What Won't They Put A 2JZ In?

Among the MANY things that bothers me about the "Fast & Furious" franchise are the innumerable technical errors. I mean, come on, these are movies about cars made for car guys.  How do they get so much stuff wrong?  Nitrous isn't explosive, blowing the intake manifold (how do you do that?) won't cause your diamond-plate floorboards to pop out, 2G Eclipses only have 5 gears, Nissan SR20's don't go into Honda Civics (Ted!) and I bet some people do like the Tuna.

But the most annoying to me, at least from the first film, was when the mousey little white kid character Jesse pops the hood of the junked Toyota Supra that Paul Walker brings to Dominic Torreto's shop, and exclaims "...2JZ, no @#%$!!"  Jesse, a word with you please.  Every 1993-1998 Supra in the whole world came from the factory with a 2JZ engine under the hood.  All of them.  Sure, some were the boring non-turbocharged 2JZ-GE, and some were the exciting twin-sequential turbocharged 2JZ-GTE, but come on.  Sure, if you popped the hood and said "1LR-GUE, no %)&^!!" you'd have a point.  But that's like popping the hood on a Civic Hatchback and proclaiming surprise at the presence of a D-series there.

Pictured: a 2 Jay-Z swap.  With Nas.  Oh my.

What am I getting at?  Well, over time, Toyota's legendary 2JZ-GTE engine has found it's way into a whole lot of vehicles that aren't Toyota Supras.  Sure, the 2JZ-GTE was sold under the hood of the Toyota Aristo/Aristo V300 (called the Lexus GS300 in the US) in Japan, but otherwise that was it.  I've seen 2JZ's in all sorts of weird stuff.  Some Toyotas - like new-generation Altezza's (IS350's), SC300's, etc.  But it's such a capable engine that some competitive teams will ditch the manufacturer's engine for Toyota's jewel - like the Nissan 240SX, Honda S2000, hell I've even seen one in a Volvo 244.

But this has got to be one of the coolest and most unusual vehicles for a 2JZ to be swapped into: the GM Kappa-chassis Pontiac Solstice.  This swap comes to us from the forums at The Car Lounge, which is a sub-forum of VWVortex- one of the largest, most active car forums in the world.

Engine swaps in the Kappa twins - the Pontiac Solstice and the Saturn Sky, as well as the European Opel GT - aren't uncommon.  It's a strong, capable chassis with a lot of potential.  But the base-model Solstice engine is really more useful as a paperweight than a sports-car engine.  The 2.4L Ecotec choked out 177bhp, and was more suited to posing than performing.  Sure, you could get the awesome 2.0L LNF EcoTec (which you should be familiar with from Matt Welliver's nasty Cobalt SS) with 260bhp, but what if you wanted more?  A common swap for the Kappas is a GM LSx small-block aluminum V8, from the Corvette/GTO/CTS-V/Trailblazer SS, etc.  GM tuning company Mallett had an LSx swap for the Kappas out almost as soon as they hit the market, and it's quite nice.

But frankly, an LSx V8 swap is about as original as Vanilla ice cream.  Sure, it's nice, but they're everywhere.  So TCL member "phlow" went about stuffing a tuned 2JZ into a Solstice Roadster.  And there are some very interesting things about this swap.

For one thing, the Solstice transmission is basically a direct bolt-on to the Supra engine.  How so?  Well, the Solstice uses an Aisin AR5 gearbox, which is apparently an updated version of the Aisin R154, which was the 5-speed transmission they bolted to... Supra engines!  So the Aisin gearbox, with a 1JZ (2.5L I6) bellhousing connects right up to the monsterous Supra Turbo engine.  And monstrous it; check out the size of the turbocharger on this one!  For reference, that's an entire cell phone.

Even weirder, the factory engine mounts on the Toyota 2JZ-GTE are a line-up, bolt down affair with the body engine mounts on an LNF Solstice.  Wait, what?

To be honest, it looks like GM may have taken some notes from Toyota's book with the Kappa chassis.  Either that, or it was an easter egg - "haha, guys, let's make sure you could just bolt a 2JZ-GTE into the engine bay with the factory mounts and transmission if you wanted to.  No one will ever figure this one out.  haha."  Or, more likely, it's one of those bizarre coincidence - like the fact that a Mazda 13B-REW (3rd Gen. RX-7 engine) will bolt up to the transmission in a first-generation Subaru WRX.

What's even crazier was that the car already had a tuned LNF in it, which as we're aware is no joke - so it takes some real stones to yank that sucker out and see if an old Toyota engine (the scrawling on the oil pan says it was from a '93 SC300) will fit.  This is the kind of bravery and "Don't give a %$@" that is largely missing from the aftermarket these days.

So, enough talking.  Here are some money shots of this monster-powered, GM Roadster with a Toyota heart goodness.  Enjoy!

Will it fit?

Why yes, yes it does fit.  How bizarre is this!

That is a huge turbocharger, yes sir it is.

Two very happy dudes.  I'd be stoked too; this is the first 2JZ-Kappa swap in the world; who knew it would be so relatively simple?  Plans for the car include an air-to-water intercooler, 800+whp, and Texas Mile runs.  As well as surprising the crap out of everyone at Tx2k12 and various Supra meets!