The JSC Speed crew headed out to the Specialty Equipment Manufacturer Association (SEMA) annual convention which was held October 31 through November 3 at the Las Vegas Convention Center. This show was huge, lots of cars, lots of parts, and even more people. We saw a few innovative new products from Perrin, Turbo XS, APS Cobb and SPEC. While the sport compact crowd was well represented with the STis and Evos, the Fit and Yaris had to be the most popular import car at the show. Since the theme at SEMA this year was "40 Years of American Muscle," it seemed appropriate that every booth had a Mustang with some level of customization, and Ford easily had the largest and consistently most crowded booth.
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| There were a ton of nicely modded cars on display both inside the center and outside on the property. There were also some very, let's just call them "unique" cars. Michelin tire had a great display with the worlds fastest cars (too bad they put them up out of reach...I guess that's fitting, though).
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| Faster than a.. |
wait, wrong superhero |
Hey, hey, we're the Monkees! |
Pretty? in Pink |
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| Mclaren F1 |
Pagnini Zonda F Roadster |
Bugatti Veyron |
Caparo T1 |
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| Brembo's Ferrari F430 |
Razo bought a cubic zirconium mine |
Super hot Citroen hot rod |
Hotwheels inspired GTO |
A couple of the most popular cars at the show were the Pontiac Solstice and the Saturn Sky. There weren't a huge number of them, but there was always a crowd around the one that there were. The Solstice GXP was very nice looking, though I was disappointed in th lack of foot room which would make it harder to heal-toe.
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| A nicely modded Solstice |
Another sharp Solstice |
Pontiac's Solstice GXP |
The GXP interior |
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| The Z0K Solstice is |
a factory built race car. |
Sky with Lambo doors |
A hot rod Sky |
While I'm talking about the new GM pocket rockets, here are the V8 monsters from Cadillac and Chevy. There was also a nicely built classic Caddy with Cherry Bomb pipes on the side, I'd rock it. |
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| Corvette C6R |
Stoptech's show piece |
Cadillac CTS-V R |
Cherry Bomb Caddy |
Ford's booth was huge (also housing the miniscule Volvo display). Ford was really pushing the Mustang, and like I said earlier, the Mustang was everywhere. I'm a big fan of the car, but won't bore you guys with a ton of pictures here. There were four very cool hot rodders for toddlers too (my kind of toys for tykes). Ford also had a big presence outside in the Motor Trend Proving Ground. On Wednesday there was a Continental Tire test drive featuring the Ford Shelby GT-H Hertz rental car (which I rented for a day while in Florida just before SEMA) and a Porsche Carrera 4S and on Thursday there was a ride along in Champ Car Mustang pace cars driven by some insanely cool women. |
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| Shelby GT (sans wing!)Drool. |
Fast ride along! Video below. |
Now that's an intake! |
Volvo's C30 heavily modded by Evolve |
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| Smooth as a babies bottom |
A Deuce fit for a kid |
Runt rod, er I mean Rat rod |
Child safe fire |
OK. I've given you the quick tour of some of the things you don't come to JSC Speed for, now onto the imports and the cars we all are interested in. Second to the Mustang for most popular car to have on display was the Honda Fit. This new sub-compact was everywhere. The Honda area was covered with modded Fits, I only included one from the booth that was my favorite. Outside on the concourse there was an insane Fit with a K20 swap that I would have loved to have heard fire up. Honda had the new Civic Si sedan on display, with an example by Hasport which was very clean, and their own in-house modifier Mugen that was shown in one of the most awesome color blues I have ever seen. AEM also was showing a very shard Civic Si coupe in their booth. |
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| Great color combo on this Fit |
This say's "K20 Power"... |
but this says "Step Back"... |
ITBs on a K20! |
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| Injen's Fit |
PowerNeo Fit |
Mugen Si sedan |
Hasport Si Sedan |
The Rally cars were out in full force, too. Subaru was showing off their racing presence with the X-Games car and the Phoenix/Inner City Youth SCCA Club car in addition to a couple of drag cars. The not-yet-in-production but hopefully soon-to-be Forester "STi" was a huge hit. Cobb had their beat-up looking time attack car in their booth where they are extremely proud to be talking about the soon-to-be-released next generation AccessPORT. Perrin was showing off their STi and the Legacy GT with all sorts of new goodies. Other notable Subbies where at Cusco, Seibon (which was showing off an incredible new one-direction weave that we hope makes it to production), Garrett, Exedy, NGK and Bare used the STi (and girls--like six of them)to promote their booth. |
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| Pastrana's X-Game car |
Phoenix/ICY STi |
SPT Drag car |
Small external waste gate |
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| Subaru: Sell this in the US! |
SPT Forester |
STi Limited |
The lone WRX wagon at the show |
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| Cobb's track battered STI |
Perrin STi |
Perrin's STi engine bay |
Perrin LGT bay |
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| Cusco/Nukabe STi |
Garrett STi |
Exedy STi |
NRG STi |
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| Seibon STi |
Seibon STi deck lid |
NGK STi |
One of the Bare (nearly naked) ladies |
APS didn't have any full cars on display, but what they had was sexy. Lots of twin turbo kits for several different powerplants all out for the world to see. The WRX and STI kits are superbly built and we can't wait to get our hands on them. |
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| 2.5L w/TMIC |
2.5L w/TMIC |
2.5L w/FMIC |
2.5L w/FMIC |
Even though the Evo 8 is on its way out, this rally inspired favorite was out in force at SEMA. We saw quite a few very clean examples, including the Cusco/Nukabe Time Attack car that we ran against at Summit Point last summer.
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| Cusco/Nukabe TA Evo 8 |
A cleanly modded Evo |
ACT brought an Evo too |
The Greddy Evo was a rolling parts display |
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| Robbie Spec's SCC Tuner Challenge entry, |
complete with a fresh engine and tune up? |
I don't know who Tool is, but |
I love their logo (and car too). |
I was a little surprised that there weren't a bazillion examples of Mazda's MazdaSpeed3 out on the floor (maybe next year?). This car promises to be an exellent performer and we're hoping the aftermarket and tuner community takes this beast and runs (fast and far)! I know Cobb is already working on an AccessPORT to get the most out of the 2.3L DFI turboed power plant, and I'm sure there will be other parts from myriad different manufacturers too! More self indugance: The Mk V VW GTi. I really like the way this new "small" hatchback looks with a little work. VW had their GTiR in the VW booth, along with a concept Rabbit they are affectionalty calling Thunder Bunny, which I really like. Autobahn Designs also had a GTI on display and the dirty style paint and big front mount looked really good.
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| Cooper Tires worked Mazda3 |
MazdaSpeed3 looks good in red |
The MS3's tiny turbo |
MS3 chasis and drivetrain |
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| MazdaSpeed MX-5 |
Mazda's LeMans prototype race car |
VW GTI-R concept, looks great |
ABD VW GTI, looking good too |
There were a pretty good number of Toyota Yaris on display tying to compete with the Honda Fit, though I didn't see quite as many performance modded Yarii as I did suped-up Fits. Of course there were a few Supras and even a sharp (er,I mean Panasonic), Camry pace car. Toyota also had an off-road demonstation course in front of the convention center where you could drive the FJ over some nice sized obstacles. Besides the dirty FJs there were a few nice and clean customized road going FJs on display. |
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| Clean and simple Yaris hatch |
Do you think this Yaris is FI? |
Love the blue wheels and red stoppers |
The only Yaris coupe at SEMA looked good |
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| Kaminari's booth featured this yaris, |
and it looked very good. |
One of a few cars in Tein's |
booth was this slick Yaris |
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| Camry pace car |
ARK Supra |
BRS's manly hot pink Supra |
Top Secret Supra |
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| FJ in its element |
Yes, it bottoms out, but it makes it |
Custom FJ,the Canyon Carver |
sportin'sharp American Racing mags |
Toyota's Scion brand cars had a decent showing, though it would have been nice for them to have the new xB on display instead of the lifted drum kit car. There were a few nice looking tCs through out the show, but it seems there is only one aftermarket hood available?! |
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| Love the 20 spoke wheels! |
Clean and white tC |
tC with a nice widebody kit |
AEM's drag tC |
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Nissan and Infiniti had a good representaion of cars too. Though, surprisingly Nissan didn't have a booth and there wasn't a single Versa on display (that I noticed). The 350Z and G35 are probably doing their Swan Song with both due to be replaced and the GT-R coming in 2007. Regardless, the ones that were there were looking good. |
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| Car and Driver's 350Z |
You know this Z never overheats |
At least the G35 is hot |
Widebodied G35 looking sharp |
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| Tein 240,just sexy |
RB26 with a little turbo on the side |
Mine's Skyline GTR |
Skyline GTRs were never meant to have 20" chrome |
