Spoon Wide Blue Rearview Mirror and Carbon Cover

One of the best 'usability' mods I have in the car is a Broadway oversized rearview mirror. As per the description it is larger than the OEM mirror and simply clips over the top providing a much wider field of vision. There is one minor gripe I have with it though - being oversized; pulling down the sun visors catches the mirror.

I wanted something OEM sized that would provide a wider field of vision than OEM. Cue the Spoon wide blue mirror. It has a 14000R convex curvature to ensure a wide field of vision and in addition it has a blue coating to reduce reflective glare.

I also didn't want the mirror to be lonely, so it's now got a fetching carbon fibre coat ;)

Aero Progress

One of the mysteries in the UK tuning scene is why TGM's body shop is not as well known as it should be. They are a top class outfit and have plenty of work through the doors; with lots of amazing projects like numerous GP2 race cars and a NSX kitted out with parts from the Mclaren MP4-12C to name but a few! Willie, Tom's brother, runs the body shop and is phenomenol in what he does. Anyway, the reason I mention this is because work has started on my aero and I am blown away by the results even at this early stage (keep in mind nothing is fully fitted or painted yet) :)

Front bumper in the body shop

Rear view in the paint booth

Like the colour scheme?

J's Racing 3D GT Carbon Fibre wing

View of the J's Racing 15mm wider front fenders from the rear. No side skirts on yet.

J's Racing 15mm wdier front fenders

Mugen Spark Plug Cover

• Autoclave moulded dry carbon fibre - check
• Quality carbon weave - check
• £350 - Not on your life 
• Sensibly priced second hand item? Oh yes

A big thanks to Dotty for this superb bit of second hand parts lurking - I doff my cap.

Beatrush is here!

I've already written about the Beatrush underpanel here. However when it would actually arrive I wasn't sure, Until I woke up this morning :)

3.8kg by the way.

Progress Updates

I went down to TGM this morning to drop off my spare wheel. On approach I noticed this.

My Function7 lower control arms and rear subframe brace were on. However the F7 anti-roll bar brackets were not on yet as the oem bushes are of a different shape. Tom is sourcing aftermarket bushes that will fit though so once he gets those the brackets will be on.

I took a look at the new Koyo radiator and it's lovely even though it's hiding behind the aircon condensor. I really can't wait to see what water temps I will be getting at Snetterton in March. With the oem radiator, my running temperature is 90°C and on track it shoots up to over 110°C easily!

Koyo R-Series Competition Radiator peeking out behind the aircon condensor.

Whilst I was there I found out what brake pads Tom had chosen. I knew they would be Hawk pads but didn't know what Tom had put in. I had told Tom I wanted something aggressive as I don't drive the teg often (or fast) on the road, only fast on track. Additionally I really don't care about squeeling brakes. Squeeling brake pads scream motorsport to me instead of embaressment.

What this meant was I wanted something more than the Hawk HP Plus, which is a fast road/track day pad. I was guessing that it would be something like the HT-10, however Tom had chosen the DTC-70, Hawk's top race compound!

Hawk DTC-70 brake pad. I was surprised the backing came in red but looks awesome (I know that's not the point)

I was secretly very happy about this as I was contemplating running two sets of pads, a low dust street pad for the road and the DTC-70's for track. Afterall, changing brake pads with my calipers is stupidly quick and going halfway house with the pads given this caliper/disc set up is a cop out and was bugging me :)

The DTC-70's operate at 204-871°C (400-1600°F) and  have an extremely high torque. They are designed to have aggressive, controllable initial bite with great release and torque control characteristics. The pads are designed for race cars with high deceleration rates with or without down force.

Spare Wheel

So a while back I was faced with a conundrum. Given the huge calipers under the front wheels, it is almost guaranteed my OEM wheels will not fit over them even with hubcentric spacers. This is because the spacers will be sized for the CE28's which are wider and have a lower offset, thus giving more clearance.
So what happens if I get a front puncture? There are two immediate options for this:

1. Keep the standard spare or an OEM wheel in the boot - swap one of the rear CE28's to the front and put the OEM on the rear. However you never know where (and under what conditions) you might end up having to change a wheel; rather one than two. Additionally I would need OEM wheel nuts for that wheel as the taper seat is different (not that that is an issue).
2. Tyre Weld - I always have a couple of cans in the boot, but to be honest I have seen a friend use this first hand and I wasn't impressed. Maybe he didn't use it correctly but even if this was true, his application of it looked sensible to me and thus I would expect to simliarly fail..

There is of course a third option, which is to keep another CE28 spare wheel in the boot. For me personally, the outlay of a brand new CE28 is not worth it as they are uber expensive. But if you can find one second hand..... ;)

Progress - Nitrons

Nitrons are on. Big thanks to Dotty for the spy photos :)