Hype is a powerful force, and few cars were as hyped as the reborn Toyota Supra. Still, as excited as people were for the new car, there were a lot of concerns by the Toyota purists about BMW’s involvement. Will the BMW straight-six hold a candle to the legendary (for a good reason) Toyota 2JZ-GTE?
We have to admit that we were a little curious about that too, so we were happy to find that none other than evil racing genius Stephan Papadakis was going to tear down the BMW B58 engine and see just how good — or bad — it is and whether it’ll be stout enough to make crazy horsepower.
In Steph’s video, which was released on Monday, he pulls the engine out a brand-new Toyota Supra with just over 500 miles on the clock and rips it to pieces. What he finds is both surprising and heartening.
When it came to clever designs, BMW didn’t skimp on its B58 straight-six. It uses an exhaust manifold that’s cast directly into the cylinder head, which means there are only two exhaust ports — one for each scroll of the twin-scroll turbocharger. It also incorporated the engine’s efficient water-to-air intercooler directly into the plastic intake manifold.
What was Mr. Papadakis’ take away after pulling the motor to pieces? He reckons it’ll be capable of over 1,000 horsepower without having to go too crazy on things like the crankshaft and the oiling system.
Needless to say, we’re very excited to see him build the engine back up and strap it to a dyno to see if he’s right.