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Thread: What's a trunk kit?

  1. #1
    Join Date
    Feb 2008
    Posts
    601

    Default What's a trunk kit?

    Random question but what is a trunk kit? I've always wondered this and never remember to ask.

    I was just looking at Protege parts and saw something about a trunk kit and hear it a lot speaking about SS cars.

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Mar 2001
    Location
    Connecticut
    Posts
    7,381

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    Back in the bad old mid- to late- 1990s, "Showroom Stock" cars started to get competition adjustments in the form of "trunk kits", a kit of parts that would improve on-track performance. These initially came not as manufacturer buy sheet options but as dealer- or user-installed, and came as a box placed in the trunk upon new-car delivery (wink wink), usually consisting of easily-installed suspension parts such as springs, shocks, and swaybars.

    Basically, they were under-the-table performance improvements that the manufacturer sold primary - in some cases, exclusively - to Club racers to improve their performance in Showroom Stock competition. That "wink, wink" eventually evolved into explicit dealer racer option codes (e.g., Neon ACR and Mazda "MS05" (?) codes) and soon became de facto and de jure SCCA-approved performance adjustments (even to the point where aftermarket parts were allowed to competitors to "even the competition").

    Eventually, sanity prevailed and "trunk kits" were removed. But - IMO - that led directly to the Touring class. And the originally-pejorative term "trunk kits" stuck...

    GA

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Feb 2008
    Posts
    601

    Default

    Well it doesn't get much more beautifully explained then that!

    Thanks for the info!

    Simon

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Oct 2004
    Location
    Northeast
    Posts
    7,031

    Default

    Miata MS-R and Solstice Z0K are recent examples of Factory specials. Saturn had a trunk kit in the late 90's!
    Andy Bettencourt
    New England Region 188967

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