Car Enthusiast: Part 1.
Oct. 20, 2013Car Enthusiast: Part 1.
If you have ever talked to me or know anything about me, you’d know that i have a passion for cars. It may also be apparent if you have ever talked to me for a decent amount of time that it is difficult for me not to bring up cars into a conversation when that might not even be the topic. Do you wanna know why this is? I am a car enthusiast. I eat, breathe, live, and sleep cars. These articles are a series on my journey through motor fandom.
It all started when i was a child. My father was also into modifying vehicles whether it be cars, trucks, and even street bikes. He was always tinkering with something so naturally i grew up in that scene. On the weekends, he would take me to car shows, car exhibits, and the best place in the world at the time, the drag strip. There is nothing better than being inside a car that is built with an insane amount of horsepower. Being around cars all the time had something to do with how i am now, but the main change came when i rode in a car that ran a quarter mile in 10 seconds.
Being in a car like that is out of this world. To the untrained eye, you wouldn’t think it was that special of a car. Sitting in the parking lot of a grocery store you would imagine it just being your everyday A to B commuter. But when it starts, you can feel it shake the ground beneath you. You can feel the horsepower rushing through your chest. You can smell the the race gas giving life to the beast under the hood. Judging by the sound of the motor roaring, you sort of feel bad for the asphalt seeing as it’s gonna be ripped to shreds shortly.
You pull up to the lights and wait for them to turn green. Before they do, the monster under the hood gets even louder. It turns into a banshee and screams at the top of it’s lungs. You start to get butterflys in your stomach knowing that in a couple seconds, you will be flying down the strip at a very high rate of speed. Right before the lights change, the butterflies get worse. Almost to the point you’re gonna be sick. And then it happens. The light turns green. It’s on now.
The asphalt thrashing horsepower is now put on the ground. The insane amount of torque is let loose and it’s almost like you get punched in the chest. You immediately get pushed back into your seat and are pinned there for the duration. All you can see is the world moving past you. You get an adrenaline rush that makes your heart pump like crazy. And all of this happens in 10 seconds. By the time it’s starts, it’s over in a blink. And that’s what ultimately made me how i am today.
As of right now, i really am not into cars packed with crazy horsepower. I soon realized it’s not just about the horsepower. Sure, all of that is fun but i had found something totally different that caught my eye in a major way. This is what we call today, the “Stance” scene.
The stance scene isn’t all about what horsepower you make. Sure, all of us like doing mods to our motor to make them faster. That’s a given. But it’s more about how the car looks. Basically, how many necks can you break when driving down the road. It’s also about self expression. What can you do to the car to express your personality.
The stance scene is pretty new. I’m sure you’re asking “What is stance?” Stance is basically how your car sits. How mean does it look. The main point of stance is lowering the car. Some people put them on coil overs. Coil overs are just aftermarket suspension that have adjustable ride height and depending on what you get, you can also change damper control. Damper is how stiff or soft your springs are which has a lot to do with how smooth your car will ride going down the street.Another thing people put on their car is called air ride or what most of us call, bags. Lowering your car doesn’t just make it lookbetter and get rid of the horrid wheel gap, but if you’re into the race scene you’ll do better times. Coil overs tend to be stiffer so when on the track you can take turns hard without as much body roll with the help of sway bars.
If you go with the coilovers, it’s much harder to adjust your suspension because you have to get under the car and manually adjust the ride height. With bags, all you need to do is press a button and the bags will adjust to your liking. Some people go so low it’s hard to get over speed bumps, which is why some people use bags. Another main part of the stance scene, is your choice of wheels.
Lowering the car on a nice set of wheels is crucial. After all, the wheels are gonna stand out more than the low. And without low, the wheels will look bad with the monster truck stance, as we call it. Some people even go as far as spending $2,000+ on 1 wheel. You read that right. $2,000 for 1 wheel. That’s $8,000 for a set of wheels. But you get what you pay for. If you drive your car hard and didn’t spend the money on a good brand of wheels you have a chance of blowing apart your wheels from even accidentally hitting a curb. Which you don’t wanna do because that will hurt. After you have the low, and the wheels what a lot of people will do is put on some Aero parts.
Aero parts is for Aerodynamics. Plus they look really good. You may say “Well, it’s not like you’re driving a race car.” Well, if you have aftermarket suspension and you’re low (which i said before will help with drag) and have expensive wheels you can count on to not break in the middle of a lap, you might as well put some aero on your car and take it to the track. Aero also helps cut the air and in turn helps with drag.
Aero parts consist of different parts, but the main parts being called splitters. As you can tell by the name, they split the air for less drag. Splitters can be on the front and the back and usually cover a lot of underneath of the car to provide good aerodynamics. It’s basically a big flat surface for the air to travel over, instead of traveling through your bay and over all the parts under your car.
Spoilers are also for aero purposes. Spoilers also provide downforce to keep your wheels planted to the ground when taking turns to make sure the power you’re putting down doesn’t cause you to over steer or under steer. Spoilers have also been a very controversial topic in the car scene. FWD cars seem to get a lot of flack by having big flashy spoilers on the back of their cars because people thin you don’t need it on FWD cars. This is a false assumption because if you’ve ever taken a FWD car around a turn at a high rate of speed you would know your back end will slide out, just as a RWD would. But, that topic is for another day.
Now that you know a little bit more about the car scene maybe you won’t shrug off modded cars as much. I’ll be making articles for people to better understand what goes on in our heads when we dump our entire bank account in our vehicles. It’s not just a hobby, it’s a lifestyle. Stay tuned for part 2.
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Leet
Cars are an important aspect of life nowadays.I’m not much of a car-lover, but I can see you have a passion for it.
Well done and hopefully more of these enthousiastic articles from you, sir!
RACEKORʕ ·ᴥ·ʔ
Nice article, was looking forward to this one. Good to see a different perspective.
Epic motor showdown! Who will convince us of what to buy! Pierre or Leet. More at 11.
Both!
Aye Aye. Both of course. And that’s because the only thing they share is that they have an engine. LOL
Nice article!I did my share of trackdays using cars as well, namely a couple of Toyota Celica T20, a Nissan 350Z, and an Audi S3 🙂
Track days are a lot of fun. After i’m done with my car it will most likely be a local track beast. 😛
Awesome. The track is where it’s at (same goes for bikes). What’s your ride?
Nice article Leet! 🙂
Yep, no showdown! They are very different adrenaline beasts of fun. Oh, yeah! 😀
No M5 pics?!!?!! this is madness!
M3>
Also this is just part 1. I don’t know what i’ll do with the rest. Maybe cover all different builds and such.
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