one this one.

One this one.

By the way, the Supra was also the automatic version of it.

Yeah, very good.

They both automatic.

Because there is also a Supra with a manual.

Yeah.

And speaking of the Supra.

That's the final edition, I think.

So it's not that cheap.

I want to say it's 71,000 and change.

Yeah.

And we paid 72,000 because our Corvette's a 2020.

So price.

They're the same price.

So they're the same price.

Yeah.

I don't know.

I think if I had enough money and we were not doing this business,

we were just buying cars, I would purchase the Supra.

Because I think it's underrated and I think it's going to appreciate.

Not the automatic one, but the manual one.

I think when it first came out, here's the problem with the Supra.

I was at the launch of the Supra and it first came out.

People were just rubbed the wrong way that basically wasn't built by Toyota.

So it's built by Magna and Austria.

Well, when you open the door and then you Supra and you look inside,

you could see some switch gear from my BMW.

Yeah.

So it's built on the same line as the BMW Z4.

It has the same engine.

It has the BMW and obviously powertrain.

It has the BMW shifter.

It has a lot of BMW infotainment.

And so it was kind of people were saying like,

this is kind of this unholy alliance between companies and people wanted Toyota.

Like with the sports 800 to actually create their own car.

Like the Mark IV.

Yes.

Super.

The original one.

Not the original, but the...

So this was four years ago now.

Yes.

And people were, you know, platform sharing.

People were just not happy about it.

But over those four years, the engine in the Supra has proved to be incredibly tunable.

Just like the Mark IV was.

And I forget what the Mark IV was.

To JZ engines, which is a famous engine.

Yes.

So there is similarities.

And this time is marched on.

And as, you know, manuals have died.

You can't get one in the lot of cars.

And Supra brought back the manual.

Yes.

All of a sudden, this car is starting to have a lot of like buzz around it.

And I'm thinking,

you remember when the last 200 series to the Land Cruiser came out?

Yes.

The Heritage Edition?

Yes.

That never went down in price.

No.

And I think there's still the same price, right?

Like $80,000, $90,000.

And if you want to get one, that's like, whatever it is now, two years old.

You're still the same $80,000.

Yes.

I think that may be the same case with this.

Especially if you get the final edition, Supra, with the manual.

The caveat there is you have to get the manual if you want the value.

Something interesting happened after the race.

We were going back to the office.

Yes.

And I saw, and our videographer Ian was also behind the wheel.

And I knew Ian was behind me in the Supra.

But then I saw an identical car in front of me.

And I thought Ian has passed me.

But it was not possible in my mind.

It was an identical car.

Somebody else was driving, which was red, with black wheels.

It looked like a final edition.

You don't see many Supras on a day-to-day basis.

Especially I didn't call Raddle.

You might see more like LA.

Yeah, probably.

But there's two identical Supras driving next to me.

On the way home.

That was quite special.

But the other car had a custom exhaust pipe.

People tune them.

People tune a lot of them.

So Jordan says, the Supra does not deserve all the hate he gets.

I couldn't agree more, dude.

I think that the car is a much better car.

Now, I do have some complaints about it.

And it's the same complaint I've had ever since they built it.

First and foremost, the roof line kind of comes down on the side.

So I look into the roof when I look.

And this would keep me from actually buying the car.

In order to get into it, I almost have to do one of those police moves,

where they put your head down to get you in the back seat.

Because I almost have to do that to myself.

Otherwise, I hit my head.

And it could be because I'm old and no longer a limber.

But it also could be because I've got a tall body.

And it's like the Miata.

It's just built for shorter people.

How about you?

How do you fit it?

I don't fit verbal into it either.

That's another issue.

But I mean, there's many other people who do fit in it.

So...

So you're an inch taller than me.

Yes.

But for tall people, it's not really the car for them.

Yeah, I agree.

And that's a shame because over the last three or four years,

I've really gotten to like the car.

I think that the styling is unusual.

I mean, in that video, we showed it with the Corvette.

It's the exact diametrical opposite.

It's kind of...

It's curvy.

It's curvy, yeah.

Whereas the Corvette is like jet fighter

and all the exacting horizontal vertical lines.

I think the nail, the styling of it.

The styling was...

Do you like the styling?

Which one would you rather have from?

If you hit one.

Because they're both the same price.

Which would you buy if it was based just on styling?

Would you buy the C8 or would you buy the Supra?

Oh, jeez.

I don't like the Corvette.

Yes.

I don't like the base C8 design.

Because it seems like the wheel.

The wheel width.

The wheels are a little bit inside the body.

Yes.

And I don't like it.

I want to feel like it's like a sports car

that wants to push its wheels way out

and be kind of muscular.

So based on that, I would go to Yorah.

I just love the correct performance, I guess.

A little bit more.

And I fit in the Corvette a little bit better.

Let us know in the comments below.

If you had something $72,000.

Right now.

Right now, which is what both least cost.

Would you rather buy a 220 LT3?

Which means the Corvette's got heated seats, cooled seats.

It's got all the options.

Head's up display.

Of course, 400.

And because it's got the Z51 package,

495 horsepower, I want to say.

Yeah.

Or would you buy the Supra?

Let us know.

Yeah, let us know.

What would you do?

Well, we know.

We bought the Corvette.

Well, yeah.

Based on the fact that I'm not fitting super well in the Supra,

I would buy the Corvette.

Okay.

Yeah.

How about you, Cole?

Corvette?

Supra.

He said Supra.

He thinks it's cool.

I'm not disagreeing with you.

I think it's a really cool car.

And it's also much more rare.

Like Corvettes.

Yeah, you could see Corvettes here and there.

Corvettes are pretty much everywhere.

And increasing.

Whereas the Supra isn't.

And I think.

And it's going away.

I think that's another reason.

It wasn't a super successful seller, right?

Yeah.

If you can get past the point of it being, you know,

a platform sharing BMW underneath in some ways.

Then I think it's fine.

Now we did.

What did Jordan say there?

Jonathan says, I don't think either is a perfect looking sports car.

I don't have my glasses on.

But I think Supra is tiny bit better.

So Jonathan likes the Supra.

Sorry, Jonathan.

I don't have my glasses on.

But we can call you Jordan.

I'm guessing at the J.O.

So I was guessing at the rest of it.

Yes.

All right.

Let's talk about the last drag race we did because it was kind of fun.

And we're kind of going into your world.

Now truck territory.

I don't have that one, Cole.

So after these first two drag races, we also once again

brought back Charlie.

Yeah.

Because he not only brought the record,

but he towed something with the Tom what he towed.

Yes.

So behind his F-350 towing truck.

Is he from Texas?

Yes, he's from Houston area.

And he's a huge Ford fan.

He owns several Ford's actually for work.

He has several working trucks like the F-550 trucks.

He's in the record business.

Yes.

And he has some personal vehicles as well.

Or tow truck as we say up here in the north.

Tow truck.

Is it weird how like we say tow trucks,

and when you go south, they say record?

I've heard record quite a lot as well.

Have you seen him ever heard it here?

Yeah.

I mean, some people don't understand when you say record.

Because they're like, what is this?

But it's because they pick up wrecks.

Yes.

You know, they go out to the accident and they pick the accident up.

And they carry them away.

He brought his supercharged F-150 base models.

So this is a shorty.

This is a two-door cab, short bed, two-wheel drive

with a five-litre coyote that was supercharged

by Ford Performance Whipple, supercharger.

Okay.

But let's make that clear.

It was supercharged as part of Ford Performance

by the dealer.

By the dealership.

So you can go and buy a coyote, a V8.

Yes.

Any V8, like ours, like the tremor.

Yes.

And you can go to your local dealer,

depending on, I guess, your dealer.

You can spend around 10K.

I think he spent less.

I think his was a little cheaper.

He bought it as a whole package.

Yes.

So his was lowered with different wheels and tires.

Yes.

Side exhaust.

And then have that supercharger put on.

And it takes your horsepower from what?

450 to 700 and something.

Which is crazy.

400 to 700.

Yeah.

Which is not quite doubling.

But that's a humongous increase in power.

And best of all, since it's done by Ford at the dealer,

it's warranty.

Yes.

So it comes with a 36-month warranty,

as far as the supercharger.

But Charlie gave me a little secret.

Because he was looking into his warranty.

And I guess there is a money amount.

So let's say you happen to be drag racing your truck.

Who would do that, Andre?

Let's say you're doing something like this.

And something happens with the engine.

And it's covered, right?

So you can take it back.

But there is only a certain amount of money that will cover.

So if it happens the second time,

you may not be able to be covered.

Yes, you think?

Well, I don't know what that amount.

Well, they just want to prevent people from blowing engines every week,

basically, in their truck.

You see what I'm saying?

Yeah.

So we've been toying with the idea of supercharging our Trevor.

Yes.

So we wanted to see how much quicker it would be if we did that.

And so we did a drag race.

And the results are kind of obvious.

The supercharger truck was lighter,

although it is tool drive.

Right?

So it's kind of difficult to get it to hook up when it accelerates.

But it ran away with it.

You were so far behind me,

we'll publish the video next week,

that I couldn't even see you.

Yeah.

And it sounds magnificent.

Because he's got this side dump exhaust.

By the way, it's not obnoxious when it's idling.

If it's just sitting there at the traffic light or in the parking lot,

it sounds like a Harley almost.

Yes.

But not super loud.

But once you step on it,

gosh, you could hear it like a jet engine taking off.

One of the things that Charlie said,

and I don't know if you experienced this, but tell me,

he said that unlike the TRX where you get both the supercharger wine

and then that deep exhaust note,

it's hard to see the supercharger.

It's hard to hear the supercharger.

Did you...

That's true.

Were we able to hear it?

No.

That's the thing with the Whipple Ford system,

is that it's quiet.

It's quiet.

But you know what I'm thinking?

When things are loud,

it usually means there's a little bit of inefficiency, right?

When a diesel engine is very, very loud sometimes.

When something is quieter,

it might be more efficient.

But we want to hear more noises, right, as an enthusiast.

So that's my guess.

Yeah.

I love that about the TRX,

because it had both.

Yeah, Colin, I recently did a video with the TRX.

Yeah, that's one of the more at all TFL.

You were kind of speculating on what the new TRX is,

because let's face it, it's coming back.

Yeah, yeah, we know this.

But I was a little concerned,

because I was worried that they'll just throw an old health cat

and do not reach out and walk away from it.

And I think they need to do more.

Yeah, basically.

So Colin, I took an existing TRX,

and we definitely heard this supercharger.

Definitely.

Well, Charlie said he's also going to get a Raptor R.

So he's a big Ford guy, obviously.

Yes.

So that one,

that one you can also hear the supercharger on,

because it's not the GT500.

But not as much as the TRX.

Yeah, no.

Remember, R is the TRX,

which is probably the most supercharger sound there is.

Yeah.

It's like you're hearing the inhaling,

and also the exhaling at the same time.

I don't think we're going to get another TRX on the stir

some compelling reason to,

I kind of feel like we've been there, done that.

But we don't know.

What are you speculating on it?

Will they actually, you know,

give another,

will they throw another 100 horsepower at it,

or are they just going to do what they did with the heavy?

And that's just take it off the shelf, slap it in the 1500

and call it done.

Well, my take,

but we don't have final specs.

Yes.

We don't have official specs that's coming

probably within a couple of months or so, maybe three.

My take is that they're going to increase the power,

and they will have a special version,

like from SRT,

like direct connection more power division.

Is that what I'm saying?

Where they can sell you the base TRX,

let's say it will have more than 720 horsepower,

because that's the level of RAP2R.

And then, this is my guess,

there could be another one,

like a red eye version or a demon version of it,

that will have even more horsepower.

We just don't know how far they can push it.

All right. Well, in the last few minutes that we have,

before we wrap it up,

let's talk about another car drove this week,

which was the Jeep wagon here.

S. Okay.

And we actually have it here now.

Jeep gave it to us for a long time.

So the week, yeah.

We have two cars actually,

Honda just gave us the Passport Trail Sport as well.

But that's a more long-term review.

So we did a slip test on that.

So if you want to see how that did on our TFL slip test,

head on over to all TFL.

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And then I actually went to Chicago.

I'll tell you a funny story.

I went to Chicago to run a 5K with my buddy Steve.

Okay.

Except Steve didn't really train for it.

So we kind of walked the 5K.

Steve, come on.

And I came in 150 seconds.

I think Steve was 150 third.

We were like second to last and dead last.

And I used to do a lot of endurance sports.

And I have a hard time on like five-year-olds,

like past me.

I'm not even...

Were you using your elbows?

I was just...

I was just like...

Because if you're going to go to a race,

you might as well race it.

Now Steve did try to run,

so we ran the downhills, which was great.

So nice work, Steve.

But I have figured out that I am too competitive

to walk a 5K.

I don't even know what my time was.

I was so like...

I was so like not into it.

But you know what number you were out of the...

152 out of 153.

Yeah.

That tells me...

That tells me that you're competitive.

Because if you weren't competitive,

you probably wouldn't know that.

But my point isn't to talk about the 5K.

My point is that when I was at home,

I grew up in Chicago.

And Jeep was kind enough to lend me the Wagon ERS.

This is the old electric.

And so I drove around...

It's very good.

It's got a good ride.

It's expensive.

This was the first edition.

Same thing.

72,000.

All the cars today are 72 in this podcast.

Must be the magic number.

But there's two kind of three things that I walked away

from that Jeep thinking that the car industry

is heading down the wrong track right now.

A lot of people think that this country's going down

the wrong track.

I think the car industry is definitely down the wrong track.

I'll give you those three lessons.

Yes.

Number one.

And I think this is obvious.

It feels like a $55,000 vehicle to me.

And I think that's what they're transacting for.

I don't understand how...

How like a mid-size...

Can you pull a picture of a Wagon ERS, really quick?

I can say, though, we had a call here.

I'll just...

So you can see exactly the one I had.

So, Roman...

You could do the...

You could pull the video and do the walker out if you want.

You want me to text it to you or do you want to...

Here.

I'll air drop in.

More recent.

It's the most recent EV video we did.

I'll just...

There you go.

I just out to you.

So, I agree with you, Roman.

It's at $55,000.

Let's say $1,000.

Is this you?

That's me.

That's me giving the...

Wow.

Is contemplative look.

Is Steve your videographer at this point?

He did.

He shot the video.

Nice.

Yeah.

And so I like the...

I like the blue color, by the way.

Yeah, the blue with the black.

We would have called this a midnight edition.

Yeah.

So once upon a time, I would have said this is a very handsome car.

But then I looked at the sticker and I literally...

I went on the launch of this and I literally forgot how expensive they are.

And 72,000 is just a boatload of money.

Now what?

Of course makes this unique is that it's Jeep's first in America.

At least all electric vehicles.

So they have an electric vehicle in Europe.

But this is the first one that's EV only.

Unlike the 4xE, which is a plug and hybrid.

Exactly.

This is all electric.

So 100 kilowatt hour battery.

So good battery.

You know, just under 300 miles of range, I did plug it in and charge it.

And I got at 40% state of charge.

I got 178 KW.

So it's pretty quick.

Not too bad.

It's not too bad.

Not in the...

We quickly dropped down to about 100.

So that wasn't great.

But my first lesson is, I think this is a $55,000 car all day.

I just don't see.

It's not that big, right?

It's kind of a mid-side...

It's a two-row.

Yeah.

And it also competes with the Model Y.

Yeah.

And the Model Y you can get in the $50,000 range all day long, right?

And it's more roomy.

And I just don't understand the compelling argument.

Now this design, I think this was the last design that Mark Allen did.

The longtime Jeep chief designer.

And I think it's a very handsome design.

It also has a very cool rear spoiler.

Good done.

Where the spoiler continues, but the roof kind of hides underneath it.

So it makes it look like it's longer and more aggressive than it is.

So lesson number one, cars are just too freaking expensive.

And I'm not just picking on Jeep.

I'm picking in general too.

And I'm not just picking on electric cars.

Just every car is just...

Like it used to be 10,000 too much.

We just did another off-road video where we did the...

Wrangler X, Rubicon X versus Trail Hunter.

And they were having a 400.

The new 400 and Trail Hunter we drove was $69,500.

And the Wrangler Rubicon X plug-in hybrid was $78,000.

Yeah, I think so.

Yeah, exactly.

$78,000.

Yeah, so once again...

Sticker price.

Used to be 10,000 too much now or 20,000 too much.

Yeah.

People can afford this.

We're living in crazy times.

And I don't know if this is due to tariffs or if this is due to...

You know, COVID or a chip supply or whatever the heck it is.

Or, you know, Jeep just jumping too high in this case.

But this is crazy.

All right, number two lesson before we run out of time.

Yes.

Can you go back to that vehicle?

Aha, here we are.

Okay.

This is happening more and more.

Now, what is Jeep known for?

Off-road ability, capability.

Where is the off-road ability in this?

I don't see it because I don't see a lot of ground clearance.

I don't see knobby tires.

I see a gigantic wheel with a small, low-profile tire.

And that's what I'm talking about.

Like, the brands that have stuck to their core competency

have done very well because they're special and they're unique

and they're, I think, valuable in the consumers eye.

But when you stray away from that,

it's hard kind of going outside of your lane for whatever reason.

And all of a sudden, I think it all falls apart.

Why is Jeep building an electric off-roader

or at least an on-roader that can go off-road?

This has less than zero.

I think that the ground clearance is like seven inches or something

or maybe even less, it's like 6.5.

It's all about aerodynamics.

This has no off-road ability.

Why is Jeep building a car that cannot go off-road

period and a story?

I don't have an answer.

I have a question before you move on to your final thought.

Cole, can you look up Jeep Recon EV?

Because this is another one that they promised, right?

I think they put it off.

Is it delayed?

It's delayed.

I think the Recon has been delayed.

Here this.

Look at that.

That's like the electric wrangler.

Removable doors.

All electric.

It's got capability.

It's got tow hooks.

It needs to be on sale this minute.

I don't know.

I don't want to conflate electric and off-road.

I'm just saying any car that Jeep builds in my mind.

Look at this.

It's got clearance.

Any car that Jeep builds in my mind should have a little tiny percentage

of off-road units.

Yes.

Because, and I don't mean to pick on Jeep.

I'm sorry if I'm picking on Jeep.

It's every brand that's doing this.

They're all trying to find their way now.

But I think every Jeep should have that wrangler DNA.

That's where it all stems from.

That's what people think about Jeep.

It is probably one of the most reliable brands in the world.

That's CJ2A.

Yeah.

That's the DNA.

And you know who did that?

So Ferrari just built a four-seater.

They've done that before.

Yes.

I call it the Paris Engway.

But they went out of their way to make sure that people understood

that this was not a crossover in SUV.

Yeah.

They called it like a four-door car.

Exactly.

Because Ferrari, of course, known for building sports cars.

And so when they did do a four-seater,

they wanted to make sure that people, whether it is a crossover,

I don't know, I don't care.

But I'm saying, at least they understood that their core competency

is sports cars.

And if they're going to build something that's outside of that,

they're going to try to somehow keep it within the family.

Jeep, with this thing, just completely,

gave up on any off-roadiness.

And maybe there is one coming.

I know that there were concept pictures of an off-road wagon ERS.

So maybe I'm jumping the gun.

And can you google that?

Can you do like a wagon ERS off-road version?

Yeah.

There is a concept when out there that they introduced.

Maybe it was a SEMA concept.

Yeah.

I think it's the green one.

It's a green one.

Trail.

Yeah.

What is that called?

Yeah, there it is.

There's our buddy, Alex.

Alex, hey, Alex.

So, Trailhawk.

Trailhawk.

Yeah.

Let's get a picture of it.

Not that I don't want to see.

Alex.

Good friend of mine.

But I'd rather show you the Jeep.

So do wagon here.

Trailhawk.

Yeah.

Here's the first story, I think.

Oh, there it is.

Aha.

Beefy to beef is more aggressive tires.

A little bit more clearance.

This should have been first.

This should have came out first, exactly.

Yeah, this should have been first.

Yeah.

So, this should have been first.

Because that to me is a Jeep.

The thing that they came out with is not a Jeep.

And I think we're running out of time and Tommy wanted me for a second.

He's waking up now again.

I think he's now.

Yeah, he's, he's, he's, yes.

Oh, thank you, Tommy.

I think he's done.

And the last thing is, can you get a picture of the inside of the wagon here?

I'm guessing there are a lot of screens, Rowan.

That's what I'm guessing.

You got it.

Yeah.

Take a look.

Yeah.

Can we make it a little bit bigger here?

Yeah.

Lots of screens.

There's a center screen.

There's a screen below to control your infotainment system.

There it is.

There's a passenger screen.

A passenger screen.

So, what?

Was Steve using his passenger screen when you were driving?

He tried, but there's no, I'm just, just use your phone.

So, I would say, you know, we are at peak screen right now.

Porsche and the new Porsche Cayenne.

It's all screen.

And I just did the Porsche McCann TV.

Too many screens.

Just manufacturers.

Once again, not just Steve.

I'm just picking on you because this is the one I had.

Just Porsche too.

Yeah.

Porsche too.

Just knock it off with people hate screens.

What is it?

I was, look, I was sitting at the bank today.

And I was listening to it.

They had a, this car doesn't even have that many screens.

It was a guy talking to another guy.

And I was waiting in line.

The guy had a brand new Land Cruiser, 250.

And they were just talking about it.

And one of the guys who owned it was a little bit older.

And he's like, he's like, I can't figure out the screen in this thing.

He said, I can't see the number.

Everything's too small.

I can't.

People hate screens.

What is it about that concept of manufacturers?

And this is a Roman rant.

I feel it coming on, Andre.

What is it about the concept of-

I think concept of-

We're done with this episode.

No, no, seriously.

What is it about that concept that you manufacturers don't understand?

People hate screens and cars.

They're not intuitive.

They're hard to use.

They're way too complicated.

Way too many nested.

In this Jeep, for instance, two things happened, which were super knowing first.

And it took me a while to figure this out.

I would drive.

And all of a sudden I get this beep, beep, beep, beep.

I hate beeping in the cars.

I looked on the screen.

There was nothing.

Nothing showed up.

It did nothing.

It just-

Were you on the highway or-

Going fast?

No, I was going through a stop sign.

Through a light.

And beep.

And I had to turn and go through it again.

And then eventually I was like, oh, hold on.

It's warning me about the speed-like camera.

Okay.

But there was nothing on the screen that said anything.

And had I not been in a slantist vehicle before that has that warning,

I wouldn't know what that was.

And there's not an easy way to turn it off.

There's not an easy way to-

Yeah.

And then you get to find the screen that says turned off.

And it's just frickin' annoying.

The other thing that it would do, which is also annoying,

this is something else that is another rant,

is it had auto-hold, you know?

But every time you cycle the car, auto-hold went off.

So basically one pedal driving, 50 auto-hold.

But every time you turn the car off,

it was back to default to zero.

So people hate screens.

And then when you set something in a car,

don't turn it off.

And I know a lot of this is because of fuel economy.

Or regulation, maybe, or some sort.

Or engines come back on, right?

But just-

It doesn't have an engine.

I know.

If I push a button, that means I want it to stay off,

or I want it to stay on.

And yet, when you cycle it, it goes back.

It returns to a default.

A default.

So why, why, why, why?

So I think we're at max screen at this moment in time.

And I'm hoping that we're going to go-

I know why screen.

Yeah, it's cheaper.

It's cheaper to make, because you can have multiple functions

in one screen versus a hundred different buttons.

It's cheaper to make.

When Mercedes-Benz hyper screen?

Yeah, hyper screen came out.

I thought it was interesting.

I thought it was kind of cool.

And then quickly, I saw it on it.

And Mercedes-Benz system, I know pretty well.

So I'm like changing a lumbar support.

Once upon a time, lumbar was just a little button

you would push on the side.

But with the Mercedes, you have to go into comfort.

You have to go into your seat.

And then you have to, on the screen,

adjust how far you want that lumbar to come out.

Which seems like it will be much more controllable.

But unless you know that, it's a huge pain in the ass

when you're used to just hitting a button

that you can feel on the side of your seat

and having the back tell you when you've pushed it out far enough.

And this is the problem.

Not you, Andre.

You're not making things easier.

And I also don't think that the manufacturers

when they put these screens in the car are actually driving them.

Like the screens are really good if you're just sitting there.

But when you're driving, it's credibly distracting.

It's just super simple.

Also hard to pinpoint.

Yeah.

You know, your hand is moving around when you're driving.

It's hard to pinpoint.

I don't understand, you know, in like a market driven society.

The other thing that these two guys were arguing about the length cruiser

is that they said they absolutely hate the driver intervention.

Like the one word, either vibrate the steering wheel

or eat the steering wheel out of your hand.

I don't know anybody.

And I know a lot of people who drive cars who likes that.

I don't.

Do you like it?

Do you driven it?

Or the steering wheel corrects for you.

Yeah.

It's specifically, we have highways on the way to the ranch

where bicyclists are on the side of the highway.

So you have to cross sometimes over the yellow or double yellow

to avoid a bicyclist.

And the car doesn't know this.

And it tries to yank your steering wheel out of your hand.

Into the bicyclist.

Yeah.

No, that's not good.

No.

Yeah.

And so I've never been in a position where manufacturers

or designers for that matter.

Another one, of course, is door handles that pop out.

You know, the fallacy is that, you know, if they pop out,

they make the car more aerodynamic when they're in.

But the number is so negligible, so negligible,

that it's almost meaningless in terms of fuel economy.

So the only reason that people are doing that, I think,

is because designers like the clean look of it.

It looks clean.

It has nothing to do with fuel economy, nothing to do with aerodynamics.

And of course, when you have these electronic door handles,

when the power goes out, they fail.

And then if you don't know where the release is,

and let's say you're a five-year-old,

bad things happen.

Mm-hmm.

You're trapped in the car.

There's videos of people having a smash to glass out of,

like the Tesla Model Y is one of them.

They said they would redesign it.

The irony, the crazy irony is that it wasn't even our government

that got down on Tesla for that.

It was a Chinese government.

We are so far down this rabbit hole now,

where there is so much that is being designed and done

that people absolutely hate, that I understand.

You know, people say that the reason that use cars

are more valuable than ever is because the high cost of new cars,

right, that use cars follow new cars.

And I'm sure that's market, and that's true.

But I think we're getting to a point now where people specifically

are avoiding new cars because the technology has gotten,

and the design has gotten so out of hand,

that people just want a car that isn't annoying to drive.

They just want to be able to get in a car and go to work

and listen to their podcasts, or listen to their radio,

without having to Google how to, you know,

put the car in gear.

I don't think I'm that far off.

No, you're not.

You're not.

And that's going to drive the use car prices up, too.

Yeah, because people are like, you know, I don't want this crap.

Yeah.

So anyway, thank you for spending on that rant.

Yeah, on that rant.

I tried to save my rant for the end.

You did.

Because if I get too ranty, I wipe myself up,

and then I can't unwind myself.

Okay.

Well, join us next time.

Yeah, and thank you for taking Tommy's spot.

Yeah.

But Tommy will be back.

I remember it from us.

If you want to watch these videos we talked about,

head on over to Altiethel, because we're publishing

the Super versus Corvette video this weekend.

We're publishing the classic Jeep versus

Tf on mud hole this weekend.

And on truck, what are we publishing on truck on drain?

Well, we have a different drag race.

So the drag race we mentioned about supercharged vehicles

is next week.

This week, oh, it's not a drag race.

It's a Denver 100.

Yeah, we're doing a Denver 100.

Yeah.

MPG testing.

Yeah, we did a video where we put the F150 up against the heavy duty.

Yes.

Diesel versus gas.

Yes.

So stay tuned for that.

Which one gets better fuel?

Diesel usually does better, right?

That's what we're hoping for.

Yeah.

For all of us diesel fans.

All right.

See you guys next time.

Ciao.

Okay.

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Ep. 305: We Just Bought Toyota's First Ever Sports Car... And We Promise You've Never Heard Of It!

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