MNECM Part 1

If any regular readers have me added on instagram, you may have noticed I have been quiet for the past few days. In this two part blog entry hopefully the reason for that will become apparent.

Whilst many online over the pond seem to be being battered by snowstorms, this week I was able to actually get out and about in the project car.

On Saturday I bid farewell to my old stock GTO alloys. There was something seemingly wrong about trying to squeeze 4 wheels into the back of a Fiat 500. The proportions were almost comical, but I do hope they enjoy living out their days as a spare set for winter tyres for their new Lancer owner.

Squeezing the alloys into the Fiat 500

On Saturday I was also able to pick up my new pod filter. It has more interesting dimensions than I imagined, I'm intrigued to see how it will look when fit into the car. I'm even more intrigued as to how it will sound... It will probably be a couple of weeks before I get to fit this now, and to paraphrase Tim Curry 'I will be left in antici...........pation'.

57i K&N Performance Intake

57i Intake

Sunday saw me hit up my first car meet of the year, and the first time I have ventured to a meet in the GTO. I hit up the Modified North East Car Meet #MNECM first meet of the year. It was advertised on their page as a 'Mini Meet' so I wasn't quite sure what to expect, and really didn't expect to see well over 100 cars there for a mini meet. I've often seen groups online comment on great turn outs for 10 cars so was astonished at how many people were there in such a wide variety of cars and stages of modification from bone stock to almost reaching race car status. Highly recommended meet to any in the area. In the awe of it all I barely even took any photos... doh!

#MNECM

I ended up parked next to 2 of the most attention grabbing cars there, a nicely restored Rover Metro and a highly modified TRD Starlett. They kinda brought to my attention how far I still need to go with the project, I know I will look forward to every step along that path.... (well, most steps at least....)

Rover Metro next to my GTO

In this pic my car looks like the smallest, yet in reality it is massive compared to the Metro and the Seat on the other side in terms of space it takes up, it is just that much lower...

It was a great night until it was time to leave AND THEN..... to be continued

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Abarth Exhaustion

In today's entry: Abarth Exhaustion... 

Monza Exhaust on the SuperSport

When I did the review of my daily driver, the Abarth SuperSport, a few weeks back I mentioned that although it only had a little 1.4l engine, it sounded mean and angry beyond its cc. So this week I decided that it was time to do that video! This may have also had something to do with damp and slippery roads combined with 90mph winds again at the weekend preventing that 0-60 video I want to do on the GTO... (wind speed may be a slight exaggeration but it was damn windy).

Digital Boost Gauge (apologies for glare)

I took this video on my phone with it propped up on a box whilst I revved. Lets be honest, this is not an ideal set-up, far from it actually... It may be how ITV film Emmerdale, but it was never going to give the sound this car makes the justice it deserves. 

In the flesh this exhaust does sound so much more beastly, especially with its Sport mode engaged even in its current stock guise. The engine and exhaust combination Abarth put on these cars (and the 595 equivalents) from the factory really make the noise generated from that 1.4 tjet engine second to none against other stock engines of a similar cc out there. 

Yes, that includes your Saxo, even with its 4" Halfords own exhaust tip you've tried to cable tie on... Wait... is that Burberry paint? 

Sport Mode - Engaged

The phone does not pick up on all the pops the exhaust makes as you ease off between revs, which is one of the traits that made me fall in love with the sound to begin with.... But alas, here is the video for now:

Although you can hear me start the car, the video was done on a warm engine. I had originally done a take with the phone sat further back and the wind noise wasn't the greatest, so this was a second take.

I have only been at this blog malarkey for 3-4 weeks now, so if I end up getting a better camera down the line I will probably re-do this video to try to show the car in the better light it deserves! If not, the phone footage will have to do.

I will probably do a similar video for the GTO, but with a bit of assistance in shooting it! I love this exhaust sound, but it will never realistically compete with that from a 3.0l twin-turbo with a racing exhaust system....

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Daily Drive

Ok, so I ended last weeks entry at the point of trading in my beloved Hawkeye WRX for a hothatch due to the birth of my son. (at this point I would like to note that the Mrs was happy to see the scooby go, as she saw it as an unneeded expense at the time, but was not impressed when the baby seat would not fit in the new car...) This week is talking through that daily driver. Those of you who have checked out my instagram will have already seen that this was for an Abarth Supersport.

When I bought this car it was from new, but at the end of its production run. A couple of weeks later I read an article about this car and how much of a unicorn it was. Apparently there were only ever around 850 Abarth Puntos brought to the UK, and of these only 138 were of the top spec Supersport version, the majority being either the Abarth Grand Punto, or the Abarth Punto Evo. Although I have seen social media peppered with them from time to time, in my area I only know of 1 other Abarth Punto, and thats an Evo.

I love the fact that a lot of people, especially non-car people, don't really know what they are. I have lost track of how many times I've been asked what an Abarth is, and when people finally click, say "so thats like a fast fiat 500, right?" as if Abarth only do 500s and nothing else..... Don't get me wrong, I like the 500 models, I went to the showroom intending to buy a 595 Competizione, but walked away happily with my Supersport instead, its more me, and I like the fact you don't see them as often as the 500 based models.

So what I have is a car which I love, and although its nippy its the slowest car I've ever had. It has a 1.4l t-jet engine which has around 180bhp, which although it isn't much pushes the car to 60 somewhere in the region of 6.5 - 7 seconds. Which given how small the engine is, isn't actually that bad.

Abarth Supersport engine bay.

In fact when I was looking into this car, I read many a reviews and most compared the car to 1 of 3 cars. The Golf GTI, the Civic Type R and the Focus ST. All of the reviewed said the same thing, the car was a great little car but couldn't compete with those 3 of hot hatches on performance. But the Abarth has a smaller engine, and cost significantly SIGNIFICANTLY less. The other 3 cars will all cost you in the region of £30k, maybe just under. More if you want a decent spec. My little gem was under £20k. This means it was being compared against the big guns, when it cost less than the smaller hot hatches on the market, still coming in a few quid shy (couple of g's in fact) of the cost of a Fiesta ST and Corsa VXR with similar performance, and has the same 0-60 as the PUG GTI but costs around £7-8k less!

With Abarth you also get lots of goodies as standard. In fact the parts list on the Abarth would do as a shopping list for the GTO... Each corner sees a set of Brembo's coupled with Koni suspension. The seats are Buckets by Corsa (not the Vauxhall kind...). The dials were designed by Jaeger. The exhaust sound is mean for a 1.4 thanks to a system by Monza coupled with an uprated airbox thanks to BMC (I'll have to post a video of it on a later entry). Not a bad list for a car which is still stock....

I have mentioned the GTO has pop up headlights, a button on the car that makes me a bit giddy. The Abarth has a go faster button, and I've always wanted one of them since I was a kid, lusting after an M3 purely because it had the M button... I've come to realise BMW's are not for me, I indicate and don't tailgate, however the go faster button is still right up my street!

I love talking about the car, I love explaining what an Abarth is to non-car people. I love explaining the bolt-on's that come stock to car people. I do love this car, but I miss the tear your face off acceleration. I miss having power whenever I want it, this car needs you to be in sport mode and in the right rev range or the turbo lag will see you accelerate from 30-60 at the pace of a Dacia Sandero. I miss having AWD and as I mentioned last week, that is what ultimately made me want a project car.....

In the mean time, if you want to keep up to date, follow me on social sites in the links, also more pictures below:

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Alloy + Brembo

Corsa Seats

Having a bath

Dat Ass!