Watch Toyota's GR Garage Restore a Third-Gen Supra and Make It Like New
Toyota currently offers many hard-to-find replacement parts for its iconic vehicles.
With new parts on the way for 2025, the automaker's GR Garage restored a third-generation Supra to show what's possible.
This car, torn apart to a bare body shell and then built up again, is basically a brand-new 1992 Supra.
Toyota first announced that it would be making replacement parts for its heritage vehicles back in 2019, at the launch of the then-new fifth-generation Supra. Earlier this year, it expanded that program to include more parts for older Land Cruisers, the third- and fourth- generation Supra, and even the scrappy little AE86 Corolla. As you'd expect for something aimed at enthusiasts, the program is run through the Gazoo Racing division as GR Heritage Parts. In an effort to promote this work, Toyota brought a third-generation Supra into GR Garage, and restored it from the ground up.
Factory restorations are almost commonplace for European marques like Jaguar Land Rover or Ferrari, but are a relatively new phenomenon in Japan. You can probably thank Mazda for the trend, as it was one of the first to offer in-house restorations, as well as reproducing new parts, initially for the NA Miata. According to the Mazda employees who set up that replacement parts program, some of the first phone calls they received after the announcement were from Nissan and Honda, curious about how they might also set up heritage parts efforts.
Thus, Honda now offers an NSX restoration program in Japan (and has said that a U.S. effort is under consideration), while Nissan offers parts for older Skylines under its NISMO brand. Further, Mazda has expanded its factory restoration program to the FD-chassis twin-turbo RX-7, though there have been some delays to rolling out those plans.
For the GR Garage restoration, a Supra model not sold in the U.S. was used: a 1992 Supra 2.5 GT. Fitted with a twin-turbocharged 2.5-liter inline-six, this car made the maximum, unofficially mandated 276-hp cap in the so-called "gentleman's agreement" among Japan's automakers. While not quite as legendary as the fourth-gen Supra that followed it, this generation of Supra has plenty of fans on both sides of the Pacific.
The car looks to be in pretty good shape initially, but some careful examination turns up a few bodged repairs and rust. GR technicians cut, disassemble, and take the Supra completely down to a bare body shell before welding in replacement steel and respraying the entire car. The whole process took two technicians six months, and the result is basically a brand-new 1992 Supra. It's now flawless. The video below shows the process (sorry, no English subtitles).
If you're a fan of golden age Japanese machinery, whether because of the cars of your youth or just hours spent playing Gran Turismo, seeing this Supra brought to concours quality is incredibly satisfying. There are any number of individual specialist shops doing this kind of work, but having the weight of an OEM manufacturer on board makes a huge difference. It's nothing but good news that Toyota is following through on preserving its heritage.
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