First of all, the "gentleman" agreement had nothing to do with
making cars with a certain amount of hp (the agreement was actually 280), it was just an agreement not to
advertise their cars with more than 280 hp. Case in point was the MKIV supra. No tuning changes between JDM vs USDM version... only difference is that our got advertised at 320 hp. So the japs have been making >300 hp cars since the early 90's... just not advertising them as such in their home market.
With emissions laws that are growing more strict by the day, the era of 500+ hp cars are pretty numbered for all car makers... but particularly for japanese due to the type of engine design they typically favour (i.e. smaller displacement, high specific output). Its just plain harder to get a smaller motor to meet emissions standards at these levels.
Quote:
Originally Posted by UKunt
isnt this one of the first cars to come out of japan with over 300bhp.due to that dealer hand shake thing???? maybe this will mean bigger HP cars will be coming out of japan now? its not as if they cant make them. now if they make them is another thing.
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