My midlife crisis Corolla is fast, furious, and modded | Hacker News Reader

My midlife crisis Corolla is fast, furious, and modded

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I love cars and driving them. But the modded Corolla/Civic/Accord/Camry (why) people have always driven me crazy because their mods often seem directed to inflicting their cars on everyone else, with loud exhaust, subwoofers, and (subjectively) garish cosmetics, rather than things that make it actually good to drive.

I recognize this is judgmental and it's unhealthy to always be annoyed at these people on the road, so I clicked the article looking for some empathetic understanding - and I really got it, UNTIL he told me about his "fire-breathing" exhaust and subwoofer. So it is about subjecting OTHER people to his car.

My 1/3 life crisis was buying a Toyota Tacoma Trailhunter long bed last year. It’s been my dream to own a Tacoma for several years, so it was finally time to make it happen.

Eventually, I’d love to modify the exhaust to make it slightly louder. The turbo noise from the raised air intake is awesome enough and I’m curious if other drivers on the road can hear the turbo noise when I drive by them.

Please do not make your exhaust louder. I’m sure you will not listen to a rando on the internet but it will annoy the shit out of thousands of people for what? Some yuk yuks? I get it. It’s fun. I would enjoy it too, but not yours. please don’t.

Odds are excellent they cant hear it. If they can hear it they either absolutely do not care or find it mildly irritating and blame it on the nearest 1500 owner.

Subwoofers are really fun though.

There are other people around you who probably don't think they're fun. Hot tip: the other people you see out and about are real, thinking humans just like you who have their own thoughts and emotions and world views.

You should consider how your actions impact others.

Hot tip: the other users you see online are often real, thinking humans just like you who have their own thoughts and emotions and world views.

You should consider how your sarcastic and condescending comments online impact others.

Wild, there are also other people around you who might they're more fun too, they might want you to turn it up.

Unfortunately for those other people, there are rules and social customs about not being an inane goober when you're in a shared public space.

My subwoofer makes a huge difference for me inside the car without being loud enough for you to hear it. They give a nice rounded tone to the music. As with literally everything, don't hate the people that like the sound of subwoofers - hate the people that abuse them.

I am aware, that’s why I don’t have one in my flat (and I don’t own a car for that matter so none there either) but they’re still a hell of a lot of fun.

A single 12 isn't really going to be too audible outside the car unless its being pushed very loud (excess of 600W~).

Most people don't have two alternators, with battery banks to drive multiple 12s or 15s.

There is effectively no point ever where my system has "impacted" others.

Have you considered that your overly condescending tone is quite ironic given the content of your comment?

Unfortunately yes. Many of the people driving tuner cars don't give a shit about cars and are merely mad that no one pays attention to them. There's an antisocial loser on my street, a ~50yo guy in a modded Infinity. The exhaust is so loud it shakes windows and I can't talk on the phone or hear my own music inside my house when it's nearby. And it's a shit car. He's destroyed it. It barely even drives. He gets tons of parking tickets because it's broken and he can't move it for months at a time, but he still goes outside and sits in it and revs the engine for sometimes 20-30 minutes at a time. When he "works on it", he lays on his back in the middle of the street, blocking traffic, for hours at a time. When he actually gets it working, he drives slowly around the block a few times, revving the engine again loud enough to annoy the entire neighborhood. All of my neighbors have reported him to the police, but they won't do anything. Whenever neighbors try to talk to him, he immediately starts screaming and waving his arms and approaching them until they back away. He's an antisocial loser.

Hard to meet a modder that isn't a loser like this.

I promise you, there are many many many people who modify their cars and do not act like assholes. The thing is, you probably don't notice them because they aren't focused on getting attention.

No sure I see that any different than the typical American behemoth truck/SUV blocking all lines of sight to everything other than a 12 wheeler. And to top it off, they can't take a corner and so they all seem to slam their brakes and cause a traffic jam at any interesting corner.

All to transport one person by themselves from home to office and back.

They can't park for shit either, so you lose spots in a parking lot and have to wait forever while they block the aisle backing out.

Here in Europe, fat American-style SUVs are still somewhat rare, especially outside cities (!). People still can't corner worth shit in their "regular" sedans. And I say this as a pretty chill motorbike rider.

I've lost count of the number of Golf GTIs and similar behind which I have to wait around when riding on roads that aren't perfectly straight. And these cars should have better cornering ability than my fat bike. I know my dad's Corolla does.

I used to drive a GTI, (it was stolen from me…) - you can absolutely fling it into a corner and come out unscathed. I never put it on a track and I don’t think it would do great without adjustment but on road legal speeds there no reason it should need the driver to be “tender”

Counterpoint: I know my car can brake and turn much harder than I do (it's not a sports car by any mean, but that's beyond the point).

I'd rather not change my tires and brake pads all the time though, and keep some margin for whatever unexpected stuff is hiding behind the corner. Also I don't like having to stop because everyone in the car got motion sickness.

I'm not saying they should drive like a rally. I most certainly don't. Just don't slow down to a snail's pace for no reason. Or if you insist on doing that for whatever reason, let other people pass you if you can see that visibility is low.

Every car can brake, turn and accelerate much harder than any of us will even think to do especially turning and braking. But you pinpointed why we must not attempt to reach for the limit, not for us but for the others. And anyway a normal car won't lay long if driven like a racing car. Every single component is not designed for that.

The usual computer analogy /s You don't run a LLM on a Core Duo 2, but of course https://yeokhengmeng.com/2025/04/llama2-llm-on-dos/

Race cars component are designed for higher loads, but they aren't designed to last either. Running cost per mileage of race cars is super high actually because of all the consumables to be replaced and stuff that needs to be serviced on a regular basis.

I have a sports car and a Model Y. Whenever I go on a twisty mountain road, without fail, if I will encounter what you said. It does not matter which of the two cars I drive! What's worse is that this happens even in roads where the speed limit is 35 mph and those people may drive 25 mph or even 15 mph! (See the road passing through Cambria in California. It's an epic drivers' road, and yet...)

For some reason people seem to fail to understand that the speed limit is not supposed to be a target to reach.

For the love of God speed up

There are vehicles that cannot and are allowed on the same roads.

It’s more like the lower end of acceptable speed to drive.

Sometimes I wonder whether going excessively slow around corners is a symptom of people pushing their steering wheel from the side opposite the direction of the curve instead of pulling it from the same side into the curve. Just a hunch, but doing the latter usually feels like I have more control.

I don't know about that. But what I usually observe is that many people tend to veer off in the next lane in the direction of the turn (even if it's a lane for traffic going the opposite way!) if there is one. But if there isn't (right turn, they're in the rightmost lane), they'll tend to leave quite a lot of space between the car and the shoulder.

So I'd say these people have a hard time figuring out the space on the road their car takes. I can only imagine this worsens with larger cars and less visibility.

Oddly enough I recently accepted an old beat up, but gigantic utility truck from the 90s that I'd never have purchased, and while it's fun to drive, it's also absurd to try and park it anywhere. Even box trucks are comparatively easy to figure out. When it dies, I'm sure as hell not going buy another one, but until then I'll enjoy not knowing how close I am to anything.

I just wish these people comprehended and cared that you can be 2km away on a country road with your stupid engine and it's still loud as !@#$ for thousands of people in the city.

I live on the edge of a city and this is a nightly thing. It's louder than the air ambulance occasionally landing at the nearby helipad. It's louder than the 6-8 trains running through town.

So much of American car/motorcycle culture seems to be about that nowadays. And it's not limited to the Japanese mod scene, either.

Loud exhausts everywhere - pickups, domestic V6/V8's, motorcycles.

Super-bright headlights/aux lights improperly mounted or operated, blinding you at night.

Stereos you can almost feel before you hear them.

All these guys (and let's face it, it's 90% guys doing the irritating stuff) are being sold a dream by the mod manufacturers that if they just install this $1500 catback or this $1000 sub they will finally get the respect they deserve.

They get online forum/Facebook/Insta/TikTok validation but very few people around them are impressed with their choices.

I mainly hate how people are being taken for a ride (pardon the pun) by marketers and putting money into things that aren't really going to improve their car-driving experience.

It's not even automobiles. The entire concept of American masculinity is about inflicting yourself on as many other people as you can. The more insufferable you are, the more "manly" you are.

Or maybe it's an attention thing. Like a dog chewing your new shoes for attention, these people feel insecure when they aren't the center of attention, and making everyone around you mad and annoyed is still better than no attention at all.

Counter point - driving down the beach in a convertible with good tunes blasting and the sea breeze in your hair is fun.

Like yeah it sucks for everyone listening, but if every other car is blasting tunes it isn't out of place. Some beach drives are known for this, right place at the right time.

When I visited Floria Keys I sure as shit rented a convertible and played bass thumping EDM as I drove over the ocean. Hell I think I may have even been wearing Ray-Bans.

Don't do that shit in a family neighborhood at 4am, but I never objected to people peeling out of the Microsoft parking garage in their lolwtf over priced garage princess sports cars. Bailing at 4pm with your coworkers to go hit up the bar is a perfect time to let loose.

Granted I don't have hair anymore but I've never driven in a convertible and felt a "breeze". Anything past 30 mph is...exactly what it is, like sticking your head out the window while driving.

> Counter point - driving down the beach in a convertible with good tunes blasting and the sea breeze in your hair is fun.

The annoying thing now is the guys with the full dresser bikes or Polaris Slingshots that have 2500W stereos installed.

You can be all the way down by the water and hear their music clear as day, as they are idling through traffic on the A1A

> The entire concept of American masculinity is about inflicting yourself on as many other people as you can.

Haha, what?

You're describing a mindset and behavior that is indeed more prevalent than it should be or used to be, but it's got nothing to do with the "concept of American masculinity"

Maybe I'm just oversensitized today, but this is the third thread I've seen in the past hour where someone brings up gender in a conversation for no good reason. As if there aren't women who are inconsiderate assholes, nor men who are kind and compassionate.

We're talking about hot-rod culture here, which has been explicity coupled with projections of notional masculinity from its inception.

Of course there are, but women tend to be inconsiderate assholes in different ways. While a population of 300 million means you could probably find plenty of counterexamples, obnoxiously loud cars and motorcycles are overwhelmingly driven by men. This isn't because men are worse than women, it's because our current culture directs antisocial men to loud vehicles, and antisocial women to other things.

Yea, it's not just masculinity, although I'm sure if you tallied up the car modders, one gender is going to be disproportionately represented.

The USA population in general has swung really, REALLY far into the "I'm going to grief others, and you can't tell me what to do!" attitude. It's much worse now than probably any time in my life. So many people out there just wake up every day looking for ways to inflict themselves on the public, act loud, aggressive and tough, and in general be "antisocial and proud of it."

> The more insufferable you are, the more "manly" you are.

That's just the usual compensation. Real heavy hitters are actually eerily quiet. They don't have anything to prove. It's the insecure who constantly engage in overt displays.

> Real heavy hitters are actually eerily quiet. They don't have anything to prove.

I've had the rare privilege to meet former SOF soldiers from a couple different nations, and working US cowboys, ranchers and farmers. While I know there are exceptions, in my personal anecdotal experience, to a man they were all quiet in the stoic sense. Nothing to prove, indeed.

>The entire concept of American masculinity is about inflicting yourself on as many other people as you can. The more insufferable you are, the more "manly" you are.

By that metric obnoxious whiny complainers who want the government to force their preferences on all of society are far more manly than someone rolling coal or whatever.

Edit: Maybe that was your point.

Don't forget the pickups "rolling coal".

Anecdotally, this seems to be going out of style, I have not seen anyone legitimately roll coal in several years. Could just be my area, of course, but we did have some coal rollers in the past.

The EPA cracked down on one of the big shops a few years ago, I believe. Probably scared off other shops from performing the mods.

> they will finally get the respect they deserve.

I believe this is a big part of it. With the rise of corporations and media, we have seen a loss of any sort of public commons. A consequence of that is that I think many people here in the US don't feel like they are part of a community. They don't feel seen by any sort of meaningful tribe, outside of their job, which is transactional and subject to the whims of corporate overlords.

So much pathological behavior in society today makes sense when seen through the lens of "this is a person who feels isolated screaming out for any kind of acknowledgement of their existence".

In addition to these reasons, there is the economic side. They're spending money on frivolous but attainable luxury items because the traditional economic path of a house and family seems impossibly out of reach.

You can save for 6 months to buy a car mod for 1500, but when local median house price is $1,000,000 they may feel like it's pointless to even attempt being a home owner.

Except people have been doing obnoxious shit to feel better about themselves since forever ago. Look two hundred years back and you will see European men duelling each other over the most random stuffs. If anything, I'd say I am seeing less modded cars and hearing less bikes with more decibels than jet engines than I did 20 years ago.

I feel like you just grasping to any social phenomenon to try to insert your own agenda.

Dueling is a very different phenomenon. Duels were typically done away from urban centers and involved only the participants. They were not done to annoy other random people.

I'm no expert, but you could do a whole deep dive on the sociology behind dueling to get a better sense of what socioeconomic conditions led to it.

Just saying "the stegosaurus is like a peanut butter cookie" to establish an analogy doesn't immediately confer wisdom. An analogy has to actually be between things that have meaningful similarity. If we were, say, talking about street racing for pink slips, then maybe the dueling analogy would be more useful.

Glad someone pointed out motorcycles. While cars with modded exhausts are loud and obnoxious, there are relatively few modders out there, so they're pretty rare. And one has to go out of one's way to make their stock car ear-splitting.

Motorcycles on the other hand, especially cruisers, are a simple straight-pipe mod away from "totally obnoxious." And the average motorcycle is going to be louder than the average car.

> Loud exhausts everywhere - pickups, domestic V6/V8's, motorcycles.

> Super-bright headlights/aux lights improperly mounted or operated, blinding you at night.

> Stereos you can almost feel before you hear them.

So no different than 30 years ago.

Around here it's a part of gang "culture". The point, IMO, is to remind citizens that the police is not doing anything and gangbangers are free to do whatever they want. As any blatantly illegal behavior it benefits criminals via intimidation and suppression of reports of their activity. Also "swangas".

I don't mind cosmetics, but noise is something some places fortunately started regulating and I hope it becomes more common:

https://nltimes.nl/2026/05/28/rotterdam-deploys-first-noise-...

I'm hearing someone gunning it through a neighboring road as I type this comment and I will be hearing such noise all night, because some people just can't help but make noise.

The other day I even saw a guy in a car with a modified exhaust and driver side window rolled down - apparently so that he would better hear the noise he's making. Considering the volume that had to have a negative effect on his hearing.

I don't understand and I will not understand.

I hope that becomes more common so long as privacy is respected. Fortunately my neighborhood is fairly quiet.

I don't understand either, but I don't have a problem with people doing what they want. If municipalities can regulate speed limits for safety and other reasons they should be able to.

So if you want to be loud live out in the country where there is space.

Probably more likely to get harassed in the country for it because the cops gotta fish harder for their extortion money/pay.

Ive been pulled over multiple times with brand new stock exhaust on a stock vehicle cruising at 55 because the body looked old and rusted and the cops were looking for any plausable excuse. With a real excuse they could throw tickets at you when they get frusterated with lack of other possible charges.

>Probably more likely to get harassed in the country for it because the cops gotta fish harder for their extortion money/pay.

Yes and no. Rich places that can trivially afford to over-staff their PD's compared to the amount of "real crime" to go around are some of the worst when it comes to baseless fishing.

There is certainly not a rich place, it is dirt poor. Which is why the people make easy targets, they don't have money to throw around for lawyers.

Unfortunately certain choices make you fit a certain profile.

Case in point: police in my region started cracking down on street racing. Original intention was to deal the obvious danger and noise pollution, but it so happened that after each round of checks they would find at least one DUI, suspended license or even a case of drug possession. Naturally they continued, as street racing is somewhat difficult to prove, but the other mentioned offences are much less ambiguous.

Unsurprisingly people who disregard the law don't just settle on a narrow range of offences.

When was the last time you saw a cop actually stop a crime? Not respond to one, but prevent a crime? Even their responses to "real crime" are half-hearted in almost every state I've lived in. Many act like I'm imposing on them.

I had a guitar stolen out of my car in the late 90's. It was hot pink, and I was pretty sure that the thief would try to pawn it. So when I spoke with the cop who showed up, I mentioned about checking pawn shops etc. He said "Sounds like a good idea. If you find anything, let us know..."

Completely useless choads...

I’m having trouble imagining the privacy concern. If someone’s vehicle is topping 90db then it’s hard to argue what they really want is privacy, and even the most invasive monitoring method I can think of (widespread mics) could be nerfed by requiring hardware that only responds at db threshholds well above conversation.

>driver side window rolled down - apparently so that he would better hear the noise he's making

Why would you think that was the case?

I’m at the point where I don’t just want ticketing and other enforcement on this front, I want yanked licenses for this after a warning, and I might even want it legal to shoot vehicles guilty of noise violations and their drivers with paintballs to mark them for further enforcement and shame.

Smoking is the atmospheric equivalent of peeing in the pool; noise pollution is something between that and opting everyone into your dumb M80 party. It’s antisocial, it causes health problems on top of discomfort, and it should stop.

Sure, but as long as they're allowed to paintball you and sick draconian enforcement on you for whatever trivial things you do they deem to be slights against society.

Like FFS, it's just fucking noise. It's a small minority of people. Can we just ignore them? There's so much bigger problems. Most people grow out of it after one car like that.

"Like FFS, it's just fucking noise"

Okay, let me blast 110dB into your ears and you tell me how the fuck you like it.

110dB once a week isn't really a big deal. I don't really care if someone rips it down the highway assuming they aren't being completely reckless.

Its not "just noise" when its preventing people from actually sleeping.

I don't think you'd like it if people played deafeningly loud noises outside your bedroom window at all hours of the night every night forever.

I live just uphill of a state highway junction so I get to hear everything accelerating leaving that intersection.

It's really not bad. You don't even notice it after awhile unless it's something that sounds funny like a semi trailer with an out of round tire or like a cluster of motorcyles or a mazda rotary or a nat-gas powered heavy truck.

What you mean is "it's really not bad for me".

Noise pollution is horrible. It is jarring and causes stress (health issues), and poor sleep (health issues).

This isn't just a vague immaterial thing, this is a genuine negative impact on people's health and by extension life expectation. If people could "just ignore it", obviously they would, right? Some of us can't. Luckily I moved away from most noise and live in a quiet area now, but nothing is stopping some arsehole with a modified exhaust driving down my road every night. It could start happening at any point. At which point, I'd want laws to stop it happening.

May you be cursed with chaotic noise til the end of your days

> It's a small minority of people

So are serial killers. A small minority of people can affect the lives and health of a lot more. A handful of people roaring through a neighborhood at night like this can mean nobody ever gets a proper night's sleep.

If someone plays with a laser in your eye, being told "it's just light, it's one guy, can you just ignore him, he'll grow out of it", won't be a consolation. You'll want him stopped.

> Most people grow out of it after one car like that.

Someone else grows into it.

If we could ignore them, this thread would not exist.

and I support extra legal measures against these people. They do it for the attention and they deserve the attention they will have coming to them.

In Seattle they had a guy in Belltown being a nuisance with a loud charger at all hours of the night in an urban setting. They knew who he was and he lived with his mom (lol). I never understood why the community didn’t deal with it when the police would not. Lack of enforcement is what leads to vigilantism.

>I never understood why the community didn’t deal with it when the police would not.

Because if you are the one who actually has to do the violence rather than outsourcing it to the state it becomes clear this isn't a subject worth that violence.

Put yourself in the shoes of the guy who has to do the pistol whipping. Unless you've got a badge and a state paycheck and can just blindly live with your actions as "it's muh job" and know that just about everyone will agree it's just not worth it.

Hence why only the state ever applies violence over such subjects.

I think it’s cameras. I used to know people who took these matters into their own hands with baseball bats to the offending vehicle at 3 in the morning. But that was many years ago where if there were any witnesses they’d be glad some blue collar kind of guy got fed up with the noise making nuisance of a car.

When you say enforcement isn't worth it, you end up letting the most inconsiderate people with some of the worst decision making set the tone for society.

It's also pretty likely that the state violence will be a threat rather than a literal pistol whipping. Harder for the vigilante to make that work.

>you end up letting the most inconsiderate people with some of the worst decision making set the tone for society.

How's that different than letting complainers send state violence enforce stuff that's not a problem worth thinking about to most people?

"that's not a problem worth thinking about to most people?"

Begs the question.

If I called the county every time someone drove past my house with a loud modded exhaust it would consume my days and nights. The loud exhaust people are a scourge and I would love an easy way to get them to stop.

Unfortunately we’ve got one of these people across the street. He is training to be an electrician and starts his modded Toyota apparently with an amplified kazoo welded into the muffler at 4:15am every weekday. Shakes the entire house like a B-17 bomber.

Many of the mods make the car worse in everyday environments, outside of a pristine track.

After I got into my friend's modded-out car, we had to slow to walking speeds to exit the parking lot because it would bottom out on the curb cut. The same happens with speed bumps. Large rims get damaged on potholes that a normal tire and rim combo would just shrug off.

Add a few years to your life and you don't want to crawl and duck into a low car anymore. Stiff suspensions are hard on the back and joints.

Some people actually do track their cars, though.

It’s a very small percentage of these vehicles though.

yeah, majority of people just want to have something that is capable of doing cool stuff, but can't really commit to actually doing it. it's like how so many buy and tune WRXs, but don't actually take it to gravel roads.

TBH most of the mods that really make people point and laugh won't fare very well on a track or rally stage either.

20-inch wheels aren't capable of cool stuff. It's all peacocking.

wdym, what else am I going to use to crush my enemies /s

> 20-inch wheels aren't capable of cool stuff. It's all peacocking.

You should let Porsche and Chevy know that all the lap records they set with the GT3 RS and ZR1 could be even faster with some proper wheels ;)

> it's like how so many buy and tune WRXs, but don't actually take it to gravel roads.

For good reason, they're not built for it. A relatively stock WRX is going to be destroyed after a few outings of hard driving on rough terrain[1]. The WRC winning Subarus[2] were fully built racecars from top to bottom and share only styling with the ones sold at dealerships. They're very fun and capable on solid pavement for a cheap car, but the rally pedigree is all marketing.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aT-o8vuhRok

[2] https://cars.bonhams.com/auction/27996/lot/87/1999-subaru-im...

I mean yeah, stock is one thing, but when WRX owners build it out, it's usually slammed and sometimes embarrassing levels of negative camber. Rally builds are rare, even though the AWD and (for the current gen WRX) the cladding would suit it.

Fashion that makes things impractical is often quite sticky.

When the first people drove mountain bikes in the city I thought it was fad that would quickly go away but here we are. Ok, they were an improvement over the previous fad of racing bikes, but neither of them is as practical in the city as they could be.

The potholes in the city of Berkeley make me glad I have a hybrid bike.

Similar with lifted trucks.

Lifts are bad for driveshafts, suspension, tires, etc

Well there's right ways to do them, where you replace all the weak components with properly strengthened components, and geometry fixing components, and then there's the wrong way to do them, which is what 99% of people do, where they just do a cheap lift, without upgrading the other components, and eventually it fails.

Probably the primary reason why vehicles like Jeeps get a bad reputation - they're incredibly commonly modded, and incredibly horribly/improperly modded, and the vehicle gets the blame when the mods fail, rather than the horrible things the owner did to them.

Average quality and reliability ratings even on new, unmodified Jeeps are abysmal. I understand why some consumers like them for style and off-road capability but overall it's a trash brand.

I see this all the time where I live. People doing their grocery shopping in their super stanced out civic, having to find a route around the speed bumps because they literally can't go over them without high centering.

Yeah, it looks sick. But it's completely impractical for daily driving, and quite frankly you are putting both yourself and others at risk the moment you blow a tire going 80 on the freeway and lose control of your car.

> it looks sick

Personally I'll take a sedan or wagon with ample ground clearance any day: https://images.classic.com/vehicles/559a40ae72662e1ac71d2286...

>I see this all the time where I live. People doing their grocery shopping in their super stanced out civic, having to find a route around the speed bumps because they literally can't go over them without high centering.

I hate that less than the upper middle class types that slow their $50k Highlander/Pilot/Range Rover a crawl to drive over them.

Why would you blow a tire? What are you on about? It's dangerous to blow a tire in any car.

But it's fun to mod the car and you get to drive around in an art project. My dad did basically the same thing during the 1950's and 60's hot rod culture. This is more or less what his car looked like:

https://www.hotrod.com/features/1932-ford-roadster-the-golde...

He never had a lot of money to spend on it but he did have access to car parts and was a gifted mechanic. One of my favorite memories was going out for a ride in that thing in the summer with him and I would ask him to go faster and he would wind it up to about 120 mph for a few miles and it was so exciting (and, in retrospect, a bad idea). He would tell me he had to do that occasionally to get the carbon out. :)

The author here didn’t even recount doing any work on his car or demonstrate any real knowledge of basic mechanics. Just talks about the high-end shops that did the work.

He did a great job painting himself as completely self-absorbed and lacking in personality that he’s making up with consooming. Down to the whining and performative identitarian victimization. Like if you just enjoy cars and love your Vietnamese-American hyphen culture awesome do that. But this whole article reeks of LOOK AT ME.

That's a pretty harsh take.

"art project" <-- eyes rolling collectively

I mean mods are always about tradeoffs. You're generally not smarter than the team of engineers that designed it, but you probably do have different goals, that's where the opportunity to improve an aspect of the car comes in.

I think it should be done with a clear understanding of what you're giving up, but some people don't want to put practicality first and that's okay.

I say this with respect and part jokingly but this is basically just a "shakes fist at cloud". And I don't disagree with you! But if people use their signal and drive sane it's not much a problem for me. Very rarely do I see a modded car like this regardless of Make - and people make every Make/Model loud it's not just restricted to the aforementioned.

Your mileage may vary and that's all good

Hard disagree. You might be ok with loud engines splitting your eardrums and interrupting your sleep (or worse, your baby's sleep!), but society as a whole should not.

Live and let live is good and all, but GP said it was about "inflicting their taste on others," so I would read that comment to mean the inconsiderate things we should not let live. Loud pipes, unsafe driving, and loud subwoofers--I'll shake my fist at those clouds all day.

Well as mentioned in the above comment I do not disagree with parent nor do I disagree with you. Vehicles of these extremes are rare, in my experience, as mentioned as well.

In practicality, I care more about how people drive than the loudness of their engine.

No offense but this is kinda soft mate. A loud car doesn’t “split your eardrums”, it’s at worst a minor inconvenience, and as part of living in a diverse society we accept that we will be inconvenienced sometimes.

I wouldn't tolerate being "inconvenienced" by someone's broken sewer pipe I'd ask them to fix it.

Straight piped trucks can easily hit over 100dB (I've seen numbers as high as 118dB) which is well above the 85dB hearing damage level, and is at the level where hearing damage occurs in minutes or even seconds of exposure.

Sorry I don't want to get tinnitus just because some asshole wanted to make his truck "sound better".

the most unsafe drivers I see usually have a "baby on board" bumper sticker. foot out the window, eyes down looking at a phone, can't stay in their lane, let alone manage a consistent (speed limit obeying) pace

If you think parents drive less safe on average than young men, you are very incorrect.

Unexpectedly successful fishing comment lol

Are they louder? Stay on topic.

Also, you are telling on yourself about woman drivers. Moms don’t drive worse than childless women. And men don’t put those bumper stickers on their cars if they can help it.

>shakes fist at cloud

the reason "shakes fist at cloud" is something to laugh at is because clouds aren't sentient. they aren't blocking out the sun to annoy you, they're just clouds. it's a natural phenomena, not something you can do anything about.

people who modify their cars to intentionally disturb the people around them are (theoretically) sentient. the guy in this article is not an uncontrollable natural phenomenon, he's just a guy who's chosen to make loud noises his hobby. shaking your fist at him is perfectly reasonable.

> So it is about subjecting OTHER people to his car.

Having not read the article yet, this is an assumption. He could himself enjoy the kick/boom of a subwoofer (I know I do, it makes music so much better) or the sound of his own exhaust (I never have personally cared about this)

Whether they are purposefully inflicting it on others or not, it takes a certain type of inconsiderate person to say "F*ck everyone else and their preferences for intact eardrums and uninterrupted sleep, I like the way it sounds."

I'm skeptical.

One thing I learned early on was that I could crank a car stereo up to levels that were uncomfortable, and rock the car with a pair of nice 12 inch subs ... and outside the car it was pretty weak. Audible, perhaps, but not for very far and nothing you'd really feel. Even with the windows down, it's surprising how loud it can be inside and still not be all that noteworthy on the outside.

The guys that have radios loud enough to annoy bystanders are deep into hearing damage territory. The ones with subwoofers you can feel in the next lane over aren't running 12s, they have much bigger speakers than that, way, way past the point of where you are doing it for your own kick.

It's very intentional, about the effect outside the vehicle, not the quality of the music inside.

I promise you it is not limited to the Camry/Corolla/Civic community, it's just that those cars are very commonplace so its more obvious. I had a full track build BRZ that looked nearly stock from the outside other than the wheels and hood vents, and I loved that car and still miss it. Even in the Miata and BRZ/86 communities where these are designed as cheap, trackable sports cars, most of the community is more focused on cosmetics and adding cheap plastic and chinesium parts to their cars than doing anything that improves driving dynamics.

As a counterpoint for practical (i.e., performance) mods being the only mods that matter... I have a F82 which has a few carbon fiber parts to make it stand out a bit. I really don't think I need more performance than what it has to offer, so making it look nicer seems like e a good idea (at least it won't look identical to all other F82s).

Now, would I do that to a Camry? No freakin way.

I don't think there's anything wrong with doing purely cosmetic modifications if those modifications don't also make the car worse. The challenge is many folks in the community do cosmetic modifications that actually reduce performance.

nah, I like cars, and I agree. I have some cosmetic mods on mine (it's none of those models in your list) and they're very subtle and inoffensive. very much iykyk. I also want a new exhaust, but mostly because I want a deeper tone, not louder.

Eh, applies to all brands. Few people care about driving faster. It’s all about being “cool”.

I have loud subwoofers in my car, but they're for my enjoyment. The fact that others might hear them is an unfortunate reality of physics. I try to be considerate in not blasting it in residential areas, late at night, etc., but bass is bass - it travels.

Nothing judgemental or unhealthy about it. It's perfectly normal to be annoyed by such nuisances. The existence of these people is one of many factors that make driving literal hell on earth.

Driving isn't so bad, the bad part is being outside a car while these things buzz by. Like there are restaurants with outdoor patios I entirely avoid because I want to hear others at the table instead of farting Hondas.

Civics are legos with extensive aftermarket support. Type-Rs are designed to be tracked (IIRC fastest FWD in NA). People often mod these to track better, and in JPN obviously mod them to drive them illegally on highways.

Civics, or more specifically the older naturally aspirated engines from Honda as a whole (including the F20C1 found in the S2000 AP1) are high-RPM engines, often revving to 8500-9000 RPM, which is going to be loud no matter what you do.

No, not all mods are designed to inflict something on someone else. Popular FL5 mods are designed around engine/oil cooling, brake capacity (prevent fading), and camber. Yes, you can get nuts with a racing-only, non-CARB DP or a non-valved exhaust, but that's a personal choice. Not every FL5 owner follows that ethos. But you can also go with a CARB-compliant DP, valved exhaust (OE is valved, many aftermarkets use valved exhausts), and even if you do a mid-pipe resonator delete, it's no louder than it's sister car, the Acura DE5, which doesn't even come with a mid-pipe resonator from the factory.

And yes, a modded FL5 is a ton more fun to drive than a non-modded one due to a single, hidden mod - replacing the suspension controller with one from a DE5 or from DSC makes the ride much smoother. Honda doesn't get everything 'right' (but they do get engines down pat).

Ofc, you do have fire-breathing 1000hp S2000s out there.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yw2tYyBbZ-Q

I don't think anyone objects to modding your street legal car to go 0-100 in 3 seconds as long as you're not interrupting every conversation for a quarter mile in any direction wherever you drive. But everywhere I go, no matter what I'm doing, someone's exhaust mod is there to make sure I can't finish my sentences or listen to my son, and I'm sick of it.

Some cars, usually older pre-regulation, are just naturally that loud.

And some people are absolute assholes - https://www.king5.com/article/news/local/seattle/belltown-he...

Should have gotten life.

I mean, I object to cars with unreasonable acceleration on the roads.

I'm looking at you, Tesla Plaid; a ten second car was a plot point in The Fast and the Furious, so this feels like yet another "we have created the Torment Nexus".

I have been spending my mid-life days pondering getting a used Porsche 986.1 Boxter, cuz, y'know, mid-life. And so reading reviews and I constantly see this refrain: "car drives great, wonderful handling, good value... but not worth it because the engine sound/note is so dull."

I just have to give my head a shake. It makes zero sense to me.

At one point my wife's 1995 Civic had a busted exhaust pipe ahead of the muffler and was loud as hell. She reported receiving compliments from a few different Civic enthusiasts, much to her confusion.

She just wanted me to fix the broken pipe.

In our family we use the expression "farting Honda" (or Toyota, Subaru, whatever) when we hear these kinds of cars on the road.

The exhaust on my old Range Rover split between the catastrophic converters and the first silencer, leaving it completely open.

The novelty of it sounding like the start of Jerry Was A Racecar Driver hadn't entirely worn off before I welded it up, I guess, but I'm not about to go around attracting attention to myself.

Not when I could see it making plate glass shop windows vibrate.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkE4-zsqYwo

catastrophic converter is such a hilarious autocorrect.

It's not an autocorrect. These things are terrible.

If you have a better way to get rid of all those pollutants, I'm sure we'd all love to hear about it.

Well, if you insist on running them on petrol, just having a lambda sensor and closed-loop mixture control breaks the back of it.

However, if you run them on propane instead of petrol - like they do for forklifts and Zambonis, where you have to run the engines indoors without people dying - you just get carbon dioxide and water vapour out. You don't need a catalytic converter and indeed if you have one it can make the pollution slightly worse by generating nitrogen oxides.

Imagine how clean our cities could have been if we'd done this 20 years ago, instead of selling people debt to buy "Cleaner Greener Diesels".

They're still emitting CO2, but a little less of it, and from fuel that would otherwise go up in smoke at the refinery flare stack - unless you want to stop making plastics and fertilisers.

fart cannons galore where I live, all hours of night and day. only option is to learn to live with em

my subaru is obnoxious in looks only, I want the exhaust to be normal, lol

someone stole the catalytic converter from my Honda CRV a few years ago by basically cutting off the entire exhaust system. It made for a very loud drive until we got it fixed hah.

It's shocking how loud even small ICE engines are. I drove a Geo Metro back in the 90s, with it's tiny little 1.0L motor (with 45 and 1/2 angry little horses-- and the half horse is the angriest of them all) and between the exhaust resonator and muffler rusting out I got to hear how loud a little motor is. Shockingly loud.

Think about how much louder a gas mower is than a car. They're insane!

None of the other things except the sound bothers me. It’s just so goddamn loud, like unbelievably loud.

Some exhausts can sound cool but at someone that lives near a road I don’t think people should subject other people to loud exhausts. Just because someone installed a subwoofer (depending on how the audio was before) doesn’t necessarily mean they are blasting it so loud it is bothering other people. Some cars have pretty horrible stock sound

I wish the car modders would adopt things like Active Sound Design (ASD) that some car manufactures are using to pipe vroom-vroom noises through the car's speaker system. It seems like the perfect compromise. The driver wants to hear his car's loud vroomvroom, and everyone else -doesn't- have to hear it.

As a car enthusiast, I hate that fake engine sound. It’s so inauthentic and is on the same level as someone painting racing stripes or flames on a Toyota Camry so that it “looks faster”

The drivers of such cars want to draw attention to themselves. But I wish your solution would psychologically trick some of them at least. I sometimes catch myself holding my breath when one of these passes by and it is still very distressing even if I temporarily plug my years with my fingers.

Hearing the vroomvroom isn’t the same as feeling the vroomvroom.

These "technologies" are unbelievably "cringe" (for a lack of a better word).

Car enthusiasts want the sound to come from some mechanical aspect. They want the sound and smell of burning fuel, pushing pistons up and down at extreme speeds with hundreds of other rotating and spinning parts working in unison for a cool sound.

A speaker diaphragm moving up and down 20 to 100 times a second doesn't quite scratch that itch. A speaker can nearly "replicate" any sound, which takes the fun out of it.

My buddy was a huge VW fan and loved taking a stock Jetta or Passat and modding the engine and transmission while making it look completely stock. He was one of the few people I knew who loved the idea of the "wolf in sheeps clothing". The guy who pulls up with a Mustang and then blowing off his doors and the Mustang guy wanted to see what he actually had under the hood. The low key stealth approach I always though was the best way to do this. You don't draw attention to yourself either from cops or LEO's.

I still feel like its the right way to do this, but clearly in the digital age of social media and the constant need for attention and dopamine hits, its now the exception instead of the rule as you have correctly pointed out.

Oh yes. I used to have a VW van (a T4) which had had a V6 transplant and an aftermarket turbo retrofitted (not by me - I am a quite capable mechanic, but not THAT capable.)

It was still a VW van, but it gave a few unsuspecting BMW drivers a surprise. Some 370bhp tends to get others' attention when unleashed.

I read "midlife crisis" as "old guy trying to impress much younger girls" and then a cheap-ish car modded to be fast, furious, and obnoxiously loud seems like it might just work. Plus it's probably an amazing toy that can also be enjoyed solo.

And as long as there's enough attractive women who are impressed by loud cars, there will be guys with loud cars. I also dislike loud cars. But I'm at a loss as to how one would fix the root cause. Pull requests welcome ;)

And, yes, I share your impression. That car is about him trying to enforce attention by subjecting other people to his car.

Is this the kind of pull request you were looking for? https://youtube.com/shorts/QiOGH6JtL5E

> their mods often seem directed to inflicting their cars on everyone else

Flies in the face of all the talk about consent. I did not consent to this...

All show no go is the trend these days - and not just with cars.

I remember some friends talking about motorcycles, and one was wondering how much horsepower you could get out of a Harley Davidson motorcycle.

And another friend quipped, "You don't tune a Harley for power, you tune it for noise!"

Back to tuner cars, I've always thought the perfect invention would be a tuner-car-audio-experience-device.

Basically, a device that you plug into the cigarette lighter and it uses some method of figuring out the engine RPM (and maybe throttle position). Then it would generate cool engine sounds and send them to bluetooth stream / fm broadcast / audio jack, for the car audio system.

You could drive a quiet car, but inside it would feel like a formula one car, a 12-cylinder italian car, motorcycle, tugboat or jet fighter.

I would say spaceship, but those days are gone since every EV nowadays sounds like an cheapo alien orchestra already.

It exists!

https://us.wrumersound.com/

Plug this into your car's OBD II port and run their app on your phone, and it sounds like whatever you configure the app to.

V8, F1, lawnmower, or fart noise!

I think the Dodge Charger EV has a lot of the fake engine noises, both inside and out. Sounds like it was a very important feature.

https://www.roadandtrack.com/news/a63141971/dodge-charger-da...

Many modern cars do this due to how quiet ICE are now. Oftentimes the fake interior noise is awful. I pull the modules that inject the fake noise, it makes the interior much quieter. YMMV.

I find the modded import scene was much bigger around 15 to 20 years ago. About 5 years ago it was loud Mustangs and Camaros. Now, down here in the deep south, pickup trucks are by far the most obnoxious. (source: I walk around my city everyday)

I also dislike loud cars, but I've come to accept that the motivation of loud car owners is probably to gain kudos from other loud car lovers, rather than to inflict pain on us normies. One time I remember being on my bicycle and a kid car revved past me and another cyclist. In my head I though "what an asshole" but the cyclist next to me shouted "Sick!!!" I'm not really defending the loud noise, but I think it's useful to shift perspective a bit and understand it is probably not an act of intentional violence (though it may be unintentional violence).

I don’t see how your “shift” makes it any better. Did you really think people did exhaust mods purely to torment everyone around them? The noise and the its effect on listeners is the entire point. The fact that it’s primarily to gain kudos from “other loud car lovers” and especially attention from vapid women doesn’t alter the fact that they know and more likely relish if not most charitably are completely indifferent to the effect on everyone else. Which is fundamentally bad character when you’re revving these around populated areas.

After all any “loud car lover” is also either annoyed when their sleep is interrupted or they can’t hear themselves think for hours on end, or they have the IQ of a box of rocks. They want to hear loud revving only when it is convenient and enjoyable to them. So you can choose either complete self-centeredness and hypocrisy at that (likely) or being borderline too dumb to operate a vehicle.

> Did you really think people did exhaust mods purely to torment everyone around them?

I didn't, but the OP wrote:

> So it is about subjecting OTHER people to his car

So my comment was in response to that. I don't think people should ignore the suffering they cause for others, but to me it's different if the motivation is to cause pain vs bringing joy to like-minded people.

Right! They're not actively malicious, they just don't care about other people.

Lol I guess. I think there's a massive chasm between being ignorant of your effect on someone else and actively inflicting pain, but I'm sure I won't convince you that this is a meaningful difference if you don't already believe it. I think you could argue that tons of modern human activities cause negative experiences for other people, I don't think that means the people doing those things are terrible people. Something as simple as watering a lawn could be construed as "not caring about other people" due to failure to conserve public resources, but I don't get a lot of person benefit from cursing every person with a green lawn in the summer.

It's possible that nobody has ever complained to them about the noise. It's possible that they have never been annoyed at loud noises. Anything's possible.

Either it's intentional and malicious, or it's unintentional and extremely inconsiderate. Either way, death penalty.

It's still incredibly immature and selfish, intentional or not.

I admire your empathy, though.

That's how you know you've got the COOLEST car on the block! (unfortunately)

Have you considered people can enjoy different things than you? I personally enjoy a nice exhaust tone and I like subwoofers as well. And I don't like them just because they might piss off somebody like yourself, it's for my own enjoyment. Not all exhausts and subwoofers are created equal. Most modern cars with 'premium' sound systems like Bose, JBL, etc. have subwoofers, but they're usually small and don't require a lot of power. The system they installed in this car might have been the OEM premium sound package as well - the one Toyota offers is JBL and comes with a subwoofer. Do you get mad when it's OEM or just DIY? The GR Corolla has a 'loud' exhaust from the factory as well. Loud enough that you'd probably rage at it judging by this comment.

People buy aftermarket exhausts for a variety of reasons. They can produce a different tone, cut down on exhaust 'drone' (which the GR Corolla is notorious for with it's factory exhaust), offer alternative styling, provide weight savings, and reduce backpressure/improve flow. It's not just about volume. Certainly you could be an asshole who buys an exhaust just because it's loud, but that's not why the majority are doing it, it's for their own enjoyment and usually provides a performance improvement. If they really wanted to achieve max volume they could just do an open dump exhaust or a hood exit, it would be cheaper than buying a Borla and significantly louder.

Have you considered people can enjoy different things than you?

Things like peace and quiet? Assholes with loud exhausts have made it abundantly clear that our tastes differ, yes.

To each their own. Enjoy your boring life.

Your nuanced hobby and aesthetics is reduced to “stupid loudness” in people’s minds because the primary interaction other people have with it is “I am being subjected to stupid loudness”, yes.

If they're really bothered by temporary noise that much, they should just invest in some ear plugs or noise cancelling headphones.

Spoken like someone that never even had to try. Neither of those can physically mitigate spikes of noise from engines, exhausts, or subs, and will only cause more harm if the noise floor is low.

Why spend three paragraphs insisting on the innocence of your motives when you’re just going to fall back on “fuck you suck it up” when pressed on the consequences of your actions?

I like sparring. If I went around punching random people in the face I'd get arrested. If you want to drive a loud car, tha's fine; just do it in a way that doesn't bother other people. Imagine how much better the world would be if everyone put in even the slightest bit of effort to be kind and compassionate to each other.

> Have you considered people can enjoy different things than you?

Midnight to 3 am driving around and around in circles in a residential area with a modified exhaust. Stopping occasionally to restart the car to play the programmed "startup growl".

Who wouldn't enjoy such a thing?

I feel certain that there are people that enjoy their lives as serial killers too.

I'm all for letting people enjoy whatever they enjoy, as long as they don't impose it on the rest of us. That's just part of living in a society.

I’m always reminded of this classic: https://youtube.com/shorts/IzeTYJJXzIk

It has an antipodean non identical twin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eo2JcTk4nBE

More noise than actual speed.

There is a saying "The smallest dog barks the loudest". Those that make the most noise to be seen are the most insecure in their position in the world.

I never appreciated a proper muffler until I didn't have one. I was driving a 27-year-old Honda Civic, and the rusty muffler fell off one day. On the way to go get it fixed, the typically quiet Honda made a ridiculous amount of noise. I had no idea my car could be that loud.

Let the kids be kids, they'll grow out of it, we all do, as opposed to grown men rolling coal in their dually Fs and RAMs. Give me a nice riced out Integra or a Sylvia any day, or a nice low rider instead. A Camry with a rally rear spoiler is sad sight indeed though.

Harleys are my scorn locally, these "tough" patched up dudes with a day job. But what's even more annoying is that there are no helmet laws in my state, all that taking up ICU beds and all and none of them organ donors I'd assume.

I live in the state that's in the top 5 in the US for worst drivers. Yes, it's Florida. Constant racing on I95, Camaros racing Mustangs, Nissan drivers hallucinating they are in an M3/4, burning coal left and right. A Cyber Truck or a Denali tailgating me. Often, there are shootouts. It's nuts.

My main peeve is the scooters, like Razer, Hiboy, Segway. I can't take my dog for a walk without being assaulted by one from behind without a warning bell or a slowdown on a sidewalk. I've begun simply taking up the whole width of the sidewalk, I'm wide and so is my fido. Let them eat asphalt if they like. Sometimes they argue, but I carry pepper spray. AirPods on full ANC. It's good that none wear helmets, attrition is a thing. Oh, and they also get on the highways. It's madness.

Is it similar on the continent these days?

Lots of weird judgment and smugness in this thread. This guy bought a fun car that he's excited about? Well obviously he's POOR and IMMATURE because if he was RICH and OLD he would buy an ELECTRIC CAR that's WAY FASTER (in a straight line) and doesn't make nasty noises and smells!!! what an idiot!!!

I'm all for cracking down on excessively loud and stinky cars, but the GR Corolla is not that loud, and it has modern emissions controls. It is also, believe it or not, possible to own a moderately loud car (even with a modded exhaust) without subjecting your neighbors to backfires, 40 minute idling sessions, and loud fly-bys at every hour of the day and night.

The attitudes in this thread really show that people just don't get it, which is probably why the driver's car is an endangered species in $CURRENT_YEAR. How many cars are available in the US with a manual transmission these days? How many that don't cost six figures (or more)? You don't have to be excited about the same things as this guy, but there is a whole lot of projection going on in here from people who can't seem to think beyond how you're perceived by others as the main factor in choosing a car. Have you considered that maybe this guy just likes the car?

> I'm all for cracking down on excessively loud and stinky cars, but the GR Corolla is not that loud, and it has modern emissions controls.

Of course it's not loud from the factory, Toyota isn't going to sell a car that violates noise standards.

But he binned the Toyota mufflers and installed something significantly louder.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48924505

> It is also, believe it or not, possible to own a moderately loud car (even with a modded exhaust)

Not legally in many places. California limits exhaust levels to 95 dbA or less, and I'm betting that OP's mods violate that given that "ATAK exhaust systems produce the highest dB (decibel) levels in the Borla line" [0]. Washington state prohibits modifying exhaust "in a manner which will amplify or increase the noise emitted by the engine of such vehicle above that emitted by the muffler originally installed on the vehicle" [1]

> Have you considered that maybe this guy just likes the car?

I'm inclined to give the same amount of consideration for this guy's preferences as he is towards the thousands of people he chooses to subject to unnecessary, annoying, unhealthy[1], and likely illegal noise.

[0] https://www.borla.com/products/atak

[1] https://app.leg.wa.gov/rcw/default.aspx?cite=46.37.390

[2] https://noiseawareness.org/noise-hurts/impact-on-health/

If people want to roast this guy for installing annoying aftermarket noisemakers then I will not try to stop them. I mean to address the (plenty of) more generic comments like this one:

---

A GR Corolla goes 0-60 in 4.9 - 5.4sec.

My unexotic stock electric does 0-60 in around 4.8sec, +/-.

So the same performance that requires a stupid amount of wasted energy as heat and noise can be had from stock electric, with a couple hundred ms leftover. Do you care about performance, or do you just want to just fart out a bunch of noise?

I get traditional car culture, but electrics embody the "money talks, wealth whispers" truism.

---

and this one:

---

My midlife crisis car would probably be a land cruiser. No need to go fast. Space and chill is best.

A 3 cylinder Corolla, regardless of how fast, is just people transportation at best and in the worst inefficient way possible. A normal base 23k usd Corolla , not saying anything against the car mechanically it is a great machine for what it is.

Just, overkill. Can’t go fast, need to have higher insurance, it’s more at risk for theft, and it’s not easily replaceable as compared to a 23k corolla.

Do you mean a real Land Cruiser, like the ones that can cross deserts? I'm with you.

Land Cruisers are great! If this guy wants a Land Cruiser then he should get one. His interest in Land Cruisers is not my issue with his comment.

There is more to performance than 0-60. But Elon told normies that's what matters, now suddenly everyone quotes those times like gospel.

It's meant for spirited driving. If it wasn't so expensive it'd be an amazing car for tooling around on gravel roads with some skidplates. Electric won't take you out to the boonies, you can't bring more juice with you and ultimately an electric package that will consistently produce 300hp while weighing 3200lbs does not exist. As far as Land Cruisers's I feel that the externalities of those and other neo-vintage boxes on 33" tires are greater than anything else on the road. Horrible mileage, makes everything less safe, less agility, less visibility, all to cosplay.

> If it wasn't so expensive

It's too bad that Toyota and Honda don't have a WRX analogue sitting below their STI analogue, but I guess the demand for that kind of car isn't what it used to be.

I'd settle for the Civic SI having a bit more power on tap. Budgetizing the GRC might be a bit more problematic.

If they could shoehorn the Prius drivetrain into a Corolla hatchback (not sure of packaging, a Corolla hybrid sedan already loses 2 gallons of gas vs the normal car, maybe with solid-state batteries), that could be a great, if sonically unpleasant, middle ground. The hybrid Civics already give the Si a run for the money (though the 6 speed and LSD are great). I could see Honda being able to punch the engine out to 2.3 (they shrank the bore on the hybrid to 81mm for efficiency) and with updated battery tech eek out 230hp. Add an LSD, type R control arms/spindles/sway bars and that'd be an incredible 40mpg combined daily though dangerously close to $40k.

The US Corolla Cross Hybrid pretty much has the Prius AWD drivetrain.

I didn't think I'd live to see a $50K Corolla. No disrespect to what's under the hood, but it's still a plasticky Corolla. It does its job at $25K for A to B. Stick to Priuses, Toyoda-san. VW Golf R still exists, thanks Odin.

Have you driven a Land Cruiser? They’re substantial better than the average pickup truck on most of the issues you listed. For example, the current F-150 crew cab which is the most popular vehicle in the US is 3 ft longer and has a taller hood. So it’s a little weird to single out a niche SUV as the worst thing on the road. Modern Land Cruisers handle pretty well, while the old ones with live front axle are harder to drive but also smaller. Everyone I know with that type of car uses it to go see cool stuff in the mountains, although I’m sure cosplayers exist.

I'm mostly just lamenting people gravitating towards living rooms on wheels. Makes roads worse for everyone, esp peds and cyclists.

If you're talking about the US Landcruiser it's actually what we know as a Prado over here in Australia. My dream midlife crisis vehicle is a 2025 Landcruiser 79. Mostly for towing capacity and being able to access more offroad areas of Australia, but admittedly a lot of the appeal is just how awesome they look when decked out for "adventuring".

My midlife crisis car is a Mercedes Sprinter.

That's more of a bliss than crisis, eh?

> So the same performance that requires a stupid amount of wasted energy as heat and noise can be had from stock electric, with a couple hundred ms leftover. Do you care about performance, or do you just want to just fart out a bunch of noise?

The flaws are the point. Keeping within power band while rowing the gears while the engine is yelling is entire point of manual ICE sports car. Or a motorcycle for that matter

Also GR Corolla is for zooming around the race track, not hitting 0-60 times, and it has roots in GR Yaris which is homologation special WRC car.

>I get traditional car culture,

I don't think you do

> but electrics embody the "money talks, wealth whispers" truism.

And I don't think it does. Raw performance (at least the straight line one) in EV is after all cheaper.

It looks like all three Borla ATAK catbacks for the GR Corolla are active exhuasts[0], so you can dynamically switch between quiet operation and loud operation.

[0]: https://www.borla.com/2023-2026-toyota-gr-corolla-exhaust-sy...

I'd be okay with those if they were geofenced to be quiet in a 6 mile radius from my current GPS coordinates.

Disclaimer: I drive an ND Miata so I "get" it.

> Now from the rear it looks like four black bazookas are hidden below the bumper and on start-up it sounds like a fire-breathing dragon.

> Those who know cars appreciate my understated taste

This guy is immature because he has the taste of a teenager in love with Fast & Furious and Limp Bizkit. The entire article's language made me cringe like never.

> Lots of weird judgment and smugness in this thread. This guy bought a fun car that he's excited about? Well obviously he's POOR and IMMATURE because if he was RICH and OLD he would buy an ELECTRIC CAR that's WAY FASTER (in a straight line) and doesn't make nasty noises and smells!!! what an idiot!!!

As someone who happens to drive an electric car that is wicked fast (and not just in a straight line...), I'm not sure why you'd suggest that the weird judgement and smugness is directed only at guys driving gas cars. I get plenty of crap over driving an EV. Especially a performance-oriented one.

I love manual transmissions too, but you're just as judgy.

> I'm not sure why you'd suggest that the weird judgement and smugness is directed only at guys driving gas cars.

Because that's what's happening in this thread?

I have no problem with EVs or NPC style cars, or really any kind of car except those that are excessively large and heavy to the point that people sharing roads with them are placed in significant danger. I own a CR-V hybrid as a family hauler and it's fantastic in that role despite being boring as fuck. Sometimes boring is good.

> ELECTRIC CAR that's WAY FASTER (in a straight line)

Why in a straight line? My Acura ZDX handles curves as well as any ICE car I've ever driven. If anything, it sticks to the ground better due to the low center of gravity from the battery pack.

Have you driven a Miata? Even if the ZDX is objectively better in every way (which I doubt, but I could be wrong), I suspect the Miata will be subjectively better when rated for "is it fun to drive".

GM does have pretty great chassis and controls tuning these days, but GP's claim is absurd.

Not even Miata, just any non-SUV.

You have not driven well driving cars if a 6000lb crossover is the pick of the litter. GM really went crazy with its Ultium SUVs by making most of them 77-78" wide with huge tires but there's only so much you can do mask the mass.

Yeah, he's just a humble douchenozzle minding his own business.

This guy picked the right car, just ruined it with the exhaust mod.

Hi everyone,

I am the author of this Corolla essay. My friend who works in the tech industry told me it was posted here. Thank you for reading it! I never expected a silly essay about a Toyota Corolla would gain this much traction, but it is what it is. It also made the LA Times, but in an abridged version.

Here's the link: https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2026-06-22/fast-furiou...

I'm not sure if this is going to change too many opinions here, but the exhaust is not literally a "fire-breathing dragon" loud (I was using hyperbole for fun). It rumbles on cold start but it's only loud when you floor it, which I don't. We live in a suburb of LA and my neighbors are older and family folk and I am respectful of them. They actually like my car and am happy I got it because it makes me happy. The amped subwoofer can only be heard IN THE CAR because it's really small, like an old encyclopedia, and it sits under the passenger seat. The music I like has bass and there was ZERO bass in the stock sound. And last, I don't track it but I am lucky to live near iconic Angeles Crest Highway and I do drive it up there for fun. I get passed by locals in SUV who drive way faster because they know the road way better. Also, one not expected benefit of the car AND the essay has been all the awesome and nice people I've met through them. Modern life can be so isolating and it's hard to meet new people or make friends in your 50's, so I am grateful that most of all.

Best, Ky-Phong

PS: I actually am mainly a speculative fiction writer nowadays! Lol

This is a bad place for content like this, unfortunately. Hacker News is extremely hostile to car culture, suburbs, California and the US in general. I don't really drive any more due to working from home and spine injuries in my 30s that made it difficult to sit in a confined space for more than 20 minutes, and I wasn't really into modding even back in the day, but as another not Asian but also not white 80s kid from the LA suburbs, I get it. My dad's softball buddy had his own garage when I was growing up. My dad himself still works on a 1972 baby blue Ford F-150 he restored 30 years ago. There was a kid a year ahead of me in high school with a Trans Am you could hear from 2 miles away.

It's easy not to understand the nature of noise in the LA suburbs. There's a lot of loudness, but for whatever reason, maybe the lack of tall structures and steel, or the prevalence of wood, grass, and alphalt over brick, concrete, and stone, or the overly wide streets and setback house lots, but the car noise is not that annoying, not like it is in east coast cities or especially in Europe. I grew up with a train line 200 feet from my house, two miles from the fault line the Whittier Earthquake struck in 1987, underneath the flight path of the space shuttle that sonic boomed every time it landed at Edwards AFB. One way or another, that old Trans Am was pushing it, but I don't think any car ever really annoyed me, at least not for sound. In Long Beach especially, most of your engine noise is going to get drowned out in the Pacific Ocean.

Living as an adult in Texas, full-sized pickup trucks taking up multiple parking spots and never seeing me or outright seeming to try and hit me on purpose when running or cycling gets pretty annoying, but even then the sound isn't a big deal. Except people that rev their motorcycles in tunnels. They're pretty bad. But rice rockets and American muscle alike live and let live. Enjoy your midlife crisis, my brother.

Thanks, man. Yeah, I'm still wondering how it got to HN myself lol.

I knew which car it was instantly based on the headline - I go back and forth on whether to get one or to continue to abuse my 2000s Matrix manual which is like the GRC's puny brother.

> I was using hyperbole for fun

I think people are just missing this. It was pretty obvious to me, but hey.

Cool article and glad you like the car!

I enjoyed reading it. Expression and culture through hardware modification and engineering.

Sorry for all the nasty replies here. You do you! I’m a car & bike guy so I’m glad you got a cool car and modded it as you like. I’m hoping for an old 900ss or monster for my delayed mid life crisis purchase but money isn’t there.

Ignore the haters. I really enjoyed reading your article as a GR Yaris owner. This car is so much fun.

You'd think that on a website that has the word "hacker" in its title, more people would be supportive of someone "hacking" their car, but I guess there's not a lot of car people here.

The only socially appropriate ways to inconvenience other people are to build dark patterns into your app to juice subscriptions, dump VC-funded detritus on the street and call it a startup, or take their life’s work and create an algorithm to regurgitate it back to them without paying them for it. Making your car louder? That’s just rude and inconsiderate.

Someone putting performance exhaust on their cool car isn't likely to disturb me in my home.

You know what is? The doings of obnoxious adtech people.

> Someone putting performance exhaust on their cool car isn't likely to disturb me in my home.

We are not all so lucky. I live one door down from an avenue that does sometimes get these kinds of vehicles and it 100% disturbs me in my home.

I understand that living in a society means that sometimes people will do things that inconvenience me. I am much more understanding of that when the inconvenience provides some clear benefit to the other person in return.

But in this case, annoying strangers is the point. When you're in the car, you aren't hearing the 100+dB exhaust. It's not a necessary path to optimizing the car's performance. It's just being an asshole to demonstrate to the world that they are powerless to stop you from being an asshole.

I live in an area with mostly a grid road pattern. It's very quiet, mostly the sounds of nature. But about a mile away from my house there's a very nice road with great curves and few intersections. Every weekend the guys with the exhausts come out and it sounds like I'm at a racetrack. They certainly don't care that there are hundreds of people nearby that have to listen to this.

No hacking involved. The tech equivalent is buying an Alienware PC from Best Buy and then taking it to the local computer shop to have them put in RGB fans and a liquid cooling system, while not overclocking we’re doing anything more than playing Minecraft sometimes

hacker vibes would be sharing how he learned to program the ecu with a laptop. or putting in a short throw. running linux on the headunit, etc. but no, all this guy did was put a louder, annoying exhaust on it and drives it like its a go kart. im just left wondering what stickers he will tastefully add to it? haha but its ok, its a mid life crisis after all.. if he is feeling happy and like a child again, thats totally great

I am a car person. I have a fun-to-drive car that I have modified. This guy is getting all the hate he deserves.

You don't get to be an assh*le and subject everyone to loud exhaust (I looked up his exhaust, it's 105 dB!), and be upset if people call you an assh*le.

Anyone who defends him is essentially saying "it's ok to be an assh*le to everyone around you, as long as you get yours."

>This guy is getting all the hate he deserves.

Most of these comments are like the car equivalent of Karen the 3x Brady Campaign donor and some Fox News Fudd complaining about someone's gun. The broken clocks might be right this minute but they're still broken.

The modifications the author describes are considered in the car community to be incredibly immature, poorly researched, and basic. "Borla ATAK" is a four-letter-word because they're bought and sold exclusively by the "louder = better" crowd and their near-ubiquity on late-model Ford Mustangs is the bane of people with functional eardrums everywhere. People can modify their cars and be happy with it, but if someone customized their house by installing an outward facing loudspeaker system that played nothing but remixes of "barbie girl" on repeat, I'd probably express criticism.

Except a car with a loud exhaust you'll hear for a max 10 seconds as it drives past you/ your house is not the same as having a house that is stationary, with a loudspeaker, that the neighbours will hear all the time.

But a lot of car "hacking" is like installing RGB fans back to back so they whine louder. Which is totally a made up strawman argument that nobody is making, but also not hacking.

My ongoing midlife crisis vehicle swerves in a different direction: I bought a 1988 Nishiki 1207 at a yard sale for $40. Mostly stock save for a new seat. With the wheels out of true, the stickers plastered over with garbage, the brakes loose, the front tire visibly cracking, the rear cassette visibly rusted, and the rack mounts stripped, the bike needs some work. I am motivated to finally really learn bike maintenance after putting it off for 30 years

Zinn & the Art of Road Bike Maintenance, if you are looking for a solid resource.

Zen. It's great but apparently not a maintenance handbook.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zen_and_the_Art_of_Motorcycle_...

No, I believe they were referring to this book: https://road.cc/content/review/192116-zinn-art-road-bike-mai...

It's a rewarding project! I fixed up a freebie old Schwinn roadbike a few years ago and it's so much fun to ride. I have a freebie Nishiki too waiting for a decision on what to do with it--touring bike or fixie conversion. Enjoy the time turning wrenches and then on the road!

I added a MIK rear rack with pannier rails. I bought a seat post collar with screw holes in order to attach it, only to realize the bike doesn't have a seat post collar! And the collar was 1/4 inch too wide for the seat post. I wedged some green tire protection strips in there and it works great. I biked home two full panniers and a watermelon in a basket from a farmer's market. Bad idea in retrospect as the whole bike wobbled from being back-heavy. And the kickstand cannot handle even the slightest amount of weight. I might invest in front pannier rails. So I guess I'm going in the touring bike direction!

Riding on a wheel you have built from parts is a joyous thing.

My favorite bike was an early aluminum framed Trek that I upgraded practically every part of myself.

The bonded frame creaked but it rode great for thousands of miles.

It got stolen and I haven't felt the same about biking since. Miss the hell out of that bike.

I have a GR Corolla and it's great in the mountains! It's tiny light and fun and fits a car seat (barely).

I wouldn't consider a loud GRC w/ catback a "sleeper" though - it's quite the opposite??

When my wife was pregnant, our garage had an ND Miata (mine), a BRZ (hers) and an Elise (also hers). We pretty quickly decided that we were going to need some kind of car that we could reasonably put a car seat in, and while the BRZ nominally had a back seat, neither of us were interested in trying to fit a car seat and child into it.

We actually did consider a GR corolla, but ended up getting a used evo x that's been pretty fun instead.

Tell me you live in the Bay Area without telling me you live in the Bay Area.

Do you have a lift in your garage?

A lift would be rad, but I think we'd have to completely redo the garage doors to get enough vertical clearance for it. In a couple years I think we're planning to redo the garage so that it's more effective as a workshop, maybe we can include a lift as part of that.

great choice NOT getting the GRC — it doesn't fit a car seat comfortably if you're 5'8 or larger haha

Agreed. I switched to an aftermarket catback (sxth single exit, lol) over the past year and while I really enjoyed the difference in tone, the increased volume level was just barely intolerable. So I'm back on the OEM one.

the stock GRC exhaust is intolerable already; every time I pull into the apt complex where everyone drives an EV, I feel like we're the neighborhood hood rats

for MY2025+ if you're in eco mode it shuts the valve so that's not too bad for me.

didn't know that! have a 2024 Premium and it's still loud

yeah. sadly toyota NA probably won't distribute an update/TSB for it. It's a shame.

If your neighbors are that snobby they can't stand the sound of a stock car that's their problem, not yours.

no one's complained (I don't even know if they notice), I just feel like it's obnoxious - I can feel the car arrive from the apt shaking haha

That, and all the other mods were visual. The car is mechanically stock.

Man, he nails it when he talks about that car culture era. I bought myself a 300zx twin turbo as my first car back then.

The experiences I had driving around in that thing were amazing.

Also though, was short lived. Was young and stupid, wrapped it around a tree shortlty after, never viewed driving the same.

So, how many "experiences" did you really have, if you crashed it shortly after?

Probably at least two.

When you're young and dumb and full of energy, you can get a whole lot of experiences accomplished in the space of a single summer.

Probably more than most do in a year.

"door ajar" so bad ass.

I accidentally bought a midlife crisis car: a Subaru Trailseeker EV station wagon. It was cheaper (and more to form) than the 2026 Outback.

It just happens to be the fastest production vehicle Subaru has ever sold. Rip-your-face-off speed wasn’t even what I was after, I just wanted an EV wagon and it’s the only one in existence. Still: stupid fun and very unique car, I’ve had it for two months and haven’t seen another one on the road yet.

In 2026 the modded gas cars that are so much slower and ridiculously loud are honestly confusing. I absolutely love them for autocross, but people building track cars and then...never taking them to the track, pretending their suburb is a track, is just sad.

I recently got the slightly smaller sister (the Solterra). The Trailseeker is actually known as the e-Outback outside North America, and it looks it.

On a straight line full pedal down it will spin the front tires. Absurdly fun. Not as nimble around a curve as the sports sedan it replaced but I honestly tell people I don’t miss my old car. And I definitely don’t miss feeding premium gas to the turbo engine.

I respect the BRZ and Miata owners who frequently do track their cars. I can’t help but hope someone makes a small range but lightweight RWD EV that can whip around a curve for them.

Just had to look this up, impressive specs for a Subaru. They've had some pretty lackluster EVs in the past (along with Toyota), but this one actually seems like a good combination of range and performance (375hp equivalent and 281 miles of range). Doesn't have super fast charging, which isn't a dealbreaker at the pricepoint.

I've got a Volvo C40 currently which is 400hp and likewise impressively fast, but the range is absolute trash (230mi claimed, usually more like 200mi). Otherwise the vehicle is nearly perfect.

I love the Trailseeker for being the anti-Tesla car. I rented a Tesla a while back and have driven friends cars: I hate everything about their UX. It's like people who never drove a car tried to invent a car from how they imagine it should work. Horrible. I won't go into detail about all the way's it's a superior design, I'll just say that it has normal door handles and that's gist of the design philosophy.

The new eTNGA platform has been bumped up to 150 kW and while it's not crazy Hyundai speed, but it's been fine on a road trip. The charging curve makes great use of that 150kw.

The only sort of gripe many have with Subaru/Toyota is their completely whiffing the software, particularly the route planner. The redeeming factor is that charging infra is becoming so common that you don't need a crazy software system to avoid running out of battery. There's a charger pretty much every 50 miles or less everywhere you'd want to go.

Available in US? I’ve only seen the Solterra

> a Subaru Trailseeker EV station wagon

That is an SUV, not a wagon.

Call it what you like, but it’s basically the same dimensions as the 2025 Outback and that’s generally called a ‘lifted wagon’ type vehicle.

I owned only EVs and PHEVs since 2012. The GR Corolla was so compelling that it pulled me back to an ICE. I had forgotten what it felt like to have FUN while driving. The biggest feature for me is that I could pull the DCM fuse and not get constantly spied on. The next-best feature is that I can disable the center screen. And I love my physical buttons.

The Corolla bangs. I had a 1990 model that got me through years of zero problems, it was fully mechanical. We're still a Toyota family and same reliability: I took our current non-electric car to a new mechanic for the yearly check last week and asked him how much life it has left, he says until the rest of my life (city emissions will cancel it well before).

The GR Corolla is definitely on my extended list of "cars I'd put in my oversized garage if I won the lottery." That and a Fiesta ST. I love tossable cars, even though I also love being able to rip a 0-60 in 2.9s on a whim and never having to wait in line for gas.

I had a 2014 Fiesta ST and it was an amazing little car. Obviously quick, but could also get close to 50mpg cruising at highways speeds.

I like those but am wary since it was reported to be prone to rollover when getting frisky with it. Was that much of a concern for you?

My midlife crisis is also cars. I'm in the process of searching for an honest to god mechanic's shop to buy under an LLC just so I have a better place to work on cars than my garage. I have a list of 8 cars I want to own and restomod, all of which probably nobody else cares about, and that's completely fine. There are some vehicles that just speak to my soul, and I want to experience the best possible iteration of that.

I've spent years on track, now I'm much more interested in the experience of daily driving. A car does not need to be a full track build to be fun. My mantra now is much more OEM+, you have to almost squint to realize its not bone stock. The coolest car to me is something that's well-maintained and shows care and love from its owner, not necessarily something loud and flashy. I think the GR Corolla is an excellent platform to build around, and I almost bought one myself although my current newer daily is a Mazda 3 Turbo. Hot hatches and wagons will always hold a special place in my heart.

That said, I have no desire for a particularly loud exhaust, although I'm more than happy to trade off NVH for actual performance.

what’s the list?

In no specific order, per se, but kind of this order, here's my 8:

1. 1986 Toyota MR2 AW11

2. 1996 Mazda Miata/MX-5 NA

3. 1990 Porsche 944 Turbo S

4. 1988 Pontiac Fiero GT

5. 1995 Mazda RX-7 FD

6. 2007 Lotus Exige S

7. 1994 Autozam AZ-1

8. 2013 Acura TSX Sport Wagon

I'm a big Toyota/Mazda fan, currently drive a Mazda as my primary vehicle, previously drove mostly Toyotas, and I have a love affair with 80s and 90s sports coupes, the lighter the better. I also happen to think the Acura TSX Sport Wagon is criminally underrated as one of the best wagons to build on, thanks to coming with the K24 and in a gorgeous Vortex Blue Pearl.

that’s a good list. i also collect japanese beaters (currently several miatas, an ae86 and an s13) and british lightweights (two vintage lotus racers and a modern aston factory race car) so lots of overlap.

i have been looking for a 944 as well. there’s a great porsche shop across from my workshop so at least it will be convenient.

I love all beaters, not just Japanese ones, but Japanese ones tend to be the best. The lighter the weight, the shorter the wheelbase, the more fun it is, regardless of how much of a shitbox it is.

One of my favorite cars in my past life is the Scion iQ. It's not in my 8, but one day I'll pick one up super cheap and turbo Busa swap it to make something ridiculous. This dude swapped in the drivetrain for a Yamaha R1: https://daveintheusa.com/ and it makes around 180hp (vs stock 106hp) at a lighter weight with higher revs, I think with a turbo Busa swap you should be able to do something similar and make close to 300hp.

I always had a love for the Honda CRX as well. If you make a car light enough and give it decent suspension, it doesn't matter if it's FWD, RWD, AWD, it'll drive good.

I'm hoping once I retire I'll have the time and space to learn how to fabricate composites. I've done a bit before, but I want to get to the point I can make my own dry carbon fiber panels. Like my ideal would be to restomod a bunch of my list of 8, keep them looking fairly stock-ish, but just cut weight like bananas on them. Think carbon fiber body panels but painted so its not stupidly obvious, titanium or aluminum billet components wherever possible, lightest wheels I can manage (Volk CE28Ns or similar), and /excellent/ suspension. I don't even care if I make that much more power than stock on most of these cars, I just want to make a bunch of beater go carts :)

my ae86 is caged and my s13 was a formula D car. they can be amusing

i have a '62 lotus 23, i am tempted to put carbon fiber body panels on it to lower the weight even further (currently ~ 900 lbs)

Wow, if that's a legitimate 23 and not a replica, that's a hell of a car with quite a lot of racing pedigree. Personally I'd be almost afraid to drive it due to its rarity, but I wouldn't be able to resist giving it a good run at my home track. I've always had a love for Lotus, but somewhat at a distance until they started using Toyota engines in the late 90s. Maybe more than any other car company they embody the understanding that power to weight ratio has two variables, as exemplified by the famous quote from their founder "Simplify, then add lightness", and I've always really loved that. It's very much in line with my own thinking about cars and why the lighter a car is usually the more I love the feel of driving it. The Lotus Exige S makes my list because it has every bit of that design pedigree but the reliability of a Toyota drive train :). I'm not sure I'd want to actually try to campaign any of the non-Toyota powered Lotus cars, heh.

What's it like around the track in a 23? 900 pounds is already incredibly light. Unfortunately it would be impossible to meet modern safety standards while following the same design, but if you applied modern materials science to the car I wonder how much weight you could really save. Even in the 60s on the Lotus 23 they were using magnesium alloy drivetrain components and wheels, space frame chassis with lightweight skinning for body panels, and other techniques we still rely on. I would guess you wouldn't cut that much weight using carbon fiber body panels, maybe another 40 pounds or so at maximum perhaps? You'd probably pick up more speed by modifying it to accept wider tires and increasing the track width slightly, like some of the later replicas.

I think you and I would have fun in a garage wrenching over a few beers, glad to see there's others out there that appreciate the joys of lightweight beaters :)

it is real. serial number 2. it’s a terrifying car. i can’t drive it much at my home track (laguna) because of the sound level, and it’s not eligible for most track days. https://www.jalopnik.com/don-t-feel-bad-if-you-get-passed-by...

it runs knobbly tires so just going to slicks would probably help a lot, but i don’t think the transmission is built for it.

Modding a car to be louder is antisocial behavior and should be illegal.

Much of the time for a car like this it's more about changing the tone and maybe squeezing a bit more performance out of the car. But along with that there's usually a volume increase. It's a much smaller subset of car owners who change an exhaust just to have an obnoxiously loud one.

For sure, but nobody seeking that buys a Borla ATAK, which has achieved memetic status in car communities for its absurd volume at the expense of everything else.

It already is illegal in some places, but there's a lot of legal antisocial behavior that we let go but that doesn't get talked about as much - like watching videos in public transport on the loudspeaker, or advertising in general.

A friend of mine in college had the same CRX as the author and I’d get rides to campus with him. He passed away in an accident not long after the first Fast movie came out. I totally get what the author is saying about some cars being time machines/memory capsules.

Ok if anyone does find this comment, its as simple as this 1 - Manual race tuned cars are all about mechanical engagement for the driver. The engine sound is almost a requirement so you can shift without having to look at the tach.

2 - Modding cars for more noise or looks is a preference thing and in some cases can be annoying and even law breaking. We live in a chaotic world

3 - EVs are faster but do no offer the same mechanical engagement with the car. A manual requires you to understand what the engine and wheels are doing to properly clutch and shift and while doing that you are also dealing with brake and body weight shift, etc. Its analog vs digital, its rolex vs casio, its 70mm film vs Laser.

Unmodded GR Corolla will be plenty loud enough to gauge the RPM anywhere close to the redline. Or get a shift light?

I've driven manuals my whole life. Never needed the engine to be louder so that I knew when to shift.

I said race tuned. For regular roads I agree

I wish everyone complaining about other people’s choices here were forced to also post the make/model of the very boring cars the commenter drives. People complaining about others mods are doing it out of insecurity… do you point out loud clothes and styling choices of your coworkers too?

Loud clothes don't roll up in front of my house around midnight with a giant bass thumping for 10 minutes while they pick up or drop off whoever.

Or sit next to me at a redlight drowning out my radio and vibrating my lungs.

The author doesn't do that either.

A 50 year old got excited about a Toyota Corolla and everyone is blaming him for the decline of fucking society.

> do you point out loud clothes and styling choices of your coworkers too?

If the answer is “no”, will you admit that people complaining about noise are, in fact, complaining because of the noise?

Things are posted to HN to be discussed and opined on. For some reason somebody's objectively entry level and subjectively tastless car mods were posted here, and people are expressing their opinions.

And, to wit: 1987 Nissan Be1 2011 Nissan Frontier Pro4x 2014 BMW i3 REX 2020 BMW M2 Competition

All with manual transmissions, with the exception of the direct-drive one.

I agree with those comments and my vehicles are a 1990 Mazda Miata that I fixed up[1] & and a Model 3 Performance. The Model 3 looks boring, but is ridiculously fast. The Miata has the stock engine, intake, & exhaust, so it's not loud. It's not fast, but it's very fun to drive.

I don't care about loud clothes because they don't wake me or my family up at night, or interrupt a conversation during a walk, or hurt my ears while I'm waiting to cross the street.

1. https://geoff.greer.fm/miata/

I think it doesn't have to be insecurity. I drive a Hyundai Kona, and have no particular desire for speed or performance; I'm happy for other people to have sporty, fast cars even if they are modded, but I do get annoyed by very loud vehicles (regardless of performance; e.g. small motorcycles or pickups that are very loud are also annoying).

I'm not blaming OP specifically for this, but I don't think you have to drive a sports car to be allowed to be annoyed by loud cars without it being 'insecurity'.

Love my Model Y. Looks boring, tons of stuff can be packed and still comparable acceleration to not that old BMW M3. And no smell and no noise. Fantastic car.

Too bad the handling is shit. It's too heavy. This is why I kept my motorcycle for when I want to have fun on the road.

also the ride, and the interior is not great though post-covid all the other manufacturers except the japanese are speed running to that same interior setup

Yeah, I'm waiting to sell it for an EV minivan to come out. The Mercedes VLE looks interesting. I was hopeful for the VW Bus, but it's just underwhelming.

the VLE looks great but the pricepoint basically limits it to livery use in cosmopolitan cities. I'm thinking they'll probably sell 1000s of units over the whole run in north america

IDK, it looks pretty comparable at the bottom end to the Buzz. New vehicles in general are so expensive now. I remember buying my first car in the 2000s for $1K (used, granted) and I couldn't imagine buying something that actually drives for that price anymore.

https://www.caranddriver.com/mercedes-benz/vle-class-ev

What's wrong with the VW bus?

Too expensive for a worse vehicle than the Model Y (with incentives, it was a >$20K difference). I take 1-2 trips for 12 hours a year and the Buzz gets >100mi less range, so that's also a consideration. If it wasn't 50% heavier, it would probably get better range.

IIRC the first generation of it also didn't have the right plug to use the supercharger network, didn't have fast charging, or wasn't available >5 seats in the US, so we've kept waiting for future iterations to improve and it hasn't been good enough for the high price.

I absolutely can't stand the suspension on Teslas, some of the worst ride quality of any modern vehicle.

I think, Tesla experimented a lot with suspension. Early models had some bad design and bad quality things. I bought my car when model Y facelift news were leaking everywhere. Suspension and stock wheel alignment were well done. Interior quality is not that good though.

It feels odd that extremely few in Anglosphere is pointing that out. Tesla chassis design and handling tuning is apparently atrocious enough that many total amateur dads on car review sites have to mention it, in the Japanese sphere.

I hear it all the time in the US, and I'm not even around car enthusiasts that much. Idk, either way don't want a Tesla cause of the touch screen.

Performance is not the issue, electric cars are like driving a fridge, it doesn’t matter how fast it goes.

"Comparable acceleration" is basically irrelevant to me, that's a number, numbers don't matter, I want quality of experience not arbitrary quantities.

If you’re not a proper petrolhead you won’t get it and that’s fine, most people aren’t and a car is just a tool for them.

Starting with a GR Corolla is not cheating, but he could have gone a little further. Swapping a 2GR V6 into Corollas is now the thing to do. Throw in a little nitrous or a turbo and you have a car capable of allowing you to live out your kamikaze dreams.

I'm past mid life, but my fall back cars to my youth have been convertibles. The last round being SLK's.

I also own a GR Corolla. it's a fantastic car.

I think its a pretty amazing engineering feat to combine Toyota reliability + 1.6L of engine + the weight of a hatchback + 300hp. Sure, not the best exhaust note, but probably such a fun little monster to drive.

I'd say the reliability statement is still a bit early (GRC has been out four years, GR Yaris with same engine has been out about 5-6). But so far it does seem fairly reliable at least up until someone decides to push the power limits for various components.

It's insanely fun. I previously had a BRZ which was also a lot of fun. This is a whole new beast. Especially in not ideal conditions (wet road in the fog on a mountain and presumably in snow or dirt).

it would be such a blessing to America if the cool-midlife-crisis-move went back to sports cars and got more of those SUV urban assault vehicles off the road

All these words and yet 2 pictures of the car. Show off the mods! Show me the engine bay, the suspension and sway bars!

I daily a GR Corolla. It's insanely fun to drive. The hardest part is i) keeping under the speed limit (which I do more often than I don't), and ii) the suspension. My god, the ride in this thing is SO stiff. The shitty Seattle streets bounce me around like crazy.

I get it - the enthusiasm - I totally get it. I think I'd sell my soul for an 1980's BMW M3.

I used to love cars but the roads are too crowded now for sports cars, between other drivers and cops and cameras you’re guaranteed to have a bad time. These days I’m all about utility for my vehicle (plus e-bike for the thrill). I do miss the stick shift sometimes though.

I bought a Miata as my midlife crisis car (I'm 60 is that still midlife?). I have to say I didn't realize how much fun this car is. Its turned boring trips to the store into an experience. Cruising down the street with the top down feels really relaxing. Plus its just amazing in corners. I don't drive fast but now I don't slow down for corners. Its like a go kart. I know everyone is moving to hybrid and electric vehicles but having a stick shift sporty convertible is just way more fun.

This was a great article. As for movies, be the change you want to see. For example,

Fish, Prawn, Crab is an indie Asian American movie in development.

i had a gr corolla for a year and sold it. the ITCC (the sealed clutch pack that transfers power to the rear) “overheats” and the throws the car into 2wd limp mode after a session and a half on track. “overheat” is in quotes because supposedly it doesn’t have a temperature sensor at all, the ecu runs a model based on other sensors (rear diff etc) and guesses that it is overheating.

still, a pretty amusing car. the traction control system is outstanding, it’s very hard to upset and you can trivially drift it around every corner. even with aggressive play on an empty track it was a incredibly difficult to spin the car. sadly it wasn’t that fun as a DD (you really have to wind it up.) i also had a focus RS (i like hot hatches, i guess) and found it somewhat boring on track and a lot more fun on the street (way more torque at the bottom)

anyway, it remains: miata is always the answer

Anyone who modifies their car to "sound like a fire breathing dragon" is a mouth breathing loser.

> "Now from the rear it looks like four black bazookas are hidden below the bumper and on start-up it sounds like a fire-breathing dragon"

Ah yes, the "everybody in a 3 mile radius must know how much I spent on my exhaust"-mobile

Just like my neighbors with Harleys that drunk drive home at 2a revving the engine.

My car has a 3.5L V6 and is almost silent. The only reason to fit one of those exhausts is to be an arsehole to everyone around you.

I'm sure the author is a nice guy, but there's nothing I find more obnoxious than someone driving down a quiet neighbor with a vehicle they've modified to be intentionally loud.

In an alternate universe the cannonball runners, with their cars silent, unassuming, but blazingly fast won over the car modding scene

A GR Corolla goes 0-60 in 4.9 - 5.4sec.

My unexotic stock electric does 0-60 in around 4.8sec, +/-.

I get traditional car culture, but electrics embody the "money talks, wealth whispers" truism.

this car is about handling in the twisties, not on straigh line.

if you care about performance, you should know that its not only momentary performance what matters, but sustaining it and on repeated occasions. this car is made to be driven hard in a circuit or mountain roads. a electric car overheats its battery and its brakes due to their weight.

the thing most close to electric sport car must be the ionic 5n. the rest is just old people saying "hey look how fast i can launch this car on the highway"

ps: most car people dont care about performance, but about the thrill and the emotion of driving

I've yet to have any issues with the battery overheating, and most if not all of the braking is regenerative (no brake pad wear).

the first time I drove a model 3 I felt like I couldn't stop. it's on par with my 80s van that has drum brakes on the rear. the brakes just aren't good enough for sport, the car weighs too much. if this is hard to understand, you're living in a different world from motorsports enthusiasts

You don't need to drive race cars to understand that a Tesla Model 3 stops faster than an 80s van with drum brakes. Sure, probably not as good as a sports car.

The van weighs 1500lbs less and has discs up front. It’s seriously not that far off

This guy's car may be designed to be driven hard in a circuit or mountain roads, but that ain't what this guy is doing:

> Now when I hit a loopy freeway interchange at night and my GR Corolla carves through the turn, it’s 1996 and I’m cruising in my CRX, getting pho in San Gabriel or rushing to a flyer party at Naga in Long Beach.

So doing the famous LA Stop-and-Go Freeway Circuit.

> We published our own magazines, built our own businesses, and for good and bad, promoted our own outlaw street racer image and our own beauty standard.

Or hitting the 4-way-intersection midnight drift curves.

Lets be honest, most people who drive these kinds of cars drive as many circuits as the average F-150 owner drives on western canyon dirt tracks.

Some do, sure, and if you do that, great, get the best tool for your job. But most people only daydream about these things and simply want the image as an escape from the existential meaningless of their suburban lives (is the op's "midlife crisis" title snark or an actual cry for meaning?)

I'm not gonna prevent people from spending their money on their hobbies, do whatever floats your boat. But if your hobbies are really just reving a loud engine from one strip mall red light to the next red light 1/4 mile down the road, well, that's not the thrill and the emotion of driving, that's a desperate display of loneliness and disconnection.

This is very funny when talking about the GR Corolla specifically because it is notorious for overheating its AWD system after more than a handful of laps of a racetrack.

Your "unexotic stock electric" is boring as shit to drive and corners like a boat. Stomping on the throttle and going very fast in a straight line is a big marketing point for modern EVs with an excess of power (and usually weight), but there's a reason the concept of a "driver's car" exists, and if you think it's just about making noise then you really, really, really don't understand why people buy them.

I also have an EV, probably the same one as the grandparent...a Tesla Model Y Dual Motor Long Range. It's rated at 0-60 in 4.8s. It also has good handling, with very little body lean through curves, and a lateral G force of around .85 G.

If I switched to the same tires as the Performance version, that would increase to .95 G. That is better than many legacy sports cars.

Those who love engine noise are the modern equivalent of those who, shortly after cars became mass-market, wanted them to include buggy whips. ;-)

More spec sheet flexing, more assumptions that for owners of internal combustion sports cars it's all about the noise. More projection. Another person who just doesn't get it.

I'm sorry to be harsh in this thread, but it's always odd to find these weird empathetic blind spots in people.

The article literally brags about how loud the car is (and makes it sound likr it was modified to be louder?) so it seems like a reasonable point to take issue with.

Fortunately or unfortunately, driving a car is a public activity and even as a hobby, other people are going to be exposed to it in a way that you just don't get from, say, building model boats out of toothpicks.

I'm a big fan of people having hobbies and enjoying them, but we live in a dense and crowded world where stuff like a loud car can negatively affect literally hundreds of other people.

The comments I've replied to in this subthread have nothing to do with the aftermarket exhaust issue. It's just people who've never driven a real sports car (at any price point) posting numbers from the Tesla spec sheets.

You're absolutely wrong on both points in my case.

I've driven many "real sports cars", and I'm not not just "posting numbers from the Tesla spec sheets", my Model Y is my daily driver.

Ironically, you're the one "projecting".

> I'm not not just "posting numbers from the Tesla spec sheets", my Model Y is my daily driver.

Yeah? You measure those 0-60 and max g numbers yourself?

less than 1g is pitiful tbh. I’m no pro but have maxed out the meter on my wee sports car >1g front, left and right. it can only muster 0.5g accel so it’s worse than a tesla, am I right? having put in some serious miles on a model 3, those electrics are in another league — below

BEVs are great for non-enthusiasts whose goal is to be transported, but in their current incarnation they are _abysmal_ for people whose goal is _to drive_.

And people who brag about the performance specs of a car whose main selling point is that it requires no skill or attention to drive are missing the point entirely.

100%. And to be clear I have no problem with BEVs or boring cars (there is some overlap). I own an extremely boring car, a CR-V hybrid, and it's a fantastic family hauler.

Thinking about it now, I suppose I didn't feel any need for my family hauler to have a hot 0-60 time. It will apparently do mid eighties on the skidpad, which really underlines how useless that metric is for describing real world cornering performance---it's unapologetically a boat.

By the way, the stock Corolla GR can pull right around .95 G, just like the Model Y Performance...

Who cares? Static skidpad performance has very little to do with how engaging a car is to drive, and engagement is what somebody buying a GRC (or a GR86, or a Miata, etc.) is looking for.

One is an objective measurement, the other is a completely subjective judgement.

As they say, there's no accounting for taste...

I mean, engagement aside, you are really just showing your ignorance here if you think skid pad max G is a useful metric to capture real world cornering performance except in extremely broad strokes.

If you want an objective measurement that will usefully speak to how these cars feel to drive vs. each other, check out how much they weigh!

I'd love to understand why people buy cars to make noise with them then. Because making a car sound broken seems to be the goal of a lot of "car people"

> Do you care about performance, or do you just want to just fart out a bunch of noise?

WTF are you talking about? MREs will give you your daily nutrition, can be cheaper than actual meals, and definitely wins points against meals, but I don't see puritannical arguments about "Why do you need a real carrot anyway? Taste is overrated" everywhere.

> I get traditional car culture, but electrics embody the "money talks, wealth whispers" truism.

Sorry, wrong. It's basically lack of taste.

You make this comment as if this exact argument didn't happen 6 times in the past decade when talking about Huel and Soylent

it's not just about straight line performance. lots of subie fans won't trade their STI for the current gen WRX, even though the engine is way better, because the driving dynamics are just not as good.

that said, it's possible to have a fun ICE car and not build it in a way that your neighbors will hate you.

Your unexotic stock electric car drives and feels like a white goods appliance though.

Sure electric in raw numbers wins on top trumps.

This is fine for a lot of people who want to go to A to B and car is just a tool to do that

Cars like the GR Corolla are about the engaging driving experience, the road feel / handling, the gear shifts, usable power, not outright top speed. It's a machine and some people like mastering controlling the machine and that mastery makes them smile, some even find fun.

What kind of white goods appliance? My washing machine is very different to my fridge, in basically every way, other than it being white goods

There is nothing like the rage I feel when a car/motorcycle is moving 5mph in heavy traffic doing nothing but revving the engine nonstop.

A few burned out - a high compression turbo charged 1.3L 3 cylinder engine is not a good idea.

VW has one on their Polo GTI but it is the iconic 2.0-liter turbocharged four-cylinder TSI engine (EA888) - the normal Polo has 1L turbo charged 3 cylinder but even they did not try high boost.

Imagine the shock of the non-car-enthusiasts in this thread when they discover the factory exhaust on this car is already pretty loud. It's so loud from the factory it comes with a valved exhaust to tone it down under light throttle and idle.

I just like it! Reminds me of my youth and when Fast And Furious was actually about fancy modded cars and not just actions and explosions. Kudos for riding the Midlifecrisis that way. :)

I drive a Crown Vic PI, hoping by midlife crisis there's some way to either give it a stick + turbo, or at least an electric swap to make it less of a dog.

My midlife crisis car would probably be a land cruiser. No need to go fast. Space and chill is best.

Just, overkill. Can’t go fast, need to have higher insurance, it’s more at risk for theft, and it’s not easily replaceable as compared to a 23k corolla.

I did enjoy the Vietnamese part and history of fast and the furious. It’s been a good minute since I’ve seen the first one.

The GR Corolla isn't really the same as a Corolla. Different engine, drivetrain, brakes, wheels, exterior, interior, suspension, and more, all built to be a sports car.

It's also very highly acclaimed for being fun to drive, comparable with the other fast hatchbacks (Golf R, Honda Civic Type R, etc), and is pretty fast.

Yes, all inside the same chassis as a Corolla.

It isn’t bad, I would just prefer a WRX/STi at that point.

Most people getting a GR Corolla aren't getting it only as a point A to point B car. So your point about it basically just being people transportation is mostly moot.

It's also really completely different from a standard Corolla.

Yes, all inside the same chassis as a Corolla. It isn’t bad, I would just prefer a WRX/STi at that point.

My midlife crisis car is same price, much faster, more comfortable, and doesn’t wake the neighborhood when I drive it.

If you must relive the nostalgic, early 1900s technology of generating motion by rattling metal pistons with gasoline instead of steam then why not open Autotrader and buy any one of the Supras, 300ZX, 3000GTs, or other great 90s tuner cars that can be had for the same $50k as this 1.6 liter leaf blower. Shit, there’s a convertible 300ZX for $20k and now you’ve got $30k for mods.

If it isn't a blatant cry for attention can it really be considered a midlife crisis car?

Honorable mention to the the Nissan 240SX aka Sylvia, the Mitsubishi Eclipse, Toyota MR2 an Celica :) Don't remember if the Prelude was highly moddable.

It's not fully modded until it's electric 8-/

Having been through 3 midlife crisis, I can speak with some authority on this...

For one quarter to half the price he could have had a motorcycle which is faster than nearly everything on the road.

Motorcycles and cars are not the same thing. Some people like one, the other, or both.

everyone specially male should get into either fast motorcycles, fast cars or fast boats.

fast motorcycles are kind a speed run about life - you learn that life is fragile quick. you become deliberate in making your decisions. better to ride when you're 23-25.

the other thing you learn quick - is life is never about fairness - but events.

Love the car, Toyota rocks with these GR cars (Corolla, Yaris). Mods are also super cool!

I think people are missing the point: the loudness and ostentatiousness is seen as a celebration of Asian American identity by the author. In Denver there is a similar culture surrounding low-riders and the Latino community on Federal St. Both are a celebration of minority cultures in America.

Judging these car sub-cultures divorced from their communal aspects, or as an expression of mainstream American masculinity is pretty off-base IMO.

Damn a GR Corolla is one of my dream cars. Super cool!

I'm looking for a stick shift at the moment. Oh boy, there is a lot of crap out there. Manuals have been enshittified in the last 20 years. A lot of economic cars like compact hatchbacks with <= 2l naturally aspirated engines now have top gears that are like 4th gear, buzzing at 3000 rpm at 100 km/h. Even some 6 speeds! What a shitshow! A few are decent and I've zeroed in on those.

I don't fast, just efficient. Modded fire-breathing exhaust should be pulled of the road.

The irksome relationship between "manual" and "cheapest base model" is still there to some extent, too. Mechanical joystick side mirrors and manually cranked windows are actually better, but FFS don't take away remote locking and AC! Sheesh ...

98% perfect. What would take it to 100%: wearing headphones instead of a subwoofer, and a whisper quiet exhaust. Your neighbors will be your biggest fans.

But seriously, happy birthday! I fly a loud aircraft that I’m sure the world wishes was quieter.

You had me at All-wheel drive

> Forget Vin Diesel. Asian Americans Are the Heroes of Import Car Culture

Jfc. We're posting this wokescold crap on HN.

I say this as someone who is buying an Ariel Atom this weekend. I'm an enthusiast as much as anyone. Acting as if Asian (viet) Americans in SoCal were the only fucking people into Japanese cars is insanely retarded.

Nearly no one in tech or on HN is viet compared to the massive Chinese population in SV - so why is this even getting traction here?

What I think is more interesting is to look at the media outlet that published this article to begin with. According to https://www.zocalopublicsquare.org/mission/

> Founded in Los Angeles in 2003, Zócalo is a unit of ASU Media Enterprise. Over our 20-plus-year history, we have hosted more than 700 live public programs in cities across the U.S. and abroad, have featured more than 2,000 guest speakers and performers, and have published more than 3,500 established and aspiring writers. We work in partnership with cultural institutions, public agencies, and community organizations to develop, curate, and produce high-quality public programs, editorial work, and multi-year series that engage the public.

> As a unit of ASU Media Enterprise, our primary source of income is Arizona State University. Our work receives further funding through a combination of grants, programming sponsorships, and public support. Donations made to Zócalo are processed by ASU Foundation on behalf of the organization.

Maybe there are political changes that could be made that would affect Zocalo media's funding model - why are they getting the majority of their funding from Arizona State University? Is this something voters in Arizona might vote to stop funding, if it was made salient to them? What are the incentive systems behind the grants, programming sponsorships, and public support that ultimately lead to Ky-Phong Tran writing and publishing this article?

I drove an i3 (Tiny sporty electric BMW) for a while, and it really changed how I see this kind of thing. The noise your car makes .. is wasted energy. You are blaring and bragging about your inefficiencies. That tiny i3 will out-accelerate you at every light, and you will be making a ton of noise, while it is nearly silent.

Car people seem to have got 'louder' and 'stronger' correlated in their heads, but they are NOT.

I have an i3 and a 2020 M2 Competition with a 6 speed manual. I assure you the i3 is not faster, and attempting to describe either one as a "better car" is ridiculous because the overlap in their goals and design ethos is two completely separate circles on a Venn diagram, with a little overlap that says "has four wheels". Both excellent cars, neither a substitute for the other whatsoever.

I mean, if this isn't the place to share this video, I'm not sure where IS:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLJETZyfb7I

Writing a high brow essay about the ingenuity and hard work of import car culture while driving a modern Corolla iM and paying a mechanic to install a cold air intake. Lol.

Pinnacle of modern internet car guy is cosplaying as a F&F tuner while paying for a Reddit-approved aesthetic via catalogue and never dreaming of driving hard harder than a spirited on-ramp pull.

Self describing a basically stock corolla as a sleeper, just lol. Cargo cultism.

That is not a modern Corolla iM. The iM had about 130hp. The GR has 300. The iM had comfortable, "sensible Corolla" suspension. The GR has race suspension.

This is not a "basically stock" corolla. It's actually a really cool car with a fun story behind its design. Toyota's then-CEO Akio Toyoda is a big car nerd and an accomplished race car driver. The GR Corolla was his dream car. He was directly involved in the design and development of the car, and personally took the prototypes to the track for test drives to provide feedback to the engineering team.

It's ok that this is not your thing, but please do not be condescending towards other people's hobbies.

That's a whole lot of words to say "Corrola with a bigger turbo and a hard durometer poly bushing kit".

They should not have called it a Corolla at all. It's nothing like a Corolla.

> Corrola

Corolla.

And I suspect Toyota put a little more effort than that into the GR.

The normal corolla does not have a turbo at all. Besides the turbo, the GR Corolla has a completely different engine, different transmission, all wheel drive, limited slip transaxle and differential, and completely different suspension.

I hate how popular lowering & spacer mods are for performance cars, you're just adding bump steer.

I’d like a Civic Type R for my midlife crisis please. No modding needed ;)

Fun to drive?

Translation: reckless driver.

Thanks for endangering us.

Then again my age 50 midlife crisis was spent hooking up with 23 year olds on Feeld and FetLife.

I loved driving a sportbike with a tune and an unrestricted racing exhaust, if I revved it just right I could make it backfire directly into your rolled down window

This is a genuine question and not intended as an insult: do you have a personality disorder?

Eh, you ride a bike long enough and you're more or less forced into this level of hostility toward the drivers around you.

Maybe a bicycle. If you ride a bike long enough on US roads - you probably have a death wish.

Given the gun ownership rates, I wouldn't be surprised if someone gets shot for doing obnoxious shit in a road rage incident.

Tl;dr: Not sure why you're catching downvotes here, you aren't wrong.

True Story:

~25 years ago, well before ubiquitous mass shooting events or the now weekly local road rage incidents, I went for a ride early one Sunday morning. With the sun barely up, the air was crisp without being chilly even at speed, and the local roadways were empty. The two most common stressors while riding being the weather and other drivers this was shaping up to be something special. The kind of borderline tantric riding conditions you daydream about but only encounter once or twice a year if you live in a busy metro area.

So imagine my irritation when this blissful communion of man and machine was rudely interrupted by a Bentley running a red light. Dude blew through the red and pulled 3/4 into my lane before he noticed me and slammed on the brakes, leaving me about 8/10ths of a second to juke a full lane width to get around him. Not only was this the only car in sight in any direction but literally the only other vehicle I'd encountered on the road this morning and this dickhead has just made a passable attempt at killing me.

Now I'm not one to hide my light under a bushel so of course I gave the driver the finger on my way past. I noted the driver appeared to be in his late 70s, had his similarly elderly wife in the passenger seat, and a very young girl in a lovely church dress in the back seat. It's amazing the amount of detail you can capture in a split second while riding an industrial grade adrenaline dump, but I digress. This dude had absolutely earned some flavor of response and given I wasn't prepared to get into a fist fight with a guy old enough to be my grandfather I figured the least aggressive option that conveyed my total disgust at his driving skills would get the job done.

My miscalculation here was in discounting the psychology of the kind of geriatric upper middle class white guy that drives his family to early church services in a Bentley. In hindsight I'm guessing it had been several decades since that guy had caught any flavor of static off of literally anyone and had grown so unaccustomed to getting called on his shit that when it finally happened dude divided by zero.

At the time I was also ignorant of the performance characteristics of a 4 door Bentley sedan. Having mistook it for your garden variety land yacht I exited the interaction at a sedate 20mph over the speed limit confident that was sufficient to get me over the horizon with no further hassles. So you can imagine my surprise when I checked my mirrors and saw this guy power slide through another red light and charge me from behind at something like 3x the posted speed limit. The chase that followed was deeply stupid in ways usually reserved for action movie scripts. This guy just would not let it go. I dragged him through 6 red lights, two neighborhoods, and a mall parking lot before finally cutting through a pedestrian greenway to lose him. I ended up stashing my bike and riding gear behind a service shed in a local park and hiked home, returning hours later to retrieve my ride.

To this day this encounter haunts me a little. I can't say for certain what would have happened if either or both of us had been armed but the potential was certainly there. These days I frequently take back roads to avoid a section of the local highway due to how frequently folks are getting shot in traffic through there, and you couldn't pay me to ride a motorcycle anywhere within a 50 mile radius of any major metro area. Y'all be safe out there, shit's crazy.

It happens (FL). I haven't experienced it personally, but it's floated frequently enough in local news. Bicycles, I just take the full lane. Local bike lanes are suicide lanes. Brake or pass. Honk at your own peril.

Never had these issues in CA, NY, NC.

I don't think people in Real Cities understand how nice they have it. Now that I'm back in suburbia, I would never even dream of attempting to ride a bicycle anywhere.

It's a death wish to even attempt walking half a mile up to the corner store. Nobody stops at the stop signs, if you see a car coming you have to stand and wait for them to stop.

Everyone has very dark front window tints, you cannot see their faces, so you don't know if they can see you or not. Most of them do not have the self awareness to flash their lights to indicate that you're good so it's a really awkward standoff until they get impatient and honk.

The number of times I was almost killed, both by inattentive drivers and people who think They Are The Law and have the right to swerve over the lines to stop me from filtering up to a light, is absolutely insane (It was fully legal). Getting flashbanged is a light sentence.

My favorite was when it would set off their car alarm, while their car is on, and there is seemingly no way for them to disable it.

Sometimes they would put their car out so far that my handlebar could not help but go fully through their $1700 side view mirror, which is thankfully designed to crumble like a paper cup.

Oh absolutely but it has no relevance here

Cute, but you haven't really lived until you've ripped an apocalyptic burnout in front of the dude that's been tailgating you for the last N miles. Trading ~1k worth of tire wear for coating the front of their car with rock chips and molten asphalt is a damn good deal.

$1K? And I thought my tires were expensive, damn...

Lok 1k miles worth of equivalent tire wear, but you got me curious and it looks like a set of z-rated motorcycle tires is about $700 these days so not off by much.

> 1k miles worth of equivalent tire wear

LOL, that does make more sense. Just wasn't how I read it.

I had a coworker who one day showed up to work, pointed out the window and said look I bought a midlife crisis car very matter-of-factly, and I will never understand this. You don't need to do anything, nobody is making you do this.

I'd imagine that it's them doing something they earnestly want to do, but trying to lampshade something that they believe people will perceive of them or be judgmental about. Like most self-deprecating humor, people often want to signal that they're 'in' on their behaviors and not completely unaware of how they're perceived.

I've wanted a Porsche my entire life. Doesn't have to be a track monster - actually, I'd prefer a lower-powered one. I want the handling of a Boxster, but a truly fast car is only fun on the track.

When I was young, I couldn't justify the cost. Now that I'm a bit older I could afford it, but I can't spare the time for a hobby. With kids still in child seats, I had to stick with a practical car.

When I'm 50? The kids will be old enough to sit up front. I probably still won't have a lot of time for a hobby, but I do have money now.

Buying a midlife crisis car doesn't mean that you feel it's a rite of passage. It doesn't mean someone felt like they had to. It might just mean that for the entire first half of their lives, there has always been a reason to /not/ buy the expensive toy they wanted. They finally treated themselves.

I guess what I don't get is the part where you broadcast that it's a midlife crisis. If I bought a super expensive computer or house or vacation I wouldn't walk into the office and announce I've had a midlife crisis. Maybe I'm being too literal, lol

Give it time.

> I guess what I don't get is the part where you broadcast that it's a midlife crisis

A number of my friends have said this as a joke (the kind of joke someone finds funny when they have a stable job, stable marriage, and a couple of kids, I guess)

A few others have definitely not been joking, and hey, if the red sportscar and chasing women half your age lets you momentarily forget about how much you hate your job, your mortgage, and your ex-wife... I can't really find fault with that?

Right or wrong, there are a lot of people who treat guys differently based on what they drive. In a corporate office there is social pressure to drive something that fits your role. Can you ignore that pressure? Of course. Do what you want and own it. But that pressure is still there.

When you have a 2-seat sports car you can't be the one who drives when the team goes out to lunch. If your car looks more expensive than your coworkers' cars, they start to gossip about how you can afford it.

Declaring it a midlife crisis is an attempt to get ahead of that. They're saying that they didn't buy it to avoid driving the team to lunch. They're saying that it's a rare treat, not something they could easily afford. They're saying that this car isn't their personality, it's something they wanted to enjoy.

Is any of this necessary? No. But it might cut down on rumors, and that put their mind at ease.

> I want the handling of a Boxster, but a truly fast car is only fun on the track.

This is so true. A while back I had a sixth generation Camaro SS 1LE. The handling was sublime. Think 1.5 scale Miata. Cornered on rails, begged to be driven faster, faster. And 455hp on tap, it was definitely no slouch. But when I took it out to the rural twisty roads for some fun, I found that I would be entering corners at 80+ mph if I wanted to make it do any work. That is categorically a bad idea in all regards, there is so much energy in play at that speed that one unexpected patch of gravel can end your existence. Loved the car, but to drive it safely meant never going past 2/10 of it's ability except on track days.

As compared to (much longer ago) a 2.5RS that I had back when they were cool (pre-WRX days in the US) and you could fling that thing around with no regards to propriety, and it was fun because it didn't have much power, didn't have that much actual capability, but it was relatively light and very communicative. Much better choice if you're not going for track days.

Two words - Mini Cooper. Any gen. The dash in the center is an acquired taste, but you stop caring soon enough. Had 2, much fun, contemplating another or a 912. Drove my 2015 Mini from LA to Miami with a Weimaraner and an Akita in the back. Much fun.

Probably just joking around, not serious. I said the same thing when I bought my Camaro years ago. The only better choice would have been a Corvette. If you are 40+, every second comment will have some form of mid-life crisis slant to it, so you just run with it as the joke.

But the truth is that many of us have been buying such irresponsible sports cars for our entire lives, it didn't start in mid-life ;-)

I almost ... almost bought a hat with a fake mullet sewn in just for when I was driving the Camaro, all for the lulz. Some people don't take themselves too seriously, and I'm definitely in that camp.

> You don't need to do anything, nobody is making you do this.

Hey, you just figured out the entire point of buying a mid-life crisis car!

It's a joke to begin with, but if you are actually curious: One day you wake up and realize you're getting older, you can't take the money with you, and that "dream car" from your teens you always wanted to own is suddenly very much in reach.

It's now or never. May as well enjoy it for a few years until the novelty wears off.

I'm not really a car guy, but I grabbed my midlife crisis car last summer because it was the last model year they are going to make it. It gives me joy every time I drive it, even though no one has a clue what it is as it's rather boring looking.

Once I no longer gain joy from driving it, I will sell it and move back to something practical and economical again.

It's not for anyone else, it's for me. For a lot of men around that point in life this is an important mental switch. At least that's how I personally see it, others will have their own reasons!

I hope it was a Taycan Cross Turismo. It's a very rare animal, driven to extinction as of this month, I believe.

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