Despite what the name might suggest, Sound Performance isn't a tinting/alarm/audio install shop. No rack of chrome-dipped rental rims basking in the window; no airbrushed, airbagged, circa-'90 IASCA sound comp winners parked out front. What you will find on the Bensenville, IL, performance specialists' grounds, however, is any number of the modern day's most potent performance platforms, modified to the hilt, each flexing more power than the other shops' best efforts, combined. Supras have conventionally forged SP's power-plentiful reputation (what with their 1,500whp shop drag car), and after 21 years in business, they continue to find new and innovative ways of turning tuning convention on its cranium. Just ask Lee Cabelof, of Troy, MI. His JZA80 is doing so for the third time.
There was virtually never a time when Lee's Supra was a stranger to the Sound Performance crew. Its previous owner was a man named Dan Soleto, who purchased the car from its original owner in 2001 and immediately brought it to SP for upgrades. Bolt-ons like twin K&N intake filters, a turbo-back four-inch titanium HKS exhaust, Tein Flex suspension, molded TRD widebody kit, and custom-upholstered interior made it one of the Chicagoland area's most well-respected Supras-a reputation it re-captured a couple years later with its prototype 700whp single turbo conversion, full Coarse Gray Metallic colorchange with black interior (it was previously Renaissance Red with tan leather), tucked engine bay, and ultra-clean audio install, all courtesy of SP. The car had become such a permanent fixture to the Sound Performance install bays and dyno that many regarded it as a shop car-maybe even SP owner Larry Prebis. "Dan was cool enough to let us try all our crazy ideas on his car," Larry explains, "and that meant we were messing around with it nearly every day."
One of Larry's "crazy ideas" that was moved to the backburner over the years was brought to a boil once Lee caught word of it. "Dan and I were thinking of ways to improve the car's mid-range power," explains Larry, "and the idea of developing an improved sequential twin turbo system came up, but we never really moved on it." After owning the car for nearly a decade, Dan was looking for a change. Fortunately for us, so was Lee. And as another faithful SP customer, Lee reinstated Larry and his crazy ideas as soon as the title changed hands. "Almost the very day Lee bought the Supra," says Larry, "he and I were tearing apart its engine bay and drawing up plans for the sequential system."
SP's first order of business was to build the dated stock-block engine-not that 2JZs can't handle ridiculous power levels in stock form, but bumping their 3.0-liter displacement to 3.25 by way of an offset-ground crankshaft, Wiseco pistons and Pauter rods builds mid-range power, spools turbos faster, and holds even more power. The 2JZ's head was also worked over: machined to accept +1mm-oversized Ferrea valves, springs, retainers, keepers and rockers, and custom Crane cams, tuned by Unorthodox Racing adjustable cam gears. Then it was time for the fun to begin.