Bobby Young (in the beanie)...
Bobby Young (in the beanie) and Matt "The Face" Drouin (under the car) of CP Racing put an estimated 50 hours into the installation of STS's Universal kit ($3,150) that features a rear-mount, Garrett 67mm turbocharger. The installation, on Doug Van Den Brink's '99 GT, was only the second project of its kind, so many of the system's tubing and bracket components were designed and fabricated from scratch using materials provided in the Universal kit.
"How can I get my car's picture in the magazine?" Or, more specifically, "What do I have to do to get my car featured in 5.0 Mustang & Super Fords?" These are just two examples of the million-dollar question asked of magazine editors. If we had a buck for each time we've been asked that by every proud 'Stangfreak we've encountered throughout the country, we'd be living like rock stars by now.
While this isn't a how-to on getting mag exposure, the information and photos might trigger an idea and hopefully put you on a path toward having your 'Stang splashed across these pages. It's a fact that time marches on and nothing stays the same. So we definitely welcome info on new cars and Mustang technology to help keep our ship afloat. Keep that in mind as you check out the 35th Anniversary Mustang GT featured here.
During our trip to the '05 SEMA show we got our first in-person look at a turbocharger mounted at the back of a Mustang. As a matter of fact, Squires Turbo Systems of Orem, Utah, showed us twin turbos at the rear flanks of a brand new '05 GT. We were definitely surprised and impressed by the sight, especially when we found out how much power they made. While SEMA put an exclamation point on the statement "2005 was the year of the new Mustang," our diabolical minds wondered more about the possibility of setting up an earlier (any year other than '05) Mustang with a remote-mount turbo system at the rear of the car, not the front/engine compartment. Enter Doug Van Den Brink and his '99 drift Mustang GT.
Doug was also at SEMA and was equally impressed with the STS setup for S197s. Doug is an up-and-coming privateer who competes on the SCCA's Formula Drift drifting circuit with his own hard-earned dough, and he isn't heavily sponsored like some of his competitors. He explained his plight of trying to keep the tires blazing with style-using a mostly stock and underpowered 'Stang-to STS-owner Rick Squires. Rick listened and offered to help Doug's cause with the setup you see here: a remote-mount, single-turbo system for a '99-'04 Mustang.
We got a tip about the union made between the drifter-an applicable moniker for 32-year-old Doug, as he's competed and won in several different forms of auto racing since age 7 before catching the drifting bug in 2004-and the radical turbo company and their venture together into relatively unknown Mustang territory (Dave Martis owns the first SN-95 car to receive STS's rear-mount turbo). So we hustled down to the heart of NASCAR, where we caught up with Doug and his adopted family at CP Racing as they finished the installation and performed the tell-all dyno tests on this unique setup.
 Due to the near-zero ground...  Due to the near-zero ground clearance of Doug's Mustang, this section of 211/42-inch tubing for the Active custom intercooler is routed through the passenger side of the 'Stang's interior. Formula Drift's rules require cars to have a passenger seat, so OMP seat brackets are used to create enough room for the turbo-to-cooler pipe to pass through and allow for the seat to be bolted in. |  Because of the rapid, lateral...  Because of the rapid, lateral changes a drift car undergoes during competition, a rigid chassis is one of its most important components. Bobby used steel plate and a ton of reinforcement welding around the entire area where the intercooler tube exits through the firewall (including the inner fender). This compensates for the factory firewall material that was removed for the tubing and prevents excessive flex in the front subframe when the car is being thrashed from side to side. |  This aluminum-block mod motor...  This aluminum-block mod motor still carries stock-as-a-rock cast crank and pistons, and untouched Two-Valve heads and camshafts. Other principal components of the engine include a Fox Lake P-51 intake manifold and fuel rails, a Dragon Performance 75mm throttle body, Aeromotive fuel pumps and regulator, Ford Racing Performance Parts 42-lb/hr injectors, a CT BA-2800 Big Air 90mm mass air meter (with BBK's cold-air inlet tube from the meter to the throttle body), JBA headers, and Dr. Gas exhaust tubing. |