The first test drive in McCall’s Z3M Roadster project was made on Dec 31st, meeting his “drive it in 2011!” goal. There’s a full write-up on the latest round of work on our forum as well as video of the car firing up and driving around the Vorshlag headquarters. Sounds good!
You can read about the all new AST 4150 Damper in this forum announcement, which has the AST-USA press release, many pictures, added details, and first-hand reports from prototype testers. This shock has the best of both worlds – excellent street ride quality and race car handling, at the turn of a knob – and will be is a game changer once again in the shock industry. The AST 4100 was already the market leader in monotube, race-quality, single adjustable shocks, and the AST 4150 builds on that and adds the best parts from AST, Moton, and GRAND AM racing experience all in one, affordable and upgradable package.
Vorshlag has six different car fitments of 4150 dampers being built in Holland right now and we should start receiving them in January.
Just a quick update on the Vorshlag Forum Build Thread for our BMW E46 “Alpha” car LSx V8 swap project, showing the header progress from the last few weeks. Getting close!
We took our 2011 Mustang GT to Eagles Canyon Raceway on Dec 10th and two drivers made laps in the car all day. It was a total blast to drive on track (2:03 laps in its full street set-up) with the added grip of the 275mm Bridgestone RE-11s on the new D-Force 18×10″ wheels at all four corners, plus the new power of the ARH long tube headers and the Vorshlag-built, custom, dual 3″ stainless exhaust. We also took the Mustang to our local tuner and it made 430 whp on their chassis dyno – no wonder its so much more fun on track! The last time we tracked this car is was making only 378 whp. Read more in the forum build thread.
We were also pleasantly surprised at the ample grip we had at this bumpy track, with the new AST 4150-style “DDP pistons” and custom valved shocks installed. These updated AST shocks are being built in Holland right now and Vorshlag has a lot of them on order (early 2012 delivery). At day’s end we turned the AST shocks back to full soft and drove home with impeccable ride quality. This shock provides “Jekyll and Hyde” type valving at the turn of a knob – with ultra-agressive and extremely digressive rebound valving when turned up, and soft cushy ride when turned to full soft. The best of both worlds. Look for more details about the upcoming AST 4150/4250 shocks in a press release from Vorshlag, later today.
The project thread for McCall’s BMW Z3M Roadster LS1 project has an update showing the completely custom built, dual 3″, 304SS, mandrel bent exhaust. We also have a video of the car starting and running – sounds great! New brake lines were made, AST/Vorshlag suspension is installed, and its close very to being ready to drive.
We have a press release for a brand new D-Force 18×10″ ET43 wheel made to fit the S197 Mustang and GR Subaru Impreza STI, in a 5 x 114.3 mm bolt circle.
(click on thumbnails for larger image)
This semi-forged 18×10″ wheel is 20 lbs, $309, available in flat black and silver, and made to bolt onto either end of these two chassis without spacers. The first production run of 100 wheels are being built exclusively for Vorshlag and we are pre-selling them on our website starting today (Mustang entry + Subaru entry).
Don’t wait – if you think you want a set, this first run of 100 of these new 18×10″ wheels (due in February) are the only ones on order for the next 90 days, so the next batch might not be here until summer. We’ve been pounding miles on the prototype set and they are working spectacularly!
These wheels have been torture tested by Vorshlag on the street, track and autocross course
Read more here.
Brianne Corn is a rally racer, and with the race on the line she pushes her machine to the limit, and breakages happen – except with her Vorshlag camber plates. On the Lake Superior Performance Rally held in Northern Michigan a month ago she was running her Subaru in the Open Light class. There was an error in the rally notes that caught a lot of drivers out, and many out of the event. A “kick” should have been a “jump”, with lower speeds than noted. Oops!
Brianne encountered more problems on Stage 12 on a ‘kick’ that caused damage to the rear suspension. She lost considerable time as she stopped to check the damage and found a bent rear left strut which caused the rear wheel and tire to rub against the wheel well. Miraculously, only the strut was damaged and the Vorshlag camber plate was not harmed and Brianne was able to finish the stage.
She managed to limp to the next stage, her crew fixed the strut, and she went on the finish and win her class. Its always good to hear that our parts withstand the absolute worst abuse – a crash that destroyed a strut – and still come out unscathed. We’re seeing more and more rally racers using our camber plates for this very reason. There’s in-car video and more details at the website Dirty Girls Rally
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Five of the Vorshlag crew attended the 2011 Performance Racing Industry show last week and we took about 100 pictures, which are posted in this gallery. Take a look and see some upcoming race cars, new products and booths from some of your favorite products. We hung out at the Moton / AST booth a bit and they had some neat stuff to show off, including the GRAND AM Rum Bum BMW M3 V8 race car.
This press release on Jalopnik announces the fact that MINI will be joining B-Spec racing in the USA, which is great, but it also points out that the Vorshlag R56 Camber Plate is part of the spec.
Don’t know about B-Spec racing yet? Read the Jalopnik article – it explains a lot. Vorshlag camber plates have been spec’d into several Club Racing racing classes before, and we’ve even worked with MINI on some other special projects, but this is B-Spec Racing and an even “bigger deal”. We were hoping we’d make that specification and we did – WOOT!