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Sneak Peek: Mike Essa and GSR Autosport’s E46 Build
By Khiem Dinh
Khiem Dinh is an engineer for Honeywell Turbo Technologies at the time of this writing. All statements and opinions expressed by Khiem Dinh are solely those of Khiem Dinh and not reflective of Honeywell Turbo Technologies.
“She may not look like much, but she’s got it where it counts, kid.” That’s what Han Solo told me at least. To be fair, the crew at GSR Autosport only has the car halfway built. But what she’s showing so far has potential! Let’s check out the new goodies on the new chassis.
Before we get to the new car, let’s go on a quick stroll down memory lane with Essa’s two previous drift cars.
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| The old E92 M3 with the 500hp M5 engine swap. This car is being repurposed as a road racing machine sporting some massive slicks. |
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| Last year’s Z4 with the boosted S54 engine. We had a close-up look at this car showing all the goods a while back. |
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| This is the old engine setup in the Z4. |
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| Onto the new setup in the new chassis! The biggest difference is going from the low-mount turbo setup to the high-mount setup. The S54 engine was built by GSR Autosport with Carillo rods and CP pistons. |
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| The turbine housing is a new Garrett V-band divided (twin-scroll) turbine housing. To ease the job for fabricators, a Garrett merge collector that accepts tubes adapts to the v-band divided turbine inlet flange geometry of the turbine housing. |
