The Road to Abu Dhabi Part One - Mission Impossible

The Road to Abu Dhabi Part One - Mission Impossible
By Mike Kojima

A few weeks ago Formula D Team Falken ace Dai Yoshihara got an invitation to participate in a Formula D expansion event in none other than exotic Abu Dhabi the capital city of the United Arab Emirates.  The event will be held at the World Class Yas Marina Circuit, a world class F-1 approved facility on February 25th 2011.

The supercharger kit was hopelessly outclassed for a Pro Drift Competition.  It also put a lot of weight far over the front end.

The old HKS supercharger kit, although a very nice kit for a mild streetable boost of about 40 whp was not anywhere close to the power needed for Pro Drifting.  It was replaced by a GTI Technical Innovatons modified Jim Wolf Technology twin turbo kit.

Dai prefers the feel of either a tightly shimmed two way LSD diff or a spool so lacking time to procure an LSD we opted to weld the spider gears in a stock R200 differential to turn it into a spool.

The 350Z is all deconstructed and read for the conversion to begin.  The only thing we will be keeping is the mocked up Baller Bolts oil cooler.

The idea of taking part in an event in such an exciting part of the world at a top motorsports facility and getting paid for it all was very intriguing.  Some of the other Formula D pros that were participating were Tanner Foust, Fredric Aasbo, Chris Forsberg, Darren McNamara, Ryan Tuerck, Mike Essa and Mad Mike Whiddett.

Burns Stainless provided the mandrel bent aluminum tubing to fabricate the charge piping from.

Burns Stainless also provided the 304 stainless tubing, U bends and V-Band clamps needed to fabricate the exhaust system.  We decided to go with 3" downpipes going into a 4" single exhaust for minimal weight.

V-band clamps were used at many points to make the exhaust fast to disassemble for easy track side maintenance.

Burns also supplied these specialty 304 stainless parts to build a really trick exhaust system.  Oval shaped piping for tight areas around the rear end, a merged collector for bringing the down pipes together, 3" to 4" transitions for the downpipes, O2 sensor bungs and 4" round to oval transitions.  These parts make fabricating an elaborate exhaust system much easier.

Look at the smooth internal transitions of the Burns Collector, metal art!