It’s been just over 12 hours of laborious driving to get here, but here we are. Heading along the Route Napoleon the altitude starts to climb, the glorious and lush valleys giving way to the first sight of those imposing grey coloured mountains. My Motorola Walkie Talkie crackles in to life through my ear piece. But the dulcet tones are not of one my fellow drivers this time round. No, this time round it’s something altogether more soothing and which puts an immediate grin across my face, someone’s playing Matt Monro’s “On days like these”. Of course, Matt’s only allowed to sing a few lines before the cheering and laughing comes across the air waves. We’ve finally made it to The Alps.
That opening scene of the I969 film The Italian Job is as memorable for that charming song as it is for the fast rate at which the sunglass wearing driver is turning the black leather wrapped steering wheel, the sonorous V12 of the Lamborghini Miura making a wonderous if all to brief an appearance before the song takes centre stage. There may not be any Lamborghini Miura’s with us today, but there certainly is a lot of steering wheel turning going on right now, and my M3’s V8 is screaming up ahead to keep me entertained and bright eyed. Welcome to the 2021 Turn&ClipiT Alps Drive.
The fact that we’ve made it to The Alps at all is a minor miracle. Expectations of a COVID quarantine on our return home along with the cost of 2-day and 8-day testing, plus advanced PCR testing before we depart and whatever other tests we have had to book and plan, made it touch and go whether we would all be able to make it. But just weeks before our looming end of August departure, the driving Gods shone on us as the British Government lightened the ever-baffling rules in our favour. And it’s just as well they did. Lockdown has given all of us far too much idle time to spend thinking about our cars and what we’d like to do with them. And so here are we are months later, with virtually every car having been finely fettled and modified to provide the very best driving experience for its owner, it’s like 2020 and 2021 have turned in to a Munich badged automotive arms race!
And what better proving ground to try our modifications out than the French and Swiss Alps, and the Napoleon Route as our warm up. Over the next 5 days we have a number of carefully planned routes mapped out to give our cars the ultimate test drive. Every day will be a dark o’clock early start, the only way to get these awesome driving roads clear enough to enjoy ourselves properly, and all stitched together with tactical high RON fuel and Coffee stops. On our route will be some of the best driving roads known to man, not least the Col de la Bonnet, the Col du Mont-Cenis, the Grimsel Pass, the Furka Pass and the Susten Pass. Bring it on.
The Cars and their Modifications
So, to the stars of the show, our cars. Amongst us we have a wonderful mix of Munich’s finest as well as a V8 tearaway from Blackpool; 1M, M2 Competition, M240i, E46 M3, TVR Chimaera 500, E60 M5, Z4M and my E90 M3. With such a variety of cars, no two the same, the modifications made to enhance the drivability, and reliability all differed, although suspension was a popular upgrade.
Starting with the Valencia Orange 1M. The changes here with such a great and rare base car, are very subtle and as much focused on improved reliability and robustness, as any significant gain in driving dynamics. To improve oil cooling for that Turbo Charged Straight Six N54 engine, a beautifully finished Mosselmann Thermostat is fitted, cutting in 20 degC lower than the OEM version. Also, the OEM Plastic Charge Pipe has been dispatched, and a new Cobb aluminium version put in its place, improving both air flow and reliability. And lastly, the ride, which can be a little spikey on the limit, has been addressed by the fitment of Bilstein B6 Dampers and Pilot Sport 4S’s. With no change to the OEM ride height, these B6 units fitted by Balance Motor Sport / Works really add a level of subtlety in the ride which brings enhanced confidence at the limit.
For the M2 Competition painted in Hockenheim Silver, which is a pretty lairy beast out of the factory, well, this has been taken to another level after a visit to the folks at Litchfield Motors. Often the OEM suspension is criticised for being over damped, so this particular example, that is only just the right side of its running in service, has had the highly rated Litchfield / Bilstein M2 kit fitted. Based off the Bilstein B16 PSS10 design, this kit has bespoke valving offering far better ride comfort in addition to providing better body control, making it much more fun and predictable at the limit. And the way this M2 was able to smear its sticky Michelin Pilot Super Sports out of every corner certainly suggested the modification was living up to expectation.
The M240i has had more overall upgrades than any other car here, which has turned it in to an animal of a motor, but an animal that retains all of the right kit to keep it stuck to the Alpine tarmac. Suspension and Limited Slip Differential were fitted by Kevin Bird (Birds), so this means their bespoke valved Bilstein based B Series Sports Suspension and Quaife LSD. Whilst stronger Ferodo DS2500 and high temp ATE Dot 4 brake fluid help in the stopping department, which is needed, because under the bonnet that unburstable B58 straight six has received Litchfield’s Stage 2 Engine remap upgrade, taking power to 450hp and torque to 440 lbft, all exiting through a rather lairy Carbon Fibre tipped full Remus exhaust system.
The E46 M3, arguably the best-looking car here with its near perfect proportions and painted as it is in Laguna Seca Blue has a Straight Six exhaust sound to die for, fitted as it is with a full Eisenmann exhaust system; never has that sonorous S54 sounded so great and it becomes a pleasure to follow up the Passes. Keeping everything firmly on the black top is a set of Koni Sport dampers and H&R Springs, Turner anti-roll bars and rear camber arms. In addition, Powerflex front lollipop bushes and rear top mounts are fitted. Tweaked for fast road, this set up really suits the M3 and has been developed well by Koni, and it shows in the corners, with body roll kept well in check.
The E60 M5, “The Boss” as it’s known to us all, never ceases to impress on our organised Turn&ClipiT drives. For a car that weighs the wrong side of 1800Kg, the way it can be hustled along is a true testament to the team that originally designed and built it. No significant modifications here, other than some wheel spacers which really fill the wheel arches nicely and some new Pilots Sport 4S’s out back. And with the rod bearing shells recently being replaced, the performance of the engine can be fully used without its owner worrying of impending doom. Although, like all of the naturally aspirated cars on the trip, the high altitude does squeeze the V10’s lungs on the higher climbs.
The TVR Chimaera 500 is without doubt one of the loudest cars on the planet. I swear that people were jumping out of their skins in Paris when the car was started every morning from the other side of France; it’s an absolute beast. With it’s 5 litre Rover sourced V8 pushing out 300hp+ and a lot of low-down torque, sticky TOYO Proxes tyres and only 1,100Kg to drag along, the car was brilliant through and out of the corners. The main modification following its recent rebuild and paint was to switch from its leaking AST dampers to a new Bilstein set up; the main benefit reported being an improved ride plushness and a little more role, but grip was strong.
The Z4M looks totally standard and unassuming in its Silver-Grey Metallic paint, but it’s anything but. Lockdown led to this car getting some serious modifications to aid both robustness, driveability and performance. Chassis wise the car has been fitted with Strong Strut braces under the bonnet and at the rear, making a surprisingly stiff chassis even stiffer. On each corner, AST’s 5100 Coil Overs have been fitted by Balance Motor Sport / Works offering epic cornering performance; keeping the car extremely flat yet enabling an initial plushness which really lets you know where the car is grip wise. Brakes wise, Performance Friction pads and high temp Dot 4 have been added to OEM Calipers, whilst an epic sound is created from the Carbon Fibre Eventuri intake.
And last, my V8 engined E90 M3. For a long time, I kept this car to factory spec, not wanting to tweak and ruin what is an extremely well set up chassis with strong performance out of the box. But now at 11 years old, and with its role as my daily driver being semi-retired, the i3S taking that city car / family role, and my fast road driving demands evolving, it was time to make some subtle improvements. The most significant and costly change was the fitting by Balance Motor Sport / Works of the Öhlins Road and Track suspension. This was a big decision for me as it also meant that I would be deleting the Electronic Damper Control fitted as an option to the car when new. But and this was an important “but”, when pushing on our driving trips, I was really struggling to find that happy medium between the Comfort, Normal and Sport settings. Comfort felt too soft, Normal and Sport just too jiggly, and meaning I was losing grip and the associated confidence at the adhesion limit.
After reading and re-reading an old Evo magazine article on fitting Öhlins to an E92 M3, and after talking with Julian at Balance Motor Sport / Works, the Öhlins became the obvious choice combined with a Bilstein EDC delete kit. Best of all, the Evo article went through a whole bunch of different set-ups, settling on fast road set up which I have emulated, and so far, and I’ve tried, cannot beat. In addition, the steering wheel has been wrapped in Alcantara by the folks at Royal Steering Wheels, with the only other changes being service items; Pagid RSL19 brake pads all round, ATE High Temp Dot 4 brake fluid and a BMC Air filter. Perfect tweaks for driving around the Alps.
Driving
Over the five days, the scenery that accompanied our driving was breath taking, travelling through the valley towards Valberg in France on our second day, and standing on top of the Col de la Bonet at 2,800 meters were particular highlights for the group. But there was little time to take in the breath-taking landscape as we often left our hotel in the darkness. Temperatures during the trip were as low as 2.5degC at the Grimsel Pass Hotel one morning, and remember this was August, and as high 29degC in the lowlands. Rain, sleet, dense fog and sunshine, we had it all, but generally the conditions were perfect for fast road driving.
We all had our favourite drives and passes. The Grimsel and Furka passes were obviously right up there for us all. Both had really technical switchback sections which rewarded strong braking on entry for a clean line, clipping the apex and fast exit. And going down them was even more fun than going up them. The view of the lakes on the way down the Grimsel Pass being one of our favourite vistas, although the brakes on my M3 took an absolute pounding and grumbled for a little while afterwards, although perhaps satisfyingly, very little brake fade was reported across the group.
My personal favourite was the Susten Pass. It was longer than any of the other drives we did and the mixture of driving through the valley to get to the base of the tighter climbing sections were more flowing high-speed elements presented themselves, to the blind switch backs as we carved our way up the mountain, it was just fabulous, a real test for both the drivers and cars alike. And there is immense satisfaction when it all comes together around the hairpins. Being in the right gear with the right entry speed, and then being just a little greedy on the throttle on the way out to kick the back end out in a little drift and then stepping on the throttle, rinsing every last horsepower from my oxygen starved normally aspirated V8 engine, before reaching the braking zone for that next corner; Brake, turn, accelerate repeat. Truly great driving fun.
Best of all, there was generally enough space to overtake safely when the need arose on the Susten, tightest sections aside, and being less popular perhaps than the Grimsel and Furka, made more fun of the driving time we had available to us. Of course, as soon as it reaches 9am everything slows down as the cyclists and the camper vans, or mobile chicanes as they became known, flock to see the stunning views afforded by the altitude. Then it’s time to unwind and just take in that stunning vista.
Getting time away from family and commitments to indulge in such an awesome experience is not easy and, I suppose the thank you for this article really should go to those that we left at home. But the thank you also needs to go to all of those that took part in this Turn&ClipiT 2021 Alps driving experience.
During each day we looked out and trusted each other’s driving, over taking and WAZE/Mapout skills (for the most part), the self-preservation society if you will. And in the evening, we shared our stories and driving experiences. We ate Schnitzel with Risotto (who knew that was a thing?), and convincing ourselves, if not everyone else, that our Man Maths inspired car modifications were outstanding choices that had proven themselves well and worth every penny. And needless to say, they all were.
