In the tuner world, there are really two kinds of cars that dominate the scene these days. There are the flamboyant drift machines with their flashy vinyl, wild body kits, and huge sideways smoke shows. These rear-wheel-drive beasts are the figure skaters of the motorsports world, trying to grab as much attention as possible with their over-the-top power slides. On the opposite end of the spectrum there are the all-business time attack machines, designed to stick to the track like glue in pursuit of the fastest lap time possible. It’s an all-go no-show approach where the only thing that matters is getting as much grip out of the car as possible.
TEIN is a company that knows all about maximizing grip, as does their American Sales and Marketing Manager Philip Chase. Having headed up several demo car builds for TEIN USA over the last five years, it was finally time for Philip to build something for himself. That’s when he picked up this ‘Apex Silver’ 2006 Mitsubishi Lancer EVO 9. The plan was to keep it very streetable with a basic suspension, wheels, exhaust and boost controller upgrade plan, since his fully built EG Civic would remain his track toy. That’s when he made the mistake of taking his EVO to a lapping day, where he discovered just how much fun this amazing AWD hooligan can be when there’s no posted speed limits in site. Maybe it happened while flying over Magic Mountain at Buttonwillow Raceway or maybe it happened on the way home from the track, but either way, Philip lost his grip on the mild street machine concept and ended up talking with TEIN R&D Engineer Katsuma Nakai about turning his EVO into a serious grip monster.
After going over his EVO’s needs with Nakai-san, who used to do race support in Japan for TEIN-sponsored race cars, a very focused strategy designed to improve handling while increasing chassis rigidity and reducing weight emerged. For starters, the plan called for a set of TEIN Super Racing dampers. These top-of-the-line shock absorbers feature double adjustable damping (for compression and rebound) and full ride height adjustability without losing any shock travel. Fixed to this CT9A’s chassis via TEIN pillowball mounts that allow camber and caster adjustment, the SuperPro polyurethane bushings provide improved suspension geometry stability compared to the softer OE bushes. Add to that a dual set of EDFC controllers and you’ve got an incredibly tunable suspension setup that has allowed Philip and the team from TEIN to dial in his EVO 9’s handling for razor-sharp turn-in response and super high mid-corner grip levels.
But as Philip and Nakai-san understand, high corner entry and mid-corner speeds can be negated by an imbalance on corner exit. To address this, Carbonetic clutch-type carbon fiber front and rear limited slip differentials have been installed, plus a retuned ACD center differential controller from T-Assist in Japan. The 1.5-way LSD’s, installed by XS Engineering at the same time as the Carbonetic twin-carbon clutch kit, provide stable and predictable traction while accelerating out of a corner by transferring power to the wheel with the most grip in a very linear fashion. This allows Philip to jump on the go-pedal earlier and more aggressively than with the stock diffs and ACD, making for higher corner exit and straight away speeds.
Since Philip still needed his Mitsu to pull street duty, a fully gutted interior with a roll cage was not an option. Instead, to reduce weight Philip removed all the interior tar and sound deadening material beneath the stock carpeting. To add chassis stiffness, Carbing front tri-point bar, 6-point lower bar, floor bars, cross bar, and 4-point trunk bar were bolted to his EVO. J-Speed fender braces were also installed, providing additional stability to the front corners of the CT9A chassis and in the process allowing it to generate more front end grip.
Of course grip is limited by the type and amount of rubber you put on the road, so Philip went with the widest and stickiest street rubber he could stuff under his EVO. Mounted on 18x9.5-inch Volk RE30’s, the lightest and strongest wheel Rays Engineering makes for production vehicles (they also make super lightweight wheels for the Williams F1 team), the 265/40-18 Falken Azenis tires fit perfectly inside the mild wide body setup consisting of Chargespeed front fenders and Voltex rear over fenders.
By David Pratte
Enjoyed this Post? Subscribe to our RSS Feed, or use your favorite social media to recommend us to friends and colleagues!