We woke up way too early this morning and headed out on a cruise with the guys from Targa Trophy / Shift-s3ctor with our Project Mustang RTR. The cruise wound up landing us at GSR Autosport where Michael Essa has been hard at work with his new E46 drift machine. With some Forgestar wheels, insane angle from Wisefab and a big Garrett turbo we really like how this build is coming together. Here are some pictures from the build in progress:
Here is the insane angle Michael Essa has gained with this new build from Wisefab. I cannot wait to see Essa bring this car reverse entry down the big hill at Road Atlanta. The suspension really is something to look over and enjoy when you see this car in the pits this season.
We found these renders laying around showing Michael Essa’s design concepts for the 2013 season. At the meet Essa was mentioning that none of these wound up being the final render exactly but we have to imagine this is somewhere close to how the E46 BMW will turn out for the new season.
Wow, not too sure i like the way it looks. His designs used to be flawless, but this looks off somehow. Should look better once the paint is done, i hope. And when did he change from Nitto to Yokohama/Enkei to Forgestar? What the hell, Mike?
Nittos program shrunk to bring in JR, i think JR and Powers are the only ones on Nitto this year after b-holtz pulled the plug and essa leaving.
Cant wait for this thing to come charging. Down the hill at road atlanta then boom reverse enty FTW! !!!
That looks rad. Wise fab is totally changing the game altogether on angle kits too. Nice to see products coming out like that.
I’m super excited to see chelsea vs essa… e46 bmw’s are my favorite german chassis of all time!
Those wheels don’t look like the same dayglo color he’s used before, but at least they aren’t black
This thing is looking great! I’m hopeing this will be the final piece in the puzzle for Essa, he’s obviously got the talent but there’s a;ways been something holding him back from success, and hopefully this will be the key to getting him regular podiums.
I think it’ll look much better in full livery (as most cars do) but I’m loving what i’m seeing so far. The wheels are a little bit off in my opinion but if they’re light who cares!
I’m confused. Didn’t Wisefab just make a big deal about putting the upper strut mounting point on their 240sx kit back into the “circle” to make it FD legal? How can Essa put the upper strut point an inch outside the circle if guys running 240′s can’t? I’m not trying to hate on Essa who is a great driver and the build looks awesome, or Wisefab who makes some really exciting products for the drift community. Just wondering how this could possibly be FD legal. Thanks
Hey Guys! Nitto Tire is a great company, and we enjoyed working with them, but things change, and with JR running Nitto’s, our budget was cut… Yokohama tire picked us up, and we are very excited about using the AD08′s! Enkei is also0 a great company and they make great product, but very limited selection for european cars. Our buisness, GSR Autosport is a European tuning and repair shop, so it made sense to partner with Forgestar, a local company to us who make a lot of custom size, offset and style wheels for euro cars.
The Wisefab kit for our car was modified from their old kit, and the current location of the upper shock mount is inside of the stock bolt circle (by about 1/2″). I know it looks crazy in the pictures but we made a template with the stock bolt circle and where the Wisefab kit mounts, and it is inside and FD legal.
So the centerline of the upper shock point just has to be inside the circle formed by the stock shock bolts and not the stock opening in the strut tower? That makes much more sense. Thanks for the quick reply! Good luck with the new car!