Jay

After buying mine, the first time it rained heavily I thought my roof was going to cave-in!

Great looking car! Have fun!

Today I finally got to get a go at the German Autobahn with my 2017 GT86 with automatic gearbox. The weather conditions were rather good, with an air temperature of 20 deg. C, a blue sky and almost no wind. The speedometer read 234 km/h or 145.5 mph, which is above expectation.
The car is in stock condition, apart from the 225 PS4 tyres, which have a 1.4% larger circumference.
Remarkable is the noticeable extra power at high speed. I guess the air gets somewhat compressed when scooped in. The stability at those speeds is pretty good.
All in all a satisfying result. 😊

Today I finally got to get a go at the German Autobahn with my 2017 GT86 with automatic gearbox. The weather conditions were rather good, with an air temperature of 20 deg. C, a blue sky and almost no wind. The speedometer read 234 km/h or 145.5 mph, which is above expectation.
The car is in stock condition, apart from the 225 PS4 tyres, which have a 1.4% larger circumference.
Remarkable is the noticeable extra power at high speed. I guess the air gets somewhat compressed when scooped in. The stability at those speeds is pretty good.
All in all a satisfying result. 😊

A friend in his S2000, getting instructions to improve lap times.
 

I don't know about fuel consumption yet. This varies heavily, as our cars have two faces regarding consumption. I'm quite sure that a wider tyre with more grip will burn some extra fuel. From the specifications I'd guess it may cost you an extra gallon per 1000 miles.

I've been commuting all week, about 35 miles a day. Having had lots of rain, I can happily report a huge benefit of the newly mounted PS4's.
These tyres definitely offer more comfort on ridges and cobblestones. On large bumps the effect is partly concealed because of stiff springs and dampers.
The overall noise level didn't really change. Maybe the noise is composed of more low frequencies and less high frequencies.
The car tends towards slightly heavier steering, which seems normal, regarding increased width and lateral grip.
Hope to have informed you well. 

Tyres fitted! Four PS4 225's on the stock wheels. I went on a 130 mile trip. Positive are the grip I get accelerating from tight corners and the notably better comfort. Negative are the (hardly noticeable) reduced straight line stability and some tyre hum around 70 mph. Remains to be seen if the wet handling did improve, as it didn't rain today.

The automatic gearbox is more reliable. If it's just for the eventual road trip, I'd go for the automatic. I have one myself as a daily driver, which is 100% stock. If I occasionally want to have some fun, I put it in manual mode.

Manual owners will say manual and auto owners will say auto.
Reliability wise the auto is a stronger box than the manual. But on track days they do get hot and its heat that kills autos so i monitor temps of my auto on track days.
The manuals clutches aren’t much good once you got turbo/SC and need upgrading, but if you are staying stock then this isn’t a problem.
Personally i bought my 86 as a pure track day car. I drove both manual and auto and chose auto as it just felt much quicker once moving (except 0-60 where the auto86 just cant build enough revs to get off the line quick enough) a bit more special/exotic/sportier and nicer/easier to drive going from home to the track.
 
I’m not fishing to bait people with this comment but on track I find that I’m always faster than the manual 86’s simply because I'm not backing off the throttle to change gear.
If you want the pleasure of old school manual gear changes then go manual. If you want to be on power without lifting off and flying through the gears super fast like you are on Gran Turismo then go auto.
They are both super reliable boxes. It all comes down to which type of driving experience you want.

There was snow and cold outside 🙂 From yesterday morning..
 

I can't get my head around the looks, to me the design looks older than the outgoing model and the proportions don't look right. The ride height with those 18s is awful, its jacked up, the bonnet line looks higher, the squarer headlights and frumpy boot pushes the whole car up, its gone from a sports car to a coupe (think 2 series, c class). That dashboard looks fit for a 4x4 or a pickup. I don't think there is any threat of me moving my GT86 along

Some cars are more of a video game these days. ☹️ 99% of the drivers just don't notice. They only care about space, comfort and status.

I imagine the typical "free safety check" involves peering at the brake pads to see if they can charge you for replacing them.

Welcome! 😎
I'm 20 years older than you and bought a GT86 about a year ago. It's my 18th car, if I remember well. 😁 I've owned everything from a Datsun 120Y to a Lexus GS430...

Welcome! 😎
I'm 20 years older than you and bought a GT86 about a year ago. It's my 18th car, if I remember well. 😁 I've owned everything from a Datsun 120Y to a Lexus GS430...

Those are rubbish, also in my '17 86.

Interesting... I just looked this up in my manual.
I have blue series with performance pack.
This is from my manual lol... so it doesn't make it clear at all. It has 3 sizes listed... fun.

No blue edition here. I guess the first print of the manual is wrong.

(still for sale btw 😅)

My car is in my profile pic. 😁

They are really cheap to run to be honest. Tyres last ages, brakes the same. Oil service isn't bad and its easy to do yourself if you want to DIY.
Your main issue will be the huge amount of aftermarket parts available for the car and the temptation to modify the shit out of it.

Welcome! Enjoy the ride! 😎

I’m cautiously optimistic. Styling definitely not sure on. I’m surprised people thought the car would be an all new platform etc. Subaru are effectively the manufacturer and their general development is glacial at best. Not a complaint, just an observation. The photos show the general platform is very similar, a lot of the tooling might even be transferable. Gives hope that development cost will be low helping to keep the price reasonable. Additionally one can hope this allows a strong aftermarket. Hopefully this will keep the spirt of the car similar to current which is good as far as I’m concerned. Really I’m just happy that this type of car still exists.