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Every weekend, all around Australia, club-level motorsport events are happening.
At these events, there’s often all sorts of weird and wonderful homegrown creations competing, such as the mid-engine V8 Holden Rodeo we discovered at a Winton test ’n’ tune day.
Our latest find, however, puts even that in the shade. The Toyota Lexcen was born from the Holden-Toyota alliance in the late-’80s/early-’90s, for those who liked the idea of a Commodore but found the Holden badge a little too racy.
The engine is a stroked 6.0-litre L98 crate motor with forged internals and topped by a Harrop supercharger. It feeds its power through a highly modified 4L70 automatic and the end result is around 450kW at the wheels according to Ian.
Suspension is all custom, though the inserts were Koni once upon a time, and VZ Clubsport electronic architecture enables the car to run full ABS and traction control, though it’s not yet calibrated for loose surface work.
It’s an awesome bit of engineering, and while it had a couple of ECU hiccups on the day, so far it has been very reliable and incredibly fast. We look forward to seeing it in action in the future.
