I’m all about balance in life. I want something sweet for breakfast and savory for dinner. I want loud rock music first thing in the morning and some easier listening electro kind of stuff on the way home in the evening. Same with cars, there’s no reason to be any different. I want good looks but practicality. I want speed but economy. I want sportiness but I also want the reliability of an anvil. You know what a car that meets all of those conditions usually has? A price tag that will make you choke. Or does it?
For this round of Rough Start hunting, I decided to switch up my search options. The $5,000 budget stayed put, but I went looking between 1980 and 2000, and insisted that the field be equipped with a manual transmission. Why? Because even the most underpowered penalty box is just a little bit sweeter when you are rowing your own gears, that’s why. With hopes of some neat third-gen F-bodies or maybe a nice Turbo Coupe in my head, I hit search and came up with…a Supra.
Okay, not a bad place to start. We like Toyota’s little coupe. Inline-six power and pure 1980s lines, we can dig the appearance. But underhood is an interesting story: a 7M-GTE engine from a Supra one generation newer has found a home in this machine. Until the 1JZ engine debuted, this was the hot ticket. Originally rated at a conservative 232 horsepower, the capability of this engine, while not as bonkers as the JZ six, is still plenty for a 3,000-ish pound car.
$4,500 seems like good money provided that the powertrain is sorted and the rear tires aren’t bald. We’d be on the hunt for the
HMMMMM
5.0 windsor
T5
8.8
ultimate sleeper
My brother used to work for Toyota back in the 80’s and had one as a company car. It was not powerful but handle great in the curves!
LS1
6spd
They are nice cars, I have a 1985 Supra five speed manual and it is all stock except for the paint job, it has 135,000 miles on 5m-ge motor. The 7m-gte is a good upgrade for the 1985 Supra!