Autoweek - Tokyo auto show: The new Lexus LFA is one beautiful screamer
In the same way that you don't want to bring a knife to a gunfight, you don't want to show up at the Nürburgring with some floppy old commuter car.
There are parts of this storied circuit that can and should scare the bejesus out of almost any sane human behind a wheel. And when we say Nürburgring, we don't mean the new, safe, runoff-happy GP 'Ring, the one where you could go straight at the end of the straight and the worst thing that would happen is embarrassment as you slowly dug deeper into the gravel trap or slid around on the plentiful grass like a drunken frat boy piloting a golf cart on the links with his bros.
No, we are talking about the old, original 'Ring, the Nordschliefe, the one made in the 1920s with skinny pavement, almost no runoff area and parts so remote they won't necessarily ever even find you when you commit your last big screwup. This 'Ring was built when men were men and death--much more so than in modern times--was a part of everyday life, certainly a part of racing.
So when we showed up at the 'Ring, all suited up in Nomex from head to toe and all the way out to the fingertips, we came prepared--with a Lexus LFA.
Yes the LFA, the car that has been shown in one "concept" form or another for what seems like forever. It was first shown at Detroit in 2005 and has been trotted out in various guises at car shows since. They even raced LFAs twice, at the Nürburgring 24 Hours in 2008 and 2009. So everybody knows it works well and can get around this track fairly quickly.
But Lexus has never let just any average driving schmo like us behind the wheel, certainly not here at the Nordschliefe. Until now.
Fast and predictable
What was it like to drive? It is fast, for sure, quick off the line and quick in passing. But it also is remarkably stable and predictable. You can't say that about all supercars.
Let's start with the basics. Its 3,256 pounds of curb weight are rocketed off the line by a 554-hp dry-sump V10 that'll take it from 0 to 62 mph in just 3.7 seconds. Top speed is a hearty and wailful 204 mph.
Yes, 204 mph! We were on our way to that speed earlier in the day on the autobahn but ran out of room. Instead of 204, we topped out at "only" 172 mph. The remarkable thing about piloting the LFA at that speed was its stability. The engine is longitudinally mounted in front and it drives the rear wheels through a torque tube, rear-mounted six-speed ASG automated sequential gearbox and a limited-slip differential. While the balance is 48/52, putting the weight out on the ends of the structure as opposed to gathering it all in the middle gives it a lower polar moment. It will tend, in general, to not spin around as quickly as a rear-engine Porsche or a mid-engine Spyker, Ferrari or Audi R8 5.2 V10.
"In our religious philosophy we say, 'As long as you are in the hand of the Buddha you are safe,' " is how chief engineer Haruhiko Tanahashi described putting the weight out at the ends of the car for better inherent stability. "You can have the best pleasure, but you are safe."
We hear ya on that religious experience.
If you lift off too quickly in a turn, the stability control will catch you first, but it does not do so intrusively. At speed on the track, it gently reduces throttle, so gently you usually don't notice it. Or maybe we were just being smoothly cautious. More-confident drivers can turn stability all the way off for a more fluid drive. But you are always in the hand of the Buddha.
The power of lightness
The LFA performs so well in part because of its unique body structure, which consists of a carbon-fiber-reinforced plastic monocoque with aluminum extrusions front and rear. Combined with an aluminum engine, it is what engineers call "light." The rear-drive LFA is almost 600 pounds lighter than the AWD Nissan GT-R and also is lighter than the Porsche 911 Turbo, the Audi R8 V10 and the Chevrolet Corvette ZR1.
Thus the brakes don't have to work as hard. But they work hard nonetheless. On our autobahn top-speed runs earlier in the day, the LFA was so safe and stable that we never felt threatened by anything, not even the pinhead in the Škoda who wandered into our lane to leisurely pass a truck--this was when we were doing about one Euro 50. The 390-millimeter front and 360-millimeter rear ceramic disc brakes barely warmed up as they brought the whole LFA down to the lumbering rate of the moronic Škoda driver.
Getting back up to speed, the column-mounted paddles click up through the six-speed ASG gearbox remarkably fast. Shifts can come as quickly as 0.2 second in Sport mode, about as fast as any gearbox made, but they aren't at all brutal. Auto, Normal and Wet modes make up your other shift choices. Each mode has its own programming. You can even select shift speeds, ranging from the 0.2-second blasts to shifts that take a full and leisurely 1 second.
The lightweight chassis is connected to the wheels by double wishbones in front and a rear multilink. Tires are Bridgestone 265/35ZR-20s in front and 305/30ZR-20s in the rear. The suspension was not just developed at the Nürburgring, as seemingly everything is nowadays, but during the Nürburgring 24-hour race. The shocks on the production car are the same ones used in the race. When engineers and drivers noticed some slight chassis flex in the races, Tanahashi-san added front and rear crossbraces connected by a latticelike central brace and two more carbon-fiber braces in the front structure.
Emphasis on handling
All of this worked splendidly on the 'Ring. We had three laps of the thing. Normally, three laps of a racetrack is pitifully few. But normal racetracks are maybe two or three miles long. The Nordschliefe is 13 miles long and has 73 turns. If you do a lap in less than eight minutes, you are hailed as a hero. If you get around it in the same afternoon and don't fly off into the spruce forest, you get respect. We accomplished the latter with dignity and a fair amount of speed.
The biggest thing you learn about a car on the Nordschliefe is its transitional handling characteristics--how it feels shifting its weight from one side to the other. In several instances we determined that, with a lesser car, we would have been flying backwards over the skinny guardrail and into the trees. We were able to go fast enough to make this determination because we were following some European hot shoe who apparently was born at this place. On blind corners--and let's face it, they're all blind--he would hammer the throttle, knowing as we assumed that he did that the track didn't end around this or that corner.
The stability that Tanahashi described was in evidence at every one of these flingingly fast turns. Only a couple of times did we feel that it was the electronic stability control that saved us from infamy; in the vast majority of the corners; it was that hand-of-the-Buddha thing that kept us out of the weeds. And our own skill, a little.
Lap time? We were not timing it, so let's estimate 6:38. Ha ha, just kidding. In skilled hands, we'd estimate that an LFA could get around the Nordschliefe in less than eight minutes. Tanahashi-san said he did not have a time, that he told his engineers to concentrate on driving enjoyment, not lap times. But can't you enjoy a good lap time?
The LFA is not as lively to drive at the limit as any of the above mentioned cars, the Ferrari, the Audi R8, the Ford GT, the Porsche 911 and the 911 Turbo, etc. Roll, jounce and rebound are firmly controlled without being harsh. The LFA feels like a shorter, greatly refined and much, much lighter Corvette. Or a lighter, rear-drive GT-R.
The LFA isolates only the feel you need and transmits it to you through the wheel and through the seat. Apparently you don't need too much feeling to drive fast and safe.
It is an amazing car considering the things it can do and the speeds it can go with more safety and stability than perhaps any road car ever made. You are not taking your life in your hands when you drive this car at the limit. You are in the hand of the Buddha, remember.
$300,000 for 1 of 500
But at least one of your hands will have to be on your wallet, since these things are going to cost "in the high 300s," according to Toyota. Lexus will settle on a price closer to when LFA production begins in December 2010. Since each model is custom-made, don't look for these in showrooms. And since the U.S. market will only get between 100 and 200 of the 500 total LFAs ever to be made, don't look for one in every driveway. The 500 cars will be made in the 2011 and 2012 model years.
The good news is that the cars are not all sold, far from it, which was at least part of the reason Lexus let us drive one as fast as we did.
Chief engineer Tanahashi figures that the LFA has taken up a third of his career--10 years. Lexus says the project began in 2000. What took so long? The official reason is that Tanahashi-san--seeking better a power-to-weight ratio--decided a few years into the project to switch from an aluminum body to that carbon-fiber tub with aluminum extrusions pointing out of it front and rear. But we're guessing the reason might also have had more to do with Toyota/Lexus trying to grapple with the ROI from a $300,000-plus, limited-production car.
Plus there's that whole notion of Lexusness. For a division known best for impeccable service and ride isolation, should there really be something in the lineup that can go 204 mph and feel like a wheeled dart?
What is the LFA, anyway, the spiritual successor to the SC400? Of course not. You could say it's sort of like a Supra injected with kryptonite. Or you could go farther back and say it's the modern iteration of the 2000GT. But each of those would be a stretch.
The LFA is an anomaly in the Lexus lineup, but the fastest, most thrilling anomaly you will ever drive. Whatever it is and wherever it came from--and we're guessing its extraterrestrial--the LFA stands on its own merits as a fully capable supercar in this age brimming with them.
2011 Lexus LFA
On Sale: Early 2011
Base Price: Less than $400,000
Drivetrain: 4.8-liter, 554-hp, 354-lb-ft, normally aspirated V10; RWD, six-speed automatic
Curb Weight: 3,256 lb
0-62 mph: 3.7 sec
Fuel Economy: N/A
Tokyo auto show: The new Lexus LFA is one beautiful screamer: AutoWeekMagazine
Pretty good reading for Autoweek. That price though, I dunno about that. Good thing production is limited.
M
