Tag: Tuned BMW

BMW G20/21 AIR LIFT PERFORMANCE KITS

Performance air suspension supremo Air Lift Performance has just unveiled an all-new front and rear lowering kits for 2020+ BMW G20 and G21 models. Created to achieve the maximum drop without sacrificing performance and a comfortable ride, whether on the street, the track, or at a show.

The front kit features progressive-rate, double-bellow air springs, paired with threaded-body monotube struts. With 30-levels of damping adjustability, the system is able to be customised to each car builder’s unique performance needs. Topped off with adjustable camber plates, the kit provides precise steering feel, comfortable ride, and superior body support. All elements combined, the front kit drops the vehicle down 105mm (4.1”) from stock height.

In the rear, it’s a similar setup, with double-bellow air springs, paired with threaded-body shocks, once again featuring 30-levels of damping adjustability, all combined to drop the rear down 155mm (6.1”) from stock height.

All Air Lift Performance kits are torture-tested on in-house validation equipment, and both the front and rear G20/21 kits are backed by a one-year, unlimited-mileage warranty.

Price £POA

For more info see Air Lift Performance or Car Audio Security

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October 26, 2020
GOBLIN WORKS BMW E30: SECOND COMING

When the Goblin Works Garage crew told us they were coming back for a second season with a BMW E30, we were excited to see what they’d do with it. But none of us expected a work of god-like genius like this…

Feature taken from Fast Car. Words Dan Bevis Photos Chris Frosin

The peril of the difficult second album is something that’s dug its claws into the very concept of creativity for generations. It took The Stone Roses five years to come up with Second Coming, and some people really didn’t like it. And there are countless examples of bands bursting onto the scene with a stellar debut, then struggling to follow it up with something of similar impact; The Strokes, The Clash, Franz Ferdinand, Elastica… it’s a broader condition, known as ‘the sophomore slump’, whereby the second bite of the cherry can lead to disaster; a footballer’s second season, a student’s second year at college, movie and videogame sequels, it’s all-pervading.

It’s also a load of absolute cobblers. Second outings are an opportunity to up the ante; Nirvana’s Nevermind was better than Bleach, Die Hard 2 was better than Die Hard – and if the excitement of the Goblin Works Garage crew is anything to go by, their second series (airing right now on Quest) is set to be far bigger and better than anything that came before.

The first series was undoubtedly impressive, serving up a broad variety of artfully modified gems, but this time around the guys have winkled out a bigger budget, done more research, spent time at SEMA, picked the brains of the world’s greatest tuning heroes, to enable them to build some truly world-class projects. And the car you see here is solid-gold proof that they’re not messing about.

“We’ve definitely levelled-up with our projects this season,” beams Helen Stanley, going all heart-eyes-emoji at the outstanding modified BMW she’s spirited into being, “and this build is a great example of pushing boundaries in a very short space of time to create something exciting. This series our builds will continue to divide opinion, but as long as these cars get people talking, encourage, motivate, inspire and entertain then we’re doing something right.”

So why an E30 this time? Well, it helps that they’re bang on-trend, with values and interest rising exponentially in recent years. The first car Helen ever drove at 17 was her dad’s 3-Series, so there’s more than a little emotion in this build. The team knew they had to find one, the idea was ticking boxes on every conceivable level.

“This E30 belonged to a mechanic I knew; it was for sale so I nabbed it,” Helen explains. “As it turned out, this car is an earlier one than we thought too, it’s registered as an ’87 model but it was actually born in ’85. When we got it, it looked terrible – covered in the dreaded BMW lacquer peel, along with rust holes, a leaky sunroof… it needed love. Also it was a 318i auto, so it was pretty lacklustre throughout.”

The perfect candidate for rebirth, then! Helen had a vision for how the car should be, a sort of ‘dystopian hellion’, and she twisted the arms of fellow Goblins Ant and Jimmy to let her vision run wild. It was to be their biggest-budget project yet, and given the tight time constraints, temperatures and pulses were rising all the time. “There were moments when I regretted this build, because it was so expensive and full-on and the deadline wasn’t conducive to the amount of work needed to realise the design,” she grimaces. “Building this car as well as filming nearly sent me over the edge – I don’t think I’ve ever been so stressed. But looking at it now, it was worth it. I love it.”

Naturally the car couldn’t have stayed as a 318i auto under the skin, that would have been far too lame. So the wheezy old four-pot has been ousted in favour of a 3.0-litre straight-six from an E46 330ci, along with an E46 M3 manual gearbox. Far more fit for hijinks. And with the heart and lungs taken care of, it was time to address the biggest and most complex element of the build: that outrageous exterior. The idea here was to harness the widebody trend and infuse elements of Japanese culture and race-inspired aesthetics, along with a scary streak of Mad Max, to create something post-apocalyptic that looks like it belongs in a sci-fi movie or a video game.

Obviously an off-the-shelf bodykit wasn’t going to cut it here, so the craftsmen at Fat Fender were drafted in to crack out the magic markers. This is one of the only companies in the UK who still create bodykits using the old-school foam-sculpting method, and their artisanal creation sublimely fuses Manga styling with Touring Car aggression. “We used the existing lines and angles on the car to enhance the body, making it wider, lower, and meaner,” says Helen. “It’s got a real DTM vibe. Moulds were made, and the fibreglass panels produced and bonded onto the original body. I wanted the kit to look like an extension of the car rather than something visibly added on, and together I think we achieved that. Fat Fender also painted the E30 for us; I think all cars look good in grey so we went with a mid-grey similar to Nardo on the exterior, then added a pastel mint colour to the engine bay. Ant and Jimmy hated the sound of it initially but came round to the idea when they saw it!”

What’s interesting to note is that this bodykit is now available to the public to buy; initially crafted as a one-off, the Goblins and Fat Fender are sharing the fruits of their endeavours with the modding public! But they weren’t done yet, not by any means. The rusty sunroof was welded up and smoothed, and Helen didn’t want a fuel filler ruining the body lines so the petrol tank was removed, the spare wheel well welded up and a fuel cell fitted in the boot. The headlights are a cool detail too – look closely and you’ll spot that the inners have functional air intakes in the centres, surrounded by LED angel eyes. “I made these myself,” says Helen. “I found some intake pipes and funnels to fit the E30 which came all the way from Reno, then I recessed the angel eyes into them. They don’t exist as a concept so it was a pain in the arse – but I wanted them, so I made them!”

The next vital element to address was the way the thing sits. 3SDM pitched in to make some custom wheels fat enough to fill the massive new arches (see boxout), and Air Lift Performance were tapped up to enable the lows. “I met the Air Lift guys at SEMA, and when I talked to them about the project and my ideas, I knew it was the right way to go for this build,” Helen enthuses. “It’s the coolest thing to see a car slam to the ground on air – the noise it makes is awesome too. I’ve never used air suspension before so I can’t get enough of it; to me it makes the car seem like a Transformer.” It is unquestionably very cool, and this angry wideboy looks mean as hell when it airs out. So, the Goblins had addressed the oily bits, the shiny bits, the up-and-downy bits… but perhaps the most important part of all is the interior. After all, these guys are hard drivers and every GWG build is crafted first and foremost to be a hoot to helm. You’ve got to have a nice place to sit, haven’t you?

“The original dash and console were repaired and covered in anthracite grey Alcantara with a mint contrast stitch,” say Helen. “The doorcards were dyed black and also have Alcantara inserts with a mint stitch to match – this was all done by Brett at Alpha Auto Concepts, he’s an interior genius. He also made a custom carpet in black with the same contrast stitch, re-covered the steering wheel, and installed a custom black headliner. I wanted to keep the old dials as well; it was important to strike a balance between originality and modernisation with this car. Too much one way or the other wouldn’t have worked.”

The front sports custom-stitched Corbeau RS2 recliners, which tilt to provide a perfect view of the rear, where the bench has been binned and replaced by a custom air install with every element of the mechanicals proudly on display. And quality audio was imperative, so Helen insisted upon a Pioneer smartphone receiver headunit, TS-A speakers in the front and slimline Class D active subwoofer in the back. The interior vibe is a balance of form and function, blending the 1980s design with a variety of tasteful modern upgrades.

“I’m especially proud of this car,” Helen smiles. “It’s a little out there, but it’s usable. I wouldn’t say it’s necessarily 100-percent practical because it’s a fair bit wider than before, but it’s been built to be fun to drive. It’ll certainly drive you out of trouble when the apocalypse comes, and look good doing it.”

You see, that ‘difficult second album’ vibe was all total nonsense. The Goblins have absolutely killed it with this E30, it’s an astonishing creation that takes its cues from the 2019 scene and throws in a fresh retro-futurist vibe that only they could create. A dystopian hellion indeed, and proof positive that this team has very much upped the ante.

TECH SPEC: BMW E30

Styling:
Custom one-off bodykit by Fat Fender, custom mid-grey paint, engine bay painted pastel mint, OE fuel tank deleted (replaced by fuel cell in boot) and spare wheel well welded up, sunroof welded, custom inner headlights with LED angel-eyes and functional air ducts, satin black dechrome, windows tinted by Dave at Zonkey Wrap

Tuning:
M54B30 3.0-litre straight-six (from E46 330ci), Pipercross air filter, E46 M3 Direnza radiator from Japspeed, Porsche 944 servo and master cylinder, custom-modded exhaust system, E46 M3 transmission with short-shift

Chassis:
9.5×18-inch (front) and 11×18-inch (rear) custom 3SDM forged wheels in satin black, Toyo Proxes R888-R tyres, V-Maxx E30 325i BBK, E30 325i Sport rear beam with disc brakes, EBC grooved discs and YellowStuff pads, Venhill braided lines, custom Air Lift Performance suspension setup

Interior:
Stock dash and console restored and trimmed in anthracite grey Alcantara with mint contrast stitch, doorcards dyed black with Alcantara inserts to match, custom carpets, steering wheel retrimmed, custom headlining, OE E30 dials, rear seats removed, pastel mint painted rear roll bar, custom-stitched Corbeau RS2 front recliners, grey TRS harnesses, Pioneer SPH-10BT smartphone receiver headunit, TS-A speakers, slimline Pioneer Class D active subwoofer

Thanks:
“Special thanks to Fat Fender UK, Air Lift Performance, 3SDM, Toyo Tires, The Performance Company, V-Maxx, EBC Brakes, Pipercross, Venhill, Corbeau, Panda Racing, Alpha Auto Concepts, Pioneer, Compbrake, Japspeed, Paul Bailey, Project Three, and Zonkey Wrap.

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October 13, 2020
MODIFIED BMW E82 COUPE: JUICY COUTURE

Danny Webster’s E82 coupé is a show-stopping stance sweetheart boasting all sorts of unique custom touches. And if you think it’s just another bagged Beemer, you’d better think again…

Feature taken from Fast Car. Words Daniel Bevis Photography Simmy

Heroic lows have become a defining feature of the modern modifying scene, that goes without saying. Indeed, that’s not just true today, but has been for generations – race cars have always run lower than road cars because a lower centre of gravity brings huge handling benefits, and it doesn’t take a genius to spot that lower cars just look better, hence the motorsport tech finding its way onto the road. Refract this logic through an absurd filter and find yourself in the Chicano lowrider culture of the 1960s. And while Citroëns have been rising up and down at the flick of a switch since the sixties thanks to their clever hydropneumatics, it’s air-ride that’s the darling of today’s show scene: technology whose origins date back to the 1940s which has become the go-to choice for people who want to hard-park when they arrive at the showground.

Danny Webster, however, is an offbeat thinker. When he set his mind to getting his 1-Series coupé closer to the tarmac, he didn’t want to follow the established path. Sure, you can buy an air-ride kit off the shelf, but he opted to go for something bespoke from Rayvern Hydraulics. Because a juiced car is a cool car, that’s just a fact, as every lowrider enthusiast for half a century will gleefully tell you.

He’s a man who knows whereof he speaks when it comes to hydros; this is Danny’s second Fast Car feature, and regular readers may remember his juiced Fiesta that graced these pages a couple of years ago, resplendent in glossy beige. And that counterculture train of thought is always chugging away down unexpected tracks – peep inside his garage and you’ll find that he’s not all about the stance builds… there’s a PD130-powered SEAT Ibiza in the works, shooting for 400bhp and raising hell in a cloud of diesel smoke. Oh, and there’s another Ibiza TDI pushing over 300bhp. Disparate tastes, but that enthusiasm for diesel power has clearly leached into the latest BMW build too, as the car we’re shining the spotlight on today is in fact a 123d.

“The plan was always to get a 1 Series after I’d finished the Fiesta,” Danny explains. “I bought this one on eBay as an unfinished project, and I knew from the very start what direction I wanted to take the build in.”

For anyone who may deride the choice of the devil’s elixir when it comes to motive power, it’s important to note that in the realm of 1-Series dizzlers, the 123d is the best one available. Yes, the 116d and 118d are pretty dull, with their sluggish and sensible derv motors, and while the 120d is moving in the right direction, it’s the N47D20 four-pot in this car that makes it the compelling choice: the motor wears twin sequential turbos instead of the single unit of lesser N47s. When it was launched, this was the first ever production diesel engine to break the 100bhp-per-litre barrier, serving up a peak of 204bhp along with a meaty 295lb.ft of torque. So there’s no hint of compromise here, this is a surprisingly rapid motor. 0-62mph flashes by in a little over six seconds, it’s not exactly hanging about.

Of course, given the eye-catching and scene-stealing nature of the Fiesta that came before it, the focus of this build was always going to be on how the thing sits. BMW had already deftly taken care of the function, so Danny was free to take the reins and sort out the form. “The first step was to install the hydraulic suspension setup, which I did myself,” he explains. Having pieced together the old Fiesta’s juice setup on his driveway, Danny was able to make short work of this task despite the increased levels of complexity that present themselves when tearing apart a new-wave Beemer, and with the coupé sitting gangsta-low he was able to put his mind to filling those arches with just the right rolling stock. “The wheels and the way they fit, that’s my favourite part of the whole car,” he smiles. “I built up the wheels myself, and fitted some fully adjustable camber arms so I could get them sitting just where I wanted them.” It’s a truly magnificent setup that he’s gone for, choosing the iconic Carline CM6 design and building them up with some properly aggressive widths and offsets: the fronts are 10-inches wide and ET7, running 205-section tyres to get those stretched sidewalls tucked right up in the arches, while the rears amp it all up to cartoonish dimensions, being ET0 and 11.5-inches wide with 235/40s. When he flicks those switches and gets this bad boy’s arse on the floor, those super-shiny rims settle in j-u-s-t right. Check out how the arch lips position themselves between the wheel lips and tyre sidewalls, it’s as much art as science.

The relatively sober exterior paint colour (beautifully laid down by A&D Auto Bodies) is thrown into sharp relief when you peek through the windows and spy what Danny’s done to the interior, because it’s frankly a bit bonkers – in the best possible way. A pair of slim and lightweight Recaros have been drafted in, retrimmed in a fruity shade of bright yellow by Spartan Automotive, the silky-soft nappa leather neatly echoing the OEM BMW pattern. The rear bench is trimmed to match, and the final flourish is a plethora of tasteful carbon fibre embellishments along with the custom iPad dash install, to ensure the 123d is always looking showground-chic. The choices are a mix of the unique and the mainstream, and it’s the flawless execution that really elevates this project to the upper echelons of show builds. It’s just really obvious from every inch of the car that Danny knows what he’s doing – and would never settle for second-best. This is equally evident when it comes to the exterior treatment, which is a masterclass in subtle upgrades which you’d have to be a true BMW nerd to identify. There’s the 1M-style bumpers of course, that’s a classic move for the E82 platform, but dig deeper and you’ll find a smoothed bonnet, smoothed wings, smoothed diffuser, the whole effect is smoother than Jazz FM with a fat Cuban and a white Russian. We love the carbon CSL-style boot with its shorty recess, and Danny’s gone the extra mile with USDM-spec headlights and darkline LCI tails along with a sprinkling of carbon fibre details to complement those of the interior.

It can always be a bit of a mixed bag buying up someone else’s unfinished project, as you have to question what it was that made them give up in the first place. But Danny’s not one to be put off by such concerns – he had a vision in mind of how he wanted this car to turn out, and he’s rebuilt it from the ground up to be exactly what he wanted it to be. The flawless exterior, the unique interior, and of course the radically reworked chassis leading to that killer stance…

The purpose of this project was to achieve those outstanding lows. But with Danny’s attention to detail and boundless creativity, it’s turned into so much more.

TECH SPEC: BMW E82

Styling:
1M-style bumpers front and rear, smoothed bonnet, smoothed wings, smoothed diffuser, USDM-spec headlights, LCI darkline taillights, carbon CSL boot with short plate recess, carbon roof spoiler, full respray, carbon kidney grilles

Tuning:
N47D20 2.0-litre twin-turbo diesel four-cylinder, 6-speed manual

Chassis:
10x17in ET7 (front) and 11.5x17in ET0 (rear) Carline CM6 wheels, 205/40 (f) and 235/40 (r) tyres, custom Rayvern Hydraulics suspension, adjustable camber arms

Interior:
Recaro seats retrimmed in yellow nappa leather to match OEM BMW pattern, iPad dash, carbon fibre shifter, handbrake lever and trim, MOMO 280mm steering wheel

Thanks:
“Thanks to A&D Auto Bodies for the paint, Spartan Automotive for the seat retrim, and Dan at Wheel Unique for sourcing the lips for the wheels.”

Source

October 7, 2020