If everyone's done having their warm, fuzzy moment...pass it over here before that service writer smokes it all to his head
Chasity - STEP AWAY FROM THE WHITE CLOUD!!!
Zero chance IMHO. Didn't they just officially kill Toyota Marine Sports? Absolutely zero chance. He may have seen Chris Anthony's Epic 23 and mistaken the "VOLVO" 8.1L engine for two Lexus 4.0L.
Things are shut down; we're on our own and no amount of cannabis is going to change that.
Anyhoo, let me take a hit and B.S. with you guys for a while: how cool would it be to float the hybrid drivetrain from the GS430H (or whatever they're calling it). Yessir, that'd dump a ton of torque to get up on plane WAY sacked out and still keep our 4GPH.
The sad thing about this is that there shouldn't be any doubt by anyone following the industry that Toyota could damn well dominate whatever market they decided to. Talk about cash-rich and a master of serial production!!!!! Just like the thinking back in the day, ANY large auto manufacturer could probably own the inboard market simply by having access to enough resources to do whatever the hell they wanted to do for as long as they want with comparitively zero defects - IF THEY SAW LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TUNNEL and knew there would be positive cash flow going forward.
Obviously, TMS knew that they would eventually succeed with their line, and probably knew it would be a couple years, not a dozen years, and no 'maybe's.' Their corporate bosses knew that too. Just look at MC, CC, and BU right now - they're friggin killing it in terms of commanding premium prices and selling buttloads of boats. Proceeds from one X-Star sale (produced by a vastly inferior manufacturer than Toyota) probably far outstrips that from the sale of a dozen Camrys. Think about it.
I haven't yet gotten to sit around the campfire with Captain Rick, but my feeling is that their last approach was really just build an American team and supply them with capital and an advanced aluminum V8. Here are ex-CC, MC, BU guys mixed with auto people and some contract/consultants producing what turned out to be three pretty successful hulls.
Do you realize how far short the effort was from a REAL go at it by corporate? How do you think the scene would be if we brought robots, automated fabric layup machines, REEEEALLY proficient structure designers and industry-leading process controls to this market? Sure TMS used some of that, and was probably heading there, but it surely wasn't their best effort.
Put it this way - within the first five or ten years, ALL OTHER BOATBUILDERS would become NICHE players, because TOYOTA would simply OWN the mainstream. Shit, they could do the same in the vastly bigger runabout market too and make gobs more money on the bigger volume (albeit smaller margin, perhaps).
Heck, while we're wishing upon a star, I'd like to vote for Honda to quit dabbling in business jets and build a line of big turbofans. A good place to start might be with the 737 & A320 replacements...Honda can build some friggin engines. Just ask Danica.
