Abarth 500

[Lagerlout]

Hi all, his name is Spike and he has the following spec:

G-Tech - GP/R 1.5

Engine rebored to 1500cc
G-Tech Roller bearing Turbo
9.4:1 Forged pistons
Cryo treated, balanced & polished conrods
Larger fuel injectors
Two larger intercoolers
Silicone boost tubes
Sports air filter
Exhaust system straight through no silencers, 200 cell sports cat
Replacement fuel pressure regulator
Custom G-Tech ECU
Stronger clutch
Single Mass Flywheel
Iridium Spark Plugs
Custom ground camshafts
Ported Cylinder Head
Exhaust temperature gauge
Quaife LSD
Brembo 4 piston brake system with 305mm front brake discs
KW Variant 3 coilovers

288 hp / 299 ft lbs torque





Next step is a cage, OMP seats, harnesses and for the summer a grippier wheel/tyre combo.

Should have some vids up on Youtube soon.

[Lagerlout]

To answer some of the questions, best I've had out of it is 55 mpg and I averaged 52.5mpg over 150 miles on a run across France. It's done a 1000 miles at 43 mpg so far. I'll post up a pic of that 52.5mpg run. It's pretty astounding economy but if you're off the turbo it's a lightweight car with a 1.5l engine!

As for torque steer - it has none - none whatsoever. The only time I experience any is when the front tyres lose grip in the conditions we've got at the moment. Before the bad weather set in I could use full power everywhere and absolutely no torque steer. The Quaife LSD seems to do a magnificent job. By comparison a Golf GTI / GT TD torque steers all over the shop.

The wheels do look shopped in that picture but I can assure you it's how it is. I think the KW coilovers make the wheels really fill the arches now so it gives that impression.

As for the engine bay, not much point in a photo, it looks almost standard. G-Tech modify the car to get compliant under TuV so even the cat bodies are retained, but a 200 cel core is put in place of the original core. It's a really tidy professional job. Will take a pic soon anyway and post it up so you can see the differences. You can see the bigger turbo but not a lot else is visible.

Edited by Lagerlout on Tuesday 12th January 20:39

[Lagerlout]

Thanks for all the comments everyone. Yes, it really doesn't have any discernable torque steer at full boost and I realise that is pretty unbelievable but it's true. I'm not an engineer, but also remember this is about 400kg lighter than an RS so maybe that has something to do with it, or as someone else has mentioned the physical design might be the issue. I own and have owned a lot of performance cars so know what torque steer is. I was fully expecting it to be a torque steer monster but it isn't and I can't explain why either. I will ask G-Tech why they think that is, perhaps they will know more.

As for cost, it costs more than an RS to put together, around £28k so far. Sure I could have bought an RS but it is not my cup of tea at all and as I said on another thread, this makes me chuckle. No one expects this little thing to go like it does but in my book if a car makes you giggle like a little kid it's a good 'un.

To answer one of the questions boost is a touch under 1.8 bar. EGT doesn't go higher than 900 deg even after a hard run. That's lower than stock temps.

I'm thinking of ditching the stickers to make it even more stealth but that will come behind the other mods I'm making as I'm intending on tracking it this summer.

Edited by Lagerlout on Wednesday 13th January 10:53

Edited by Lagerlout on Wednesday 13th January 10:55

[Lagerlout]

Some more pics..

Edited by Lagerlout on Wednesday 13th January 11:09

[Lagerlout]

I live near Goodwood so will probably be at a number of the Breakfast Club meets this year or on the track for track days.

[Lagerlout]

Well, it should theoretically get to 60mph in 4.7 seconds and to 100 in 10.8. Will check that out when the roads aren't covered in snow. I'm predicting low 5's to 60mph as traction will probably preclude any massive standing starts. I'm going to take it to the Pod at some point this year too.

[Lagerlout]

There are various figures bandied about but I think 1035 KG is the figure I see most. Once I've dropped the factory seats for some OMP shell seats, the rear seats and a few other items I think the car will be comfortably sub 1000 KG.

[Lagerlout]

Sure, it's here but it's perpetually under contruction. Had some problems with the web designer apparently.

http://www.g-techgmbh.de/

They post videos up on YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/user/GTECHGMBH

I have price lists and such, they do kits from about £500 upwards from memory.

Edited by Lagerlout on Wednesday 13th January 16:40

[Lagerlout]

The also do the engine tuning for these guys:

http://www.arden.de/aade/index.php?language_id=2

Had a ride in an XKR convertible that they had tuned, 160mph down the Autobahn with one of us sideways across the back seats! lol

[Lagerlout]

Will try and turn up for a run for sure.

If anyone wants more info on the conversion this thread has all the info:

http://www.abarthforum.co.uk/500-abarth-tuning/sta...

[Lagerlout]

Dyno run

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFKL7rw-cWo

[Lagerlout]

Thanks for all the positive comments, will try and answer a few of the questions.

I've measured the mileage a couple of times manually and the numbers are very close to the mpg computer. The figures shown are best case on a 150 mile run on the french motorways at a pretty constant 60mph so this should not be unexpected considering off boost its a little 1.5l. I was knackered on a trip back from germany so unlikely to see these numbers again. The car has averaged 42 mpg since then and I think this is accurate as the roads I drive on to work and back only allow pretty much a 50mph cruise.

Yes am definitely going to go to the pod this year so will drop you a line. That mini looks a right beast! Cost yes was including the car at approx £15.5k. Still spending more on it with seats, rollcage and harnesses. Its worth the money to me because its a lot more fun than other similarly priced cars I've owned before.

I got the brakes direct from gtech who did all of the mods to date except for the kw var 3 which I got from west tuning.

You can get brembos in the uk from pulce racing who is starting to supply tuning parts here in the uk. They also run one of the assetto corse cars.

Hth LL

[Lagerlout]

Hi everyone, thanks for the comments. Since the first posts I've had it on three dynos so far Maha & Dyno Dynamics and had figures from 250 bhp to 290 bhp. It averages c. 270 bhp.

We have actually identified a big bottleneck in the air intake. The car produces it's best numbers with no air filter so we're working on one that doesn't affect the performance (which has resulted in lower number BHP). The car was baselined on the same dyno with same parameters and it has increased in BHP by around 120-130 bhp. I use that more than the RR figures which as usual are pretty inaccurate and vary wildly depending on where you go.

Here's a few more photos. I've had the interior partially stripped and fitted 996 GT3 Carbon buckets, 6 point Willans harness, approved half cage, OZ allegerita wheels and Toyo R1R tyres and also had the complete Asseto Corse bonnet and intake fitted. This is actually a massive restriction but boy does it sound incredible. So we're building a custom airbox at the moment to solve that problem.

The wheels and tyres go great with the KW V3 coilovers and the now much lower seating position. Handling is bloody fantastic now, I keep trying to remember not to push tooo hard as these little things can swap ends quite spectacularly... lol Can't wait for next summer as this is now pretty much my track only car.

I also have a F355 and I have to say I'm selling it, the Abarth is absolutley hysterical and even more fun!!

[Lagerlout]

Yes, it is tiny. Would you believe that is what the race cars are running? They are only pushing 200 bhp but this must still be borderline.

I want to use the NACA duct and yes, water ingress is an issue for me as my road floods in the winter. We're going to try and put a BMC cylindrical filter under the bonnet as a first step and if that doesn't work we're going to get a Carbon company to fabricate something up.

The surface area of this filter is almost five times smaller than the standard car! Mental.

[Lagerlout]

Looks a little bit chav for the moment until it's properly connected to the NACA duct, but on the same dyno in Germany with the standard racing car setup the car was producing 265 bhp, with no filter at all it was producing 285 bhp and now with the large BMC CDA inline airbox it's producing 305 bhp..

I may have to swap the duct to the other side of the bonnet to get a clean install or work out some solid pipes across the head and feed back to the duct as installed now. Either way, I collect the car on Thursday and have a long drive across Germany & France where I hope to see what top speed pegs at....

[Lagerlout]

williamssam said:

Lovely, any performance figures for it?

Not yet, I'm gagging to get it to the Pod but with it almost always being worked on and now with Winter coming that might have to wait until next year. I hope performance is in the 5's to 60 and 11's to 100 mph.

Yes, the NACA duct and vent are Assetto Corse parts off the Trofeo Abarth race cars. So authentic, but I agree would prefer not to have them if it wasn't for the big problem with these little cars and thats getting cold air into the intake.

This is really the only way apart from going via the fog lamps at the bottom of the grill which I'm going to be using for brake ducts.

The day running lamps (below headlamps) are not an option as you can't get from them into the engine bay. So a louvered bonnet is the only option. Another thing the "exhaust" vent on the RHS absolutely pours the heat out, I've heard tell that the car's running temp is massively above what it shows on the dials. A bit of Fiat jiggery pokery!

[Lagerlout]

Just about hit top speed on the way back from Germany yesterday. Managed 152 mph GPS verified with another few hundred rpm left. I would say 155 is absolute top speed. Very stable at that speed too. Lack of any aero starts hitting the car at about 140+ mph.

[Lagerlout]

Thanks again all. Had some interesting runs on the dyno in Germany. Car gets 305 bhp on their dyno with the BMC filter straight out from the turbo. 20 bhp more than no filter at all. However, when you put it in the mounting position it suddenly drops down to 280. So the two bends really screw with the performance. There is literally nowhere else to mount the filter.

Anyone got any suggestions as to how the losses could be minimised? I'm probably going to mount it as shown and go across the engine bay and out near the shock mounts to pick up a cold air feed with no water issues. It's a shame as I'd love to use the NACA duct. I might still do that by getting a custom air box made.

Ideal solution I think would be to mount the filter to the left of the turbo and go out through the wing for cold air. Would have to take the A/C out to do that though and butcher the inner wing, so maybe not!!

[Lagerlout]

Oh, can anyone recommend a company to make a quality equal length exhaust header in South ish preferably Sussex/Hampshire area?

[Lagerlout]

rufusruffcutt said:

Lagerlout said:

Just about hit top speed on the way back from Germany yesterday. Managed 152 mph GPS verified with another few hundred rpm left. I would say 155 is absolute top speed. Very stable at that speed too. Lack of any aero starts hitting the car at about 140+ mph.

Interesting, i'd read somewhere that they'd done quite a lot of wind tunnel work with this car, I think you've just proved it!

Aside from the LSD is the rest of the gearbox standard?

Keep up the good work

Hiya, yes the box is standard apart from the Quaife LSD. It has a single mass lightweight flywheel and a paddle style clutch but the box itself is standard. I haven't exactly beaten on the car so far, but the car has handled normal style driving and high speed runs ok "so far".

I'm going to modify the final drive as I don't need the top speed of the car living here and I want to keep the big turbo on the boil all the time. On top of that the valve springs need to be replaced with some that will let me rev higher. The redline is a really low 6,300 rpm at the moment. This little engine should be able to rev way past that with a few small mods.