In case anyone is still interested in the Group A engine and what not...
This is about the real life one BTW.
There are a few different performance companies that have produced heavily modified 4A-GE's. Tom's, TRD, Suzuki (yeah, an unholy thing to do...) and a few more.
The one in Initial D was a 4A-GE, but it was based on the AE101's engine rather than the AE86's. TRD's "super" 4A-GE is based on the 16 valve version and revs up to 10,000 rpms and puts out about 240 hp. The one in Initial D was tuned by Suzuki, revs to 11,000 and produces 255 hp. The "Group A" isn't actually a tuning company, but rather a racing circut that has gone defunct. Most of these engine are being produced for Atlantic races (CART ones) nowadays.
The reason Takumi gets a black hood has nothing to do with joining Ryosuke's new team, but rather is a carbon fiber hood to help restore some of the weight balance the car loses when this newer engine is put in. With the heavy mods done to it, it weighs considerably more (well, for a Hachi Roku, its heavy anyway) with the engine in, but carbon fiber hood does help to almost totally bring back the almsot totally neutral balance of the car.
The real life engine is buildable, just expensive. A pre-built Tom's Group A 4A-GE can run you upwards of 30 thousand dollars. They're not cheap to maintain either. Requiring no less than 103 octane, constant rebuilds, and expensive parts, they're defintely not engines to be taken for the faint of heart. Insanely fast, yes, but revving that high is alot of work on an engine, so it's constantly eating itself alive, so to speak, when you push it that hard. Initial D does fail to mention the ungodly amount of maintence poor Bunta and Takumi must put into that engine.
Anyway, just came across this by accident in my search for some Watanabe's for my AE86 (real one) and thought I'd tell anyone interested in what I know.
Very interested. Please let me know where you won it, because the prize list I know of doesnt even have the MR-2!
