The 2024 SEMA Show is now lower than three months away. As all the time, we’re looking forward to seeing what recent builds will turn up on the Las Vegas Convention Center.
At SEMA 2013, a Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG immediately piqued our interest – and for good reason. The supercharged and wide-bodied Speedconcepts SLS wasn’t only a showfloor looker – it had loads of performance to back it up, having been built to compete in One Lap of America. For this week’s throwback post, let’s revisit Mike Garrett and Larry Chen’s feature from 2014…
2014 Feature
I spend a whole lot of my day fascinated about cars. Probably way greater than is healthy. In fact I could be forgiven as cars are my profession, however it still looks like I often spend the whole day with automobiles driving through my mind. Quite a lot of the times it’s fascinated about a feature I’m trying to jot down or a story I’m attempting to chase. Other times it’s scheming about parts and plans for my very own project cars.
Perhaps it’s because I’m so busy fascinated about other things, but I haven’t had much time these days to truly dream about cars. You already know, just throw out all the true world limitations and fantasize concerning the cars we’d wish to own and drive.
And as rare as those moments may be lately for me, it’s all the time great fun to simply lay back and take into consideration what we might drive if money was no object. While you throw the financial factor out the window, it’s natural that your mind will wander to supercars and exotics. They’re in any case, the last word type of automotive fantasy for many individuals.
So on this fantasy world, what sort of automobile would you wish to hop into? A Ferrari? A McLaren? Lamborghini? Perhaps something modest like a Porsche? It’s a fun but difficult alternative isn’t it?
While it’s likely unimaginable to narrow things right down to a single automobile, the one model that I keep coming back to is the Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG. It may not be on the highest of most individuals’s exotic automobile lists, but there’s something concerning the SLS that just presses the precise buttons for me.
For something you will drive day-after-day, the SLS just seems so right. It looks exotic, but not too exotic as to cause spectator pile-ups all over the place you go. It’s got all the posh goodies you’d expect from a top-of-the-line-Mercedes, and all of the horsepower you might want.
But most of all, I feel there’s just something that sets the SLS other than other cars in its class. Whether it’s those iconic gullwing doors or that classic long hood, short deck body design, it’s a straightforward automobile to dream about.
So yes, the SLS is a quick, unique and well-rounded automobile – one I’d be ecstatic to have in my very own garage. But what about relating to modifications? When a automobile is so impressive from the factory, improving it with aftermarket parts can grow to be quite a challenge.
That’s what brings me to the Speedconcepts SLS, which we had the pleasure of shooting on the 2013 Optima Ultimate Street Automobile Shootout following the 2013 SEMA Show. Let this serve for instance of the right way to take a automobile that’s already rattling good and make it higher.
Speedconcepts is a full service race and fabrication shop situated in Milwaukee, Wisconsin that works with all matter of high performance vehicles, including the Nissan GT-R. It was with a modified GT-R that Speedconcepts competed within the famed One Lap of America – an eight day endurance event that spans a number of the USA’s top race tracks.
For the 2013 One Lap event, Speedconcepts’ Todd Treffert decided he would do something different and compete along with his 2012 SLS AMG. With the times to the event counting down, the stock SLS was transformed into the automobile you see here in only eight weeks.
Easily probably the most dramatic change on the automobile is the widebody kit, which was designed and constructed entirely by Ty from Speedconcepts throughout the span of those two short months.
The kit draws a whole lot of inspiration from the SLS GT3 race cars, with the front fenders being an inch wider than stock and the rear fenders being two inches wider. The one parts of the body that weren’t altered were those famous gullwing doors.
The result could be very much something that appears like a rather toned-down race automobile, and it’s incredible to think that the entire kit was built from the bottom up in just two months.
But as you almost certainly know, One Lap of America is just not a contest of which automobile looks the very best, it’s about performance and the widebody conversion would only be one a part of the automobile’s transformation.
Under the hood, the fellows treated the double overhead cam V8 to a supercharger kit from Mercedes blower specialists Kleeman in Denmark.
Together with an identical Kleeman exhaust system, the Speedconcepts SLS is now putting down nearly 800 horsepower, which is the right jump from the already impressive stock output.
Beneath the automobile, the team installed a set of KW Clubsport three-way adjustable shocks together with a custom air suspension kit that permits the automobile to be dropped by as much as two inches during track days.
Filling up the aggressive bodywork are a set of Forgeline GA1R wheels, 20×11-inch within the front and 20×12-inch within the rear with 305/30R20 and 335/35R20 Michelin tires respectively.
Because the automobile could be seeing loads of hard driving, the factory seats were removed in favor of Sparco fixed-back buckets with SCHROTH Racing harnesses and harness bar.
Amazingly, the race-ready Sparcos look very at home within the matching red interior and help the cockpit keep a fantastic balance of each function and luxury.
While the automobile was accomplished just in time for the 2013 One Lap event, there was unfortunately no time for track testing before the massive show began. For this reason, last yr’s event essentially became a shakedown for the automobile.
By the second to last day, the SLS was running seventh overall, but an off-course tour at Virginia International Raceway damaged the front fascia, oil cooler and popped a tire. For Speedconcepts the event was over.
Next got here the 2013 SEMA Show and the Ultimate Street Automobile Challenge that followed.
Together with his track experience within the automobile still limited, Todd placed the SLS in twelfth position of 60 total competitors throughout the USCC.
It wasn’t a foul result by any means, but Todd says with more track time a podium finish needs to be inside easy reach.
So what’s next for the automobile now? For now, the plan is to return to the One Lap of America in 2014 with the automobile fully dialed in and able to attack – with a podium finish being the clear goal.
After that, the automobile will live a comparatively easy life in Florida where it should function Todd’s each day driver and likewise because the occasional track day weapon.
Todd says the automobile itself is nice to go, with no future modifications planned. He just wants more track time so he can get comfortable extracting every little bit of potential from the SLS.
With race automobile looks, race automobile performance and all the identical style and sophistication that makes the SLS AMG such a special machine, I’d say Speedconcepts has truly set the right example of the right way to modify a dream automobile.
Mike Garrett
Instagram: japanifornia
Photos by Larry Chen
Instagram: larry_chen_foto
This Article First Appeared At www.speedhunters.com
