Drift comp in Houston with $3000 purse : )

[aaronlosey]

$3000 purse raised by NonStopTuning!

First of all, let me say that this year so far has been super fun for local Texas drifting! The cars, drivers, and everything else are coming along really well! At the last round it was really neat to see almost 20 caged cars competing, and I know of a bunch of tier 1 cars that weren't even present, so when they come on line, the events are going to get even better! So after the first 2 rounds going successfully, I am trying hard to make the last two rounds memorable! Round 3 will be located at Gulf Greyhound Park in Houston in the front lot on October 16, and Round 4 will be at Texas Motor Speedway on the road course in the middle of the Nascar track on Dec 4! Remember even though these events are competitions we will have plenty of time for everyone to practice and play around, even people that aren't competing!

Key points for round 3 will be....

1. Rules are the same as they have been for the first two events. All competing cars will need to be caged with door bars. Basic safety inspection will need to be passed. This includes things such as a proper helmet, impact foam on the roll cage where it can meet your head, a fire extinguisher mounted in the car ( this can be a 10 dollar deal, it doesn't have to be fancy), etc. Cars not competing do not need to have a cage, but all convertibles must have at least a roll bar to drive.

2. You don't have to compete to drive at the event, we will have plenty of time for everyone to drive. The course will go cold for practice during the comp though, but the comp should only last about 2.5 hours when things go smoothly!

3. Non Stop Tuning is raising 3000 dollars of prize money from sponsors for the third round to help me out with funds, since the last round is going to cost so much. So everyone really needs to thank NST Mike when they see him for doing this, and also buy something from the man! He is taking all the responsibility for that, so thanks Mike!!!!

4. Entry fee will be 75 dollars, please pay pal the entry fee as soon as possible to erinshill at gmail.com and press the personal transfer button, or add 3% to the total for paypals fee. Spectator fee will be $10. Registrations after Oct 10th will cost $100, and I **** charging you guys extra, so please just pay on time!

5. Media passes, please contact me to get a media pass for round 2 if you want one. We are going to start going to a system where I have safety vests for the photographers, and only people with safety vests can go take photos on track.

6. Media which has already RSVP-ed include Cinema Toast, Sy Pham, Jake, and Apexautoblog. They will also be covering the media day as well.

7. Drivers arrive at 8 am sharp so we can do tech inspection and get all the forms signed, drivers meeting is at 9 am, track goes hot by 9:30am. Please be there on time bright and early so we can get as much seat time as possible. If the majority of the drivers do not arrive on time, I will hold back the drivers meeting until they do, which sucks for track time!
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October 15th Tech Day at PowerFab in Houston.

We are going to have another tech day over at PowerFab the day before the event. I really liked how the last one turned out, so we are going to do it again. All competitors in the series are welcome to take part, and are very encouraged to do so. We will be covering the dyno day with a lot of media as well. It will be covered, as well as the event the next day by WFSU.net, Sy Pham, Apexblogusa, Cinema Toast, and others.

1. We will dyno each car on the same dyno and on the same day.

2. We will weigh each car and give you corner weights.

3. We will measure the steering angle of each car.

4. We will look over the build of each car and interview each driver.

5. We are planning to incorporate a bit more by also using go pro cameras to capture video of the cars rear suspension in motion on the next day of the event, since I am curious about all the new knuckle setups we are seeing, especially the Drift Works rear knuckle setups. Are these really the cure to the camber gain issues in S-Chassis? We will see!



Special thanks to PowerFab Automotive for providing their awesome shop for this tech day!

[aaronlosey]

The series is turning out to be an awesome way for drivers to consistently get together for great tandem fun! The fact that we have big prize money and 4 Formula Drift Licenses to hand out really helps too! So the drivers list is starting to build up already for Round 3. In no particular order, although this is mostly points order, and this certainly isn't everyone, I will add more as they come forward, but we have....

Brock White in his 300 hp S13, Nissan 240SX. These chassis are the staple of drifting, but Brock keeps telling me he is building something different for next year. He is a driver out of the Fort Worth area, and has been drifting for 5+ years. His tire of choice are Falkens, his door says ASD really large, and he is both # 2 on his door and # 2 in the series right now! He will be attending his first tech day with us, so we will soon have real HP, weight, and other numbers on his car to see how it stacks up against the competition when sitting still.



Next up is Robert Lee, the 113 WHP man. The man who dynoed the lowest of all the other cars at our last tech day. He has a turbo drive train going in the car soon though, so he won't be the underdog for long. Justin Hosek can take up that mantle with his NA 4AG! I'm not sure if Taka sheds a tear each time a 4AG gets its turbo, or smiles.



Mad Brad Burnett's AE86 might have 99 problems, but a boost leak ain't one. Sporting a Toyota V8 his car isn't what the conservative Japanese engineers had in mind 20+ years ago when they designed the car with slide rulers and drafting tables, but it seems to work way better! And if Taka sheds a tear for turbo AE86s, do V8 ones make him nerd rage?!? I'm not sure how many times Brad has had to listen to purist tell him he has disturbed the balanced chassis of the car, but I bet it got old fast!



Nacho Nismo. His simple clean S13 took a beating at Round 2 of the LSD series this year. Amazingly we never really have major contact that hurts cars in Texas unless it involves my own S13 for some reason, but at this event I was luckily spared and someone else got a chance. Will it come back as wide body and all body kitted up, or will it come back with a fresh chassis? Or maybe it won't have any work done at all and will come back exactly as it left the last round?



Will Parsons might be one of the nicest drifters I know, who never gossips or trash talks, but that doesn't mean he doesn't bring a beast and a bastard of a car with him to events. His AE86 is rocking a 30R turbo and an S2000 motor! Not only does that leave us with more AE86s in the top of the lineup so far, but everyone of them is drastically different and a bastard in some way! The car makes somewhere between 350-400 WHP and sounds godly as it thunders around the track. The rev limiter on this car is at least twice as loud as any other car in the series somehow!



Yeeeeeeehaaw goes Aaren Smith's Mustang as it either snaps to full lock on entry or flies off the track trying. There is no other option for this driver, it is full lock entry or nothing, and this car has a lot of full lock! It is one of the heaviest, if not THE heaviest cars in the series, and although the car has a V8 in it, the HP falls short of many of the other by up to a 100 WHP or more, even to Will's AE86! The car works really well though with a simple solid rear axle, reliable V8 TQ, big steering angle, and simple setup. He is one of our newer drivers to and he is learning fast! He only started tendering this year!



Justin Garner and Team Silhouette are coming on strong in points this year. They have what seems like half the field at some events, and have to be the largest drift team in Texas. It is really nice seeing team camaraderie at events, and drivers helping each other and having a good time hanging out. Plus, his car is a really pleasant color! The build of the car itself is fairly simple, no huge turbo, no huge revs, no elaborate engine swap no one has ever tried. The car has a T28 and mild boost, which makes for a really nice and responsive car which is inexpensive to maintain and run. I hope he doesn't get too excited and change the car too much, because the next step that involves a 2871 gets really expensive really fast, and his car is in a great place build wise right now! Probably my favorite way to setup a 240sx mechanically at the moment. ( He is the teal car in the picture )



Another one of our newer drivers, who isn't new to drifting is Chris Conley. He popped up out of nowhere around a year ago or so, and has a really nicely setup simplistic car ( which is good! ). He has an S14 with a mild turbo upgrade and all the usuals. He is really aggressive in tandem and won't back down. When tendering with Robert Lee at Round 2 this summer, he was extremely entertaining because he refused to do anything but full on aggression runs with the little AE86. Watching 2 cars which move at very different speeds fighting to stay together was awesome.



Robert Turnbow is very much like Will Parsons, his traveling companion. They both are nice, quite individuals whom you never hear complaining, bitching, or arguing. However, there cars both SCREAM. The 1JZ tucked away in the little old Cressida is a brutal aggressive motor that demands to be driven with anger. The car might make 400+WHP, but it only starts making usable power to drift with well over 4700 RPM, and below that it is a plain dog. This means Robert has about 2-5 times more clutch kicks per run than most of the other drivers, much like Tyler Cox's old setup. This makes the runs themselves very exciting, the noise blistering, and leaves the clutch boiling! Plus, this car is getting haggard from doing so many events this year, so I expect his driving will only get more aggressive as he cares less and less about his body panels!



Josh Steele came to us first in his 350z, then an S13 with an SR20, and now is rocking a full V8 S13 setup. He has a very conservative style, and always keeps the car super presentable. He wins the contest for most stickers on one car every event, although we haven't created a prize or category for this yet. Also, I get to keep using this picture of him in Hooters garb. Regardless of how much total HP his car makes on the dyno when we strap it down, it will be just like all of our other V8 cars, which make MORE than enough. All of them do, they just make stump pulling power everywhere, thats the point of the V8. This car works fantastically well though, and he does a great job keeping it in one piece somehow.



Fielding Shredder isn't quite sure if he can make it yet, but I will bug him until he does. The car is setup with a 2871 and probably makes somewhere between 300-350 WHP, and has been rocking this same setup for years reliably. He is one of our big angle drivers, and big WHEEL drivers. He was drifting on 20 inch wheels on an S-Chassis before it was even cool. Wait a second, that was never cool. Anyways, he makes up for the 20 inch wheels with really aggressive close tandem! He was also one of our early front splitter users.



But the question remains. Will our series leader return for round 3 after moving to Florida? He probably will have to if he wants to retain his lead and win the FD license he wants so badly. We will have to wait and see if he makes it out here!



As the list continues to grow I will add more drivers, plus I think I have a text limit to each post : )

[aaronlosey]

Hidden in the shadow of his brother, we have another contender. Diabolically stitching together another bastard AE86 to complete the Texas collection, Chris Lee is a man with a plan. I can only guess that team silhouette realized how powerful of a driver they had with Robert Lee, and chose to clone him instead of recruiting fresh talent, creating a perfect copy of Robert's flesh. They stopped there though, and instead of also cloning his 100 hp car, they built something more aggressive.

You see, this AE86 isn't another 4AG car, another 1UZ swap, turbo kit setup, or even like Will's FC20 clunker. This car was built with purpose. Chris looked at each part of his AE86 and felt what only can be called distraught. He wanted power, but then the tranny would break. If he put in a better tranny, the axle would break. The suspension is archaic, he would need to sort that out to get power to the ground. The brakes are too tiny. And if he got all that together, the crank would probably fall out of the 4AG next, and on and on, forever a downward spiral.

Tweens around the world choose the AE86 chassis for its light weight drifting heritage ( - they watched Initial D because they were too young to drive anywhere and were stuck at home, and as they dreamed that sweet auto trader dream, the only thing their allowance could afford was the AE86 rusting in some rednecks yard on the last page labeled "equipment" ), but all the things that make it a decent little drift car also hold it back, and so he knew the only thing he could keep was the shell, and steal from something great. Something great like an S13. And so he did. And as the story unfolds one subframe at a time, the car finally started to have a chance at greatness. An SR20 in place of a 4AG. An S13 subframe and diff in place of the solid axle toothpick that came in the car. Even an S Chassis steering rack. Even S13 coil overs! And while his flesh might look just like Robert's, I pitty that man for having to drive against a younger and better looking brother in a superior car.

Here you can see an R200 was used in place of whatever the hell comes in a AE86, I have no idea what that is.



Unable to cope with the increased amount of electricity the Nissan alternator would produce, he had no choice but to swap out all the gauges and install switches to control the electronics of the car, for fear of dying in an awful electrical fire and being trapped inside the car by the combination of racing seat, racing steering wheel and racing cage.



Upsized fuel lines were installed to get worse gas mileage when in drift.



The AE86 clutch pedal is a known weak point, so out it went, and was swapped out for a stronger unit.



He preemptively cut out his core support so he couldn't bend it when he hits his brothers Corolla from behind because it is going to slowly in front of him.



There is only one thing that can stop this car. Hammers.



I present to you the first Corolla to ever have a hydro e brake, or have a driver that used an e brake for anything other than parking, or emergency braking.



The longer I stare at this, the more it blows my mind. Coilover. Check. Box steel. Check. Random piece of strap brace. Check. Stock bumpstops just chilling on the upper control arms. Check.





So watch out. Here comes CHRIS LEE! The only problem is I'm not sure which one he is.

[aaronlosey]

Another competitor has thrown his hat in the ring. Stewart mother fucking Leask.



His car has a corvette engine.



His wheels are TE37's.



He doesn't give a fuck.



You want to hit his car? He will just fix it.



This picture was taken at 9 am when he got to the track.