Solitude

Pikes Peak – now featuring asphalt

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Around the Way

The Saudi Falcons

Some awesome door to door action, really nicely edited together

Dualing Ferrari F50’s

It’s silly, it’s pointless, it’s loud and its fun. Courtesy of Tax The Rich YouTube Channel and Motortrend, where I found the link.

Stretching It’s Legs

Porsche 935 on track

Track Ready

Endless brakes looking very much at home on a Porsche

Contact us at z1sales@z1auto.com for all your Endless Brakes/Zeal Suspension needs. From pads and fluid to full brake kits and coilovers. When nothing but the best will suffice.

In Tow

Bride Zeta III Japan Series

In the spirit of the Japan Series seats introduced last year, Bride Japan has now put together a special version of the Zeta III. This features a carbon back, lightweight (16.5 lbs) shell, full FIA approval, and the special Japan Series logo and fabric. We have a limited number of these available, and package deals are being offered with the required bases/sliders. Contact us for details!

Italian Couger

Lately I’ve been looking lovingly at some of the great race cars of the 70’s. What I like best is that they resemble what comes mind when I think of what a modern race car is, yet they do so with a raw, seat of the pants flair. They were purposeful looking, and the 70’s were a time where the manufacturing processes finally began to catch up to the engineering knowledge base.

So, here is today’s entry – the Lancia Beta Montecarlo. Lancia’s have always been a bit of an eccentric marque, and despite all the nightmare stories of ownership, who wouldn’t want one of these in their garage? I’m also a sucker for that Martini Livery, as it’s just looks so damn good on just about any sports car.

Don’t let all the wild bodywork fool you. Underneath lurks a 4 cylinder engine. This tour-de-force packed a whole 7:1 compression ratio – pretty standard for the day, as this was the infancy of turbochargers in full competition use. The weighed less than 1800 lbs, and power ranged from the mid to high 400’s….wheeeeeee !!! Later versions developed by Abarth made over 500 hp.

Just listen to the engine wail – heavenly!

This is an awesoe in-car video I found from last years Goodwood Festival of Speed.

Now I’m going to hunt online for some Group 5 Books/DVD’s to grab up before F1 starts! If anyone knows of any good ones, let me know!

OS Giken Super Lock Limited Slip Differential

In our neverending quest to offer only the best products on the market for your performance car, we are proud to now be an authorized OS Giken dealer. OS Giken has been producing performance parts for both OEM manufacturers as well as the aftermarket since 1975. Professional racers, home grown racers, and performance enthusiasts alike have come to know and respect OS Gikens immense knowledge and resources, and we’re honored to be able to bring these products to you.

So what makes the OS Giken differential so special? It’s in the details! There are lots of differential options on the market, but here is what makes the OS Giken stand head and shoulders above the rest.

1. Lock Timing Technology – under normal driving conditions, the OS Giken LSD acts just like any normal differential. Once full power is applied, it turns into a true 100% locking unit. However, unlike other clutch type differentials, what separates the OS Giken from others is how smoothly this transition is performed. In addition, due to unique gear driven center section, the OS Giken differential is extremely responsive, allowing it to transition from lock to unlock instantly.

2. When we say 100% lock, we mean 100% lock! Many lesser differentials on the market claim 100% lockup ability, but due to their low number of disks and small diameter, they never are truly able to sustain such high lock percentages. Not so with the OS Giken. These differentials feature more disks than any other differential on the market, which are placed in a forged housing. This not only keeps heat to a minimum, but spreads the load over a greater number of disks, which is the reason it works so seamlessly.

3. Less undesteer = more goodness! When your car enters a corner off throttle, the spring inside the patended pressure control ring reacts immediately and the differential immediately unlocks. This is done so quickly and efficiently, that the car is able to turn in quicker than with convential differentials. However, when power is put down upon corner exit, the OS Giken unit immediately returns to 100% lockup, allowing for less chance for wheel spin.

4. No More Figure 8’s!!! Ever wonder why some aftermarket differentials require you to dizzy yourself with endless figure 8’s as a “break in”. The reason is simple – because the components used are not machined as precisely as in other units. The OS Giken unit is built to such stringent tolerances, there is zero break in required. Simply install and go

5. Tons of Applications! OS Giken has one of the widest application ranges out there. They make the famous Super Lock LSD for BMW, Porsche, Nissan, Honda, Mazda, Mitsubishi, even Corvettes. Contact us for your application and we’ll be happy to make you a killer deal!

“Super Potential”

One of my favorite things about being in an online business is being able to meet and talk to people from all over the world.  I met Jason about a month or so ago when he purchased some Cusco camber plates from us for his Starion – all the way from Australia.  I can tell Jason has “the sickness” and lives, eats and breathes cars like we do!  He was good enough to send me some pictures of a race prepped Starion owned by his friend Ron Masing the other day.  Jason is building his Starion for track use as well and we can’t wait to see how it turns out.  Onto the pics – this thing is awesome!

I have a fondness for the Starion, as Mike, one of the founders of the company, had one when I first met him in the early 90’s.  While it wasn’t blessed with a real sports car engine out of the box, it did have a wonderful chassis IMHO.  A very neutral car that with some well planned mods, turned it into a screamer.  It was Mitsubishi’s answer to the 944.  In the late 80’s the car really started to look the part with the giant fender flares, and low front lip spoiler.  It’s rare to see a clean one today but man, what a neat car they are.  Dodge also jumped on the bandwagon in the late 80’s and came out with their version, the Conquest.  I don’t know the technical differences, if any, except for colors.  I remember seeing bright blue Starions (looked similar to the WR Blue of the Subaru), and a nice yellow, that reminds me of the hue later found on 300ZX Twin Turbos.  I’ll see if I can dig up any other differences though.  These collaborations eventually lead to the 3000GT/Stealth, Mirage/Colt, Montero/Raider, and a bunch of others.  We’ll have to get our resident Mitsubishi expert Mike Ko to chime in with more.  He is a encylopedia of all things Mitsubishi!

I did a little searching and found this awesome old school Japanese commerical for the Starion.  I love these old car commercials…they are so cheesy, but it’s history, so it’s cool in my book!  And of course the tagline “Super Potential” is just genius.

Jason – not sure if you’ve seen this, but this video is for you! Plus it’s got a neat Rammstein song, and while I don’t understand a single word, and it almost makes me think a German invasion is near, it’s great music to drive to (or toture small furry animals to – whatever your scene is)

All Around the ‘Ring

Here’s a neat thing one of our UK customers linked me to – a live cam at the Nurburgring!  Open in a new page and Click F5 to keep refreshing (or just let it be and it will refresh every minute on its own according to the site)

http://www.nuerburgring.de/fileadmin/webcam/webcam.jpg

Cool thing to check out randomly when you’re bored at work – you never know what you’ll see!

This was earlier today!

You Sexy Thing

Just wanted to show you guys another customer car.  This sweet G35 Coupe is owned by our good customer Giovanni.  Awesome car and a great guy!  This car has more mods than we have room to type, so I’ll just show you a quick video.  This was shot this past weekend at E-Town.  Not bad – a clean, clean daily driver that can click off solid 12’s on pump gas and street tires (even with a crappy 60 ft – gotta work on that boss!), and get you back home in style!  He’s also an autocross freak too, and hopefully we’ll get him out to a track day this fall and see what she’ll really do!

The G rips it at 2:00 minute mark in the video, but before that you’ll see a few other nice cars from Englishtown this weekend.