As the European car aftermarket industry continues to expand, we've started noticing milestones within the scene. Our enthusiast media isn't solely reflected in publications, events and the Internet any more. Television has become a significant highlight of our industry's achievements, especially with the emergence of Speed TV and its hit reality series, Street Tuner Challenge.
For the second consecutive season, Autobahn Designs (ABD Racing) of Riverside, CA was invited to participate in Street Tuner Challenge and to build a '06 GTI 2.0T. The car would go head-to-head against a Honda Fit and a Ford Mustang on the streets and on the track. For a recap of this year's competition, see p62.
ABD Racing and VWoA have been exercising a newfound relationship that began last year. We sat down with Dave Anderson, co-owner of ABD, and picked his brain to uncover the relationship and the buildup of the new GTI.
"Being in the business since 1990, we always had an interest to build project cars," he started. "We hit VW with the idea for many years but they were never interested, mostly because they didn't know how to do it. Last year, we finally got a long-term loaner from them, which was the Jetta from last season's Street Tuner Challenge. That opened the gate for this year. They were very happy with the marketing results. The opportunity came with the second season of Street Tuner Challenge and the GTI was a perfect fit. VW came back and asked us to build a GTI."
The goals of Street Tuner Challenge have shifted from last year's agenda, which was a race for the best track car where ABD Racing's Jetta project was quickly left in the dust, behind a Nissan Skyline and a Chevy Cobalt SS. For this year's program, building a complete all-around car was the main focus, which was right up ABD's alley. "The whole deal was to choose modifications that complemented the car," Dave outlined. "It's too easy to get a hold of a whole bunch of aftermarket parts, modify the car and make something different. The real challenge is to make something different and likable."
Now that ABD was competing in a more familiar playing field, the company contemplated the amount of custom work for its project car. "Custom, one-off stuff might improve the originality of the car but it doesn't keep you in business. You can't sell handmade, irreplaceable stuff and expect to survive from it. It's the unfortunate truth. So we looked for good sources to help modify our GTI. We especially sought after companies whose product we could sell, such as Caractere and Eibach."
With that being said, the GTI was outfitted with Caractere body components, which included a front bumper, rear valance, side skirts, grille and rear hatch blend. The kit flowed exceptionally well on the car and had no fitment issues.
Then Eibach and ABD tossed the idea of developing a custom suspension setup, but the two concluded off-the-shelf parts would benefit both companies. The factory suspension was swapped for fully adjustable coilovers. Eibach also provided a complete sway bar package to minimize body roll. To add rigidity to the chassis, ABD developed a twin-tube front upper stress bar, which is still in the production stage for the general public.
The brakes were also off-the-shelf products, which included a front 12.9" Brembo big brake kit. ABD Racing already had the rear brake rotors developed from its Jetta project last year so it was a breeze to acquire a set and install them. Stainless steel braided lines were finally fitted to ensure firm pedal feel.
An important ingredient in building a complete project car was upgrading the engine's performance. ABD wasn't looking to build astronomical horsepower, but enough power to handle straight-aways on the track and canyon roads.
ABD started by designing certain performance products that could be easily reproduced and sold to future customers. A front-mount intercooler was fabricated and installed to cool intake temperatures. A larger turbo outlet hose was also created, enabling more air to pass through the turbo system. Finally, a ceramic-coated air intake system was mounted to the car. All these products are currently in production and should be on sale by the time this magazine hits newsstands.
ABD collaborated with Techtonics Tuning to liberate the restrictive OE exhaust system. Randy Roth flew down from Techtonics to install the new 2.5" downpipe and exhaust for ABD. The team went a step further and implemented dual exhaust tips that correspond to dual-cutouts in the rear valance.
GIAC and VF-Engineering also teamed up with ABD to develop a bigger turbo. Utilizing a GT28RS turbocharger, a prototype tubular manifold and custom GIAC software, the car boasted 282whp. This dyno was done with a conservative software program so Dave assured us that when the turbo kit is ready for public release, the power should be as high as 350whp after fine-tuning.
Utilizing several bolt-on and in-production pieces, ABD successfully tackled several elements of an all-round street car. In spite of the progress, this wouldn't be enough to win the competition. So Dave and his team returned to the drawing board to resolve their final plans. "We thought, let's do something that makes sense for our industry and something that really hasn't been done before," Dave explained. "I wanted to make sure we had a theme that was carried throughout the whole build and represented our industry. Project Industrial, as we call it, reflects everything metal. It's a little rough around the edges - not rough quality but in the actual look - a bare metal look. We didn't want it to be too pretty."
The new theme proved to be an excellent idea. ABD didn't need to have a widebody conversion or candy paint job to be different. Unluckily, the crew encountered problems with production. "The paint job was the biggest obstacle," Dave stated. "It was the single most stressful part of our build. For everything else, we knew what we were going to do or we researched it and came to a resolution. The paint job haunted us before we even had the car. We had three painters fall out during the season because they were unable to do the project. We were left with a two-week time period to paint the car with a new and experimental technique." West Coast Collision and Zeaks Design of Riverside, CA came to the rescue.
"The GTI was originally silver. The paint was then sanded down and lightly airbrushed black. The black surface was then scraped away leaving a scratched look on the silver surface. Once that was done, the paint was highlighted with gold and blue reflection accents. The next stage was airbrushing the rivets and clear coating the car. As a final touch, the headlamps and tail lights were matched to complement the industrial theme. After 48 hours, the exterior was complete. Its unique execution led to a first-place finish in the paint competition of Street Tuner Challenge.
In keeping with the theme, ABD received help from iForged Performance Wheels, which supplied a set of 19x8.5" Variant rims left in a raw machine finish. Pirelli PZero Nero tires provided the necessary rubber for daily driving.
Next, the industrial theme shifted to the interior. A pair of Momo seats were reupholstered and paint-matched to the car. For a race look, the rear seats and trunk were stripped for an aluminum floor and rollcage. The factory black paneling and upholstery were then swapped for silver carbon fiber accents and aluminum pieces.
ABD Racing isn't known for doing great audio work, but it was required for the television show. "The audio was another new concept," Dave said. "I'm not an audio guy and didn't want a whole bunch of crap in the car. So we kept it simple by first removing the factory head unit. In its place, a 9" monitor was fitted. A hidden receiver is completely run off a remote control. We installed a remote pod where the ashtray is that drives the DVD player and integrated iPod." To finish off the stereo, ABD swapped the factory speakers for Sony Xplod components. Two 8" subwoofers were secretly mounted within the rear quarter panels.
Overall, the audio system didn't add much weight to the car so ABD had the luxury of keeping the stereo installed on race days.
Dave concluded, "The entire project was a big hurdle. The television show makes it sound like we had twelve weeks to work on the car, but it's actually twelve episodes. They don't want us doing any major things off camera. Realistically, we built the car in 20 full days. A lot of all-nighters were done by the staff in order to finish the car by the drop-dead date. The project isn't impossible to do and a lot of us work great under pressure. Looking back at this season, it was fun to take the challenge."
ABD Racing has successfully catapulted the European car enthusiast market to new heights. It has taken numerous years and hard work from tuners and enthusiasts to achieve television exposure. We look forward to seeing more coverage on TV, or maybe on the big screen, for our scene and the likes of ABD Racing.