here i'll weigh in on T2 Xray since im bored
chassis- has got to be heavy with the 20 million extra screws they use for tuning chassis flex. plus the front bulkheads are extra long in the front for no apparent reason (in front of where the sway bar mounts). tuning chassis flex is good for the buyer because its cheaper, but it definately weighs more.
drivetrain- holy crap if only you could use xray drivetrain in a cyclone!!!! (but with 16t center pulleys). those new universals are sick, good to see them drop the 10x15 wheel bearing finally! multi-oneway is nice, but again its heavy. and they act like the one-way spool feature is new or something, its the same as a spool with center oneway (except that the belt doesnt spin under decel with their setup like it would with a center one-way which should actually hurt accel transition performance). again another example of good for buyer bad for performance.
still tho the oneway outdrives and rear diff setup are sweet. then again alum isnt as light as delrin!
shocks- am i missing something or these are the same just shorter right? still external adjust shocks are nice, but i highly doubt they are as smooth as cyclone or tamiya. hahah let me say it again, good for use, bad for performance (tho to a MUCH lesser degree here).
4mm body posts- SWEEEEEET
roll centers- adjusting lower arms still sucks
i think mounting all suspenions pickups vertically just cannot be beat
but actually xray wins their 2nd performance improvement here (after the awesome universals and front oneway outdrives), this setup is DEFINATELY lighter than cyclone style.
and only having 4 roll center adjustments up frnt isnt very fun. making practical use of shimming at the hub carrier is interesting.
bellcrank- seems like they should have gone cyclone style, instead of std eccentric mounts. idk tossup prolly.
all in all i say a huge upgrade for XRAY fanboi's. compared to the cyclone the only thing it has going for it imo is the univerals and maybe shocks if you like that.
people really miss that the cyclone is about the most optimized for performance sedan you can buy. msx is right there as well, but it seems that center bellcrank is better.
cyclone is extremely light weight and low cg. its definately not as easy to adjust as the new xray (shocks and chassis flex) but what you make up in your labor you should gain in performance.
sure you can argue that the perfomance is so small that most people wont notice and you're prolly right, but its still there.
no digs to xray tho, they've made a huge step and brought some interesting things to the table, i'd just take a cyclone over it every day