Glad you more-or-less enjoyed the AT even though you would have preferred MT. Cool drifting video! At one time people were claiming the AT couldn't be drifted. 🤷‍♂️

 

Been with the AT 86 for a year and a half now, just hit 23k miles on it.

It's fine. The car is holds a unique space in the marketplace regardless of trans.

Waiting for a manual in NY with the absurd markups, while having a trade in a deadline of when I wanted to be a new car last year was insane. Either wait 6 months minimum, have my car fall apart on me AND rates in general going up or wait 4 weeks for the AT to just fall into my laptop and enjoy it anyway? Ended up choosing the latter.

 

Good write up. The auto is definitely fine. If the 6MT had eyesight, I would have bought it without a second thought.

 

For you the automatic versus manual had you second guessing the decision. Others could have similar regrets after the purchase for 2 versus 4 doors, AWD versus RWD, and so on. The moral of the story may be to make sure you buy what you want to own.

 

Agreed.

 

Did you insert an led strip on the dash? Anymore info or pics?

 

Yeah, look up how to take the dash apart. Then get a LED strip from Amazon, there are different ones but this is the one I got LED Strip. I cut everything extra, and only used two led light for the foot illumination, and then one strip for the dash. You can try mounting it to different places but how I basically did it is I had to cut the clear insert things so it's just the tube left. There is not much back there to mount to so you got to use a thin 2-sided tape. The first thing you need to do is remove the side panel (just look up how to turn off the fake engine noise, it's the same panel). then take out the glovebox. Then you just need to gently pull the big piece out and put tape on there, where you plan to attach the LED strip. Then do the cable management, I got the LED strip up and then behind the big circle AC vent. Once you have it cut to the correct length, put the plastic piece back, and then put the led strip inside the clear tube and attach it to the tape area. Also, make sure you cover the end of the clear tube otherwise it's gonna have a bright light. It's actually not as easy, you're gonna have to do it until you get it to look as ideal as possible. Some tips would be to put the tape not too deep because otherwise, the led strip will not fit. hopefully this helps

 

I sympathize with your post. I still regret buying an auto since the manual is just so much more fun, but ultimately the market is still shit and I'll probably break even swapping it out for a different car and I wouldn't get anything as nice. And my fiancé likes it, but even she admits the manual is way more fun. The Auto just feels like a step up from a normal car and I will die on that hill.

 

Consider shipping. I'm on the east coast but the last car I bought was in Phoenix, AZ. I bought my GR86 about 500 miles away and even paying for shipping I saved at least $700 versus what it would cost locally, assuming I ever found one locally.

Check out this video another member here posted in a different thread: