Chizfab shop blog

BDC Round 2 and various cool stuff....

2011-05-28T14:08:00.003+01:00

After a truly disastrous start to the season that left Ade brannans sierra needing some chassis and bodywork repairs and a 540 with a faulty drive train I was keen to get back to the shop.

While jeek and Ade took time to ponder clutch/flywheel and crash damage solutions I got back to work on various jobs needing done

Coilovers, carbon mirrors and rear wing, flared arches and buddyclub style exhaust. Nice!

Camy's ek civic has been in for various bits n pieces including full Chizfab stainless exhaust, now with buddyclub style tailpipe and some arch rolling to accommodate his awesome wheel choice, not my thing being fwd but an ek with the right mods can look real nice.

I love the variation of work we get in the shop...

Corrosion needing removed on Tool's e30 325i sport. Nasty!

New metal shaped, welded into place and dressed for prepping.

Sorted!

Barry's corrolla was in for a stainless exhaust system, lovely little car with some nice mods including Driftworks CS2 coilovers and some baller wheels!!!

Ades luck seemed to be back as he had found a body repair shop with time to fit him in so the sierra was trailered away to mj racing and would hopefully be ready for round2 @ Norfolk arena! Jeek had also sourced a solid lightweight flywheel and m5 clutch to replace the 140k mile worn one causing the issues!

And what a nice part the flywheel was, almost a shame to hide it away in the box! Fitted using oem spec clutch all back together everything was working good and ready for norfolk. The v8 seemed much more responsive, although with a saving of 10kg over the standard flywheel I'm not surprised! For more info on the solid flywheel setup please contact jeek@Dtune.

Mj racing done a great job on the sierra ! With new bumpers and a 4x4 bonnet and some new panels it looks better than ever!

400 miles to Norfolk with the trailers was predictably boring other than a quick stop off In Leeds to pick up these little beauts... BBS RS 9.5j et13 split rims, although there postion of coolest wheels @ chizfab was short lived when K's new OZ's arrived a few days later.... see inset left!!

Genuine BBS RS 9.5j et12!! For sale now@Dtune

Friday was practice day and on a completely different track to donington with judges looking for lots of accurate track positioning and even a manje from drivers! Practice went well jeek seemed happy and had a working car other than a blown rear shock from running over track markers to avoid a spinning car in front but that wasn't a huge issue. Ade struggled with the track to begin with showed massive improvement by the end of the day and put in some consistent runs.

Saturday morning in the dust bowl and Ade was first to complete his 3 qualifying runs, with a spin and 2 average laps he didn't do enough to make top16. With such a low spec, low powered car and his first year in bdc, it's never going to be an easy season, but we see his driving improving with every outing at the moment! It's all about seat time!!!!!!! Someone with plenty seat time would be our other driver jeek...
Just qualifying in top 32 and drawing semi pro driver, in pro via bdc promotion scene and last seen smashing it at donington, danni murphy. jeek made a stupid mistake, spinning in the second corner while leading danny on the first run, gifting the win to her. Lessons learned, another round over with disappointing results. Ah well time for a sulk and then watch the super pro finals...

Failure is immanent

And all I can say is wow! Huge shout to our fellow countryman david waterworth who had been rocking it all day in his s13, the new paint scheme and wheel game look great!!

Rubbing cones and bashing the rave limiter like we had never seen from him before, he looks to be driving hard this year! Unfortunately he spun at the very end of an epic run loosing out on his 1st twin drift battle!

my highlight of the wknd was Remo and his e39 m5 powered falken tyres e30. I've seen him drive before at jdm all-stars in Newcastle and was just as impressed then, the man is a hero! Incredible car control!

Thanks to Twistaphoto for some nice images from the event!!

BDC Round 1

2011-05-06T10:46:00.002+01:00

I find it really hard to believe that were already into the 5th month of the year, time has flown by since January! April meant only one thing, British Drift Championship round 1 @ Donington was upon us!

Having spent some time in may fitting jeeks 540 out with a full 14 point weld in cage to comply with BDC regulations, and him spending some time fitting safety cut offs and all the related safety equipment, the 540 was almost good to go for round 1, with only the exhaust left to modify, it now sounds like WAR!!

Jeek will be competing in the pro class of the BDC and Team Chizfabs other driver, automotive photography wizard Ade Brannan from abcarpix.com will be entering the semi pro class.

Ades car needed some minor maintenance before it was time to make the 7 hour trip to Donington park for round 1

Friday 22nd would see all drivers from all 3 classes practice through the morning and then attempt to qualify after lunch. Ade found difficulty in the morning with trying make sections of the course in what is the lowest powered car in BDC but showed great improvement into qualifying. Unfortunately it wasn't to be his day, the cut from 40+ drivers down to 8 did not include the 24v sierra. Too many errors in his 3 judged runs meant low points, but his improvement from the morning sessions was huge and we hope to see him being competitive in his first season of BDC. The weekend went from bad to worse for Ade, washing out into the trees on open practice on saturday morning and colliding with a fence post!

Jeeks' weekend was to prove difficult due to a slipping clutch making getting power down in third gear impossible. Slow entry speeds caused by this problem meant he couldn't get the best line into the corners and get close enough to clipping points to score high, with 55 points from his best run this was not enough to make top 16 so the 540 would not be making it's debue in BDC twin drift battles at Donignton. Other than the lack of clutch the car seemed to be working well and we can't wait to get down to Norfolk arena for round 2 with a fully working car!

A good weekend all round tho, and a great start to the 2011 BDC with some awesome driving from many drivers across all classes. Danny murphie was on fire putting in some trully epic qualifying runs on friday and a shout must go to Bizz Bizz also his new LS3 power seemed to be working well and i saw some seriously impressive driving from him! We decided to leave early on saturday to get back home for a decent time with work looming the next day, so for more information on the finals check out http://www.thebritishdriftchampionship.com/blog/news/ and http://www.driftworks.com/

We would like to take this opportunity to mention that without the help from our hugely generous sponsors, Jeek and the 540 would not have been able to attempt a full season of BDC, the guys from Edeco Petroleum services Ltd, Hargreaves Jones, Zech Tech and Geokey have been very enthusiastic, giving generously providing us with sufficient funding to compete this year! From my self and Jeek we cant thank you enough for the opportunity! If anyone else would like to help out olease get in touch, Tyre sponsors especially!!!! The car is due to have the full sponsorship livery completed in time for Round 2 @ Norfolk Arena along with an upgraded solid flywheel and clutch kit later this week.

Back at Chizfab HQ I have busy on a wide variety of work on various makes, including some progress on Ades car for next season, the Classic Ford mag featured ford Capri.

The Volvo rear axle is currently being installed using 4 link setup with watts linkage to go on also.

Chizfab HQ also sees many jdm cars visit the shop for various work, recently John falons epic r32 skyline with rb25 power was here for shotgun exhaust and rear arch tubbing for the overfenders. johns car is one of my favourite cars in Scotland at the moment packed full of awesome!

Last but not least, legendary film producer Brooksie has completed his video showing highlights from Round 1 of BDC, and its awesome......

THE BATTLE BEGINS : Maxxis Tyres British Drift Championship Round One from Stephen Brooks on Vimeo.

Knockhill Test Session

2011-03-09T12:01:00.013Z

Hi again folks, Last Sunday we were invited to Knockhill to practice our new DRIFT EXPERIENCE we are going to be offering at Knockhill Racing Circuit

It was such a fun afternoon i wish i could do it every day. Much more details to follow on the Drift experience. We are just working out the final details now and should go live in MAY.

Chizfab & DTune Testing Teaser from Fraser Gordon on Vimeo.

www.D-tune.net www.Chizfab.com www.stile-auto.com www.Knockhill.com

The drift season is HERE!

2011-02-22T20:56:00.009Z

The drift season has finally started. After a long cold dark winter we got to smell the sweet smell of burning tyres and overheating BMWS. At long last we got all three E39 540s working and on track at the same time. We loaded up the thre cars on the Satuardy night using K's Transportation Services. On Sunday we headed up to Crail Raceway to have a shakedown of the cars after the winter break.

We had a fun day with no major issues and even got to do a bit of twin drift practice which is rare in Scotland. Here is a nice pic of Myself and the main man Kyle@Chizfab.We are also getting my car ready for the upcoming BDC season which isnt too far away now. All of the saftey equipment is here for the car, its also booked into CHIZFAB for a full BDC/MSA spec weld in roll cage. My new sport bumper is away for paint and will finish off the aggresive front end along with my Carbon Fibre splitter which survived its ordeal last year. Hopefully this week my 1 off CSL style rear spoiler will arrive to complete the look. One last thing before I leave you for this time is a link to my new driver profile on the British Drift Championships Website Thanks for reading Jeek@D-Tune www.d-Tune.net

Made a start on some capri fabrication

2011-01-22T19:31:00.004Z

Were now half way through january and im happy to say ive found time to get some actual progress on ade's capri, the last blog update had seen the car away to get shot blasted in some epic post apocaliptic scottish mountain scene and further inspection after priming lead me to decide that the rear chassis legs were shot, and with plans on removing all of the rear floor section anyway, there was a lot of cutting to do!

With the spare wheel well and boot floor removed it was even more obvious that the chassis legs had to go, years of scottish winters had left the metal weak and pourous...

Replacement chassis legs are available in the uk for the capri, however with a 4 month wait and a fairly large price tag they were not an option. Although my ideal solution to this situation would be a tube frame rear end, its not an option on this build, so i fabed some legs up from suitable dimension box section...

Why no tube frame? This car is being built predominantly for use in the BDC and part of the rules they use means spaceframe chassis is a no go. Disapointing from my point of view as i love working with tube whenever i can, but im more than happy with the box section items we now have to work with.

With the shell suitably braced and the rear valance and lower quarter panels tacked in place it was time to remove a little more existing sheet metal and offer up the new legs to see how they fit.

After a lot of measuring the chassis legs are now in, fitting nice and true, and i went about welding them into place and bracing them where they join to the original chassis. Also added some lateral tubes which will help form part of the rear floor but before that we need to offer up the volvo axle ade has chosen to use, and start mounting the boxes for the axle link bars.

Currently waiting for our hub adapters to be made for the volvo axle so rear end progress depends on getting them into the shop, went ahead and cut the inner arch area out once the new legs were in, i will be fitting some nice wheel tubs once we get the axle mounted and work out all our clearances, we have to assure we get maximum lows!!!

I have also been busy on the floor pan and front corners, replacing sections of chassis leg and floor, adding strengthening plates in places and preparing cage mounting areas so there nice and strong, but rather than show pics of that i thought i would drop in some of this instead....

No caption required.

Mosselman carbon intake!

Ladies

Awesome Braid forged wheels, currently trying to convince one of my customers to put these on his WRC ESCOS!!

Myself, Ade, Jeek and K took some time off last week to drive down to the Autosport show which was packed with lots of cool things, from group B rally cars and current WRC cars to ex F1 mclarens (including prost and mansell cars) to modified mk2 escorts with huge spec and a very impressive build quality. Japspeed were also on hand showing off the subaru and s bodies, both in the static stand and the live action arena, subaru looks awesome guys nice work! And thanks to abcarpix.com for the autosport pics!

All in all a good day, done some good business, and plenty inspiration for the capri build.

2011 @ Chizfab...

2011-01-10T22:21:00.000Z

Its been a slow start to the year, between some of the worst snow in years and flu doing the rounds first week back in the shop was a quiet one, however we are now back on full throttle!

2011 looks like it's going to be a good year@ Chizfab HQ, We have even more drift events on the calender than last year and were looking at the possibility of running a car or two in a few rounds of the BDC this year so keep a look out! This year will also involve Lots of new and exciting work in the shop, starting with the addition of stainless steel exhaust fabrication to the services available here @ Chizfab HQ.

The system shown is the end result of the first use of our new bender, producing a nice fitting cat back system for a Honda Civic EK9. Note the HKS style final bend before the exhaust box which allows for a more 'JDM Tyt' exit angle!

When i havent been out clearing snow there has been some progress on Ade's capri, pictures of that i will keep for the next update!

An Introduction

2010-12-20T09:14:00.014Z

Well where to start? Im Jeek owner of http://www.trampdrift.com/. I started TD around the end of 2004, around the same time that Chizfab was starting to form from a few mates building cars for them selfs to a company offering bespoke Track/Drift car builds. I think i was CHIZFABs first 6 point roll cage customer way back in 2005, where i was preparing for a season of Eurodrift(now the British Drift Championship). Back then i still thought sierras were cool LOL

After a few years struggling to be competitive with the sierra and spending way more money than i had on competing i decided it was time to go back to basics so the Sierra was sold to a nice chap down south. At this point i bought a nice cheap and cheerful BMW E34 535.

I drove this car to within an inch of its life and then decided it was time i upped my game to get more power.

Now we get on to my current drift car. My E39 540 V8 manual. There will be loads more info and updates on this car but for now ill leave you with one of my fav pics of the car, followed by a cool video from Davey Dave dave.

SXOC August Drift Day - Crail, Big Track, 28-08-10 from Dave Murray on Vimeo.

Ade's Busted Old Capri......

2010-12-14T22:02:00.001Z

One day a few years back, myself and jeek from Dtune Auto Dismantlers (our next door neighbour, and more to come from him soon) met Adrian Brannan, on a Fast Ford shoot for jeeks sierra he was drifting at the time. Turned out ade was a great guy and has a huge talent for photography aswell as an unquenchable thurst to drift,so he was here to stay, and actually now owns said sierra, which is now known as the Fast Ford mag drift car!

If you see an awesome quality picture of anything chizfab its more than likely ades work, check out his website www.abcarpix.com for more top notch automotive porn!

So after being abused by ade to within an inch of its life for over ten years, its time to give his capri some attention...

Originally a 2.0 laser ade drifted around in the car with a modified 2l pinto which continuesly broke everywhere, it was a very tired car and in need of a rebuilt...

A few phonecalls and a little wait for the snow to melt and we took the car up some hills outside glasgow to have it blasted, made for some pretty epic pictures...

Generally speaking the shell is ok, a few areas to work on but nothing other than the usual old ford issues. Full entended spec Ade is planning will be revealed later,but rest assured it will be packed full of awesome! Including these courtesey of Image Wheels...

Chizfab shop blog is here.....

2010-12-06T14:52:00.009Z

With the ever-growing popularity of online blogs i thought it was about time we added one to the current website so now thanks to some technical assistance from dave twosheds murray, here it is!!

What can you expect to see? Basically whatever im working on in the shop that i think people might like, from fabrication and welding, hot wheels and parts,to customers cars that come in, as well as pictures of our cars on track and at drift events, lots of cool stuff essentially! So check back hear now and then for updates. lets get the ball rolling with a euro spec e36 coupe...

Roddy's e36 came in to chizfab as a relatively stock 318is last month and after a few days@chizfab we had the car dropped on coilovers, flared the arches all round to suit the staggered bbs wheels and fitted an m52b28 to oem specification. The awesome GT rear wing and ACS carbon front lip were roddy's own additions and im a huge fan!

The 2.8 engine is currently stock bar the s50 exhaust manifold, altho i believe roddy intends to build a hybrid m52 with m3 head and m50 inlet along with a chizfab stainless steel centre section exhaust (more on those soon!!) all in all a really nice e36 coupe in great condition and a good way to start the shop blog!