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Saturday the 3rd of June saw Andy Hartwell return to the Mascar race line up, a very busy work schedule along with moving work premises has seen him head down and arse up in his workshop, turning a very old dilapidated factory into to a modern day 5 ramp MOT station, so unfortunately he has had to prioritise, and work commitment has come first, as without work, there is no racing, so with the workload sorted and the new building looking rather dapper, it was time to unwind and have a bit of fun, in true Hartwell style , and what better way to do that, than hit the race track.

MASCAR Racing, Juli and Steve Stanford

With 8 races of the season already gone, Mascar turned up at Birmingham wheels, which happens to be Andy’s home race, and one that he is sponsoring, so it would be rude not to participate in this round, and Saturday morning saw us load up the truck and head off to the track for practice and a little bit set up work and catch up with the guys and gals from the Mascar community, we all had a great morning chewing the fat with a few friends, and sorting out the little set up issues, #05 was ready to rock and roll for race one.

After being away from the first part of the season, Andy lined up near the back of the pack, but fought his way through with some excellent race craft, finishing a formidable 3rd place, not a bad start to the day, and with his race face on, he was looking forward to race 2, where he lined up mid pack, to finish second behind the race winner Juli Stanford.

Click the video below if you would like to see the full race 2 coverage.

MASCAR Racing, Race 2 from Birmingham Wheels 03/06/2017

The final race of the day was always going to be one to watch, and it didn't disappoint, and as luck would have it, Andy misplaced his side safety net support bar, but with Craig on hand from PRO 24, it all got sorted fairly quickly, although Andy was now lining up yet again at the back of the grid.

The race was pretty spectacular, and the in-car Go Pro footage show not only how fast these little pocket rockets are, but also the driving standards really are first class, enjoy and watch from a birds eye perspective of what its like to race one of these stunning little race cars, this really is a series that’s going places, and with a brands hatch next week, proves it’s a series that’s growing fast, so with brands hatch on the horizon followed by another visit to Birmingham, and with a few tweaks in the pipeline, we look forward to seeing hard and fair racing, as they say “If you’re not rubbing you’re not racing” .. see you at Brum.

MASCAR Racing, GoPro In-car with Andy Hartwell, The Final from Birmingham Wheels 03/06/2017

 

In our line of business with the products we offer, we get to not only ship our parts all around the world, we also get to work with some great people on their fantastic builds, and just recently our customer Yann Boivin who resides in Dubai completed his stunning RSR Inspired 997 Turbo.

VAD VM1 10x20>265/30R20 Front, 13x20>345/25R20 Rear

Yann made contact with us mid part of 2016 about building a wide body Porsche 997, based on his Turbo with his inspiration coming not just from the race series Porsche GT3 RSR, but the VAD RSR Turbo 650R build we did in 2013, although It a personal build we like to forget about, because it wasn’t built to a standard we have always strived for, the paint work wasn’t the best, we used a very cheap, poor quality FRP RSR kit, the fit was appalling, and the wheel build was to extreme, with our initial idea was to build a race looking Porsche 997 RSR, we build a stance cambered RSR, modifying the front bumper that gave the car a silly looking smile, if we had our time over again building an RSR turbo, it would be done totally different, as we will showcase when we start to construct our new Porsche 997 build, the GT3R bi-turbo, but we will cover that in another post when our build starts.

VAD VM1 10x20>265/30R20 Front, 13x20>345/25R20 Rear

Yann had a few niggles along the way, mainly with the body shop he chose, but with a new recommendation and his vison and determination still in full flow, his dream build has now hit the street, and its one very special looking 997 Turbo.

His wheel choice from day one was to fit our VAD VF1 3 piece forged concave wheels as seen on our original demo, but they wouldn’t be as extreme, and they would be a completely tyre set up and colour combo, with Matte brushed bronze, with brushed silver hardware, 10x20 > 265/30R20 front and 13x20 > 345/25R20 rear sitting on custom coilover suspension, the finish and colour of the wheel suit the beautiful Metallic Khaki green to absolute perfection.

We have a full range of professional photos heading our way over the next few weeks, so check back in for details as they will be uploaded to our blog and VAD fitted vehicle gallery.

 

Over the last few weeks we have been in collaboration with the guys from L.A Transporters and Hartwell Motor Services, with us all having an input into the VW T5 Transporter builds the L.A boys have been carrying out, and although our input is minimal, we just wanted to show people what these boys can do with the VW Panel van, with the Mercedes Vito also on their build list.

There are quite a few VW T5 specialists around the country, but the L.A Transporter guys seem to go about the business a little differently, looking at doing things their own way, yes they will fit the air suspension, but they prefer to fit either a coil over set up, or the H&R 50mm spring drop as most of the customer base prefers, they then add a 9” and 10” wheel set up, 275/40R20 tyres front and rear, which happens to be slightly oversized, but has the correct load index to match the load rated wheels, they are constantly rectifying their competition wheel and tyre errors, of either incorrect, tyre size, wheel offset, or load index, these boys do it right the first time round, no corners cut on any of the parts they fit.

  • LA Transporters

Over the last few weeks they have been converting a lot of the older T5 to the face lift T5.1 conversion, and they look so much better, with the interiors also coming in for some enhancement, with LED interior lighting, rear seat upgrades, leather trims, rear carpeting and headlining, side windows, stainless side bars, they do it all.

For the VITO they have the Wald Bison conversion, as well as the AMG and Brabus upgrades.

We will be heading to the L.A Transporters team over the next few weeks with our very own T5 that we will be modifying, and we will bring the full details as and when it happens, as well as blogging about the new LWB transporter T5 about to undergo the 5.1 upgrades that’s just about to start.

The new L.A website is not far away from launching, so give them a follow and if you need any work doing on your own Transporter or Vito, give them a shout www.latransporters.co.uk

 
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Office Hours

Monday to Friday 9.00 am > 5.30 pm
Saturday                9.00 am > 1.00 pm
Sunday                   Closed

OFFICE
Unit C20
Rose Hill Industrial Estate
Rose Hill Road 
Market Drayton 
Shropshire 
TF9 2JU


WORKSHOP 

Unit C21
Rose Hill Industrial Estate
Rose Hill Road 
Market Drayton
 
Shropshire
TF9 2JU


Strictly by Appointment  
Art...Some people collect it, We like to build it
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