The end of the second day of the Import Meet Street Car Competition was broken into two categories: Build Quality/Fabrication and Car Show. A quick reference guide for the competitors can be found here.
Photos by Ryan Cutuli, Randy Montgomery, and Nick Poirier. Text by Matt Haugness.
Build/Fabrication Quality
After finishing the morning part of day two, the competition moved to Speedware Motorsports in Redmond, Washington. Here the competitor’s cars were put on lifts and judged on the quality of their build and fabricated parts. Speedware Motorsports is known for having one of the nicest shops in the Pacific Northwest and a highly skilled staff. Kelly Campbell (their service lead) has been a huge supporter of the IMSCC since the start and was happy to spend his evening judging the cars with the help of his coworker Rob Blundell.
The main areas that Kelly and Rob were looking at were cleanliness, fabrication, execution, and the overall quality of the build. They both spent about thirty minutes with the owner of each car going over every detail and modification. The intent with this category was to award points to cars that were built with a purpose in mind and executed well. Stock cars with minimal fabrication or only purchased parts were meant to be scored lower.
The lightly modified Evo, the nearly stock R35 GTR, and the 240SX had the most difficultly earning points in this category. The Evo had chassis mods and the 240SX had significant engine mods but neither car was a complete build. The Evo received 50/100 points which earned Nathan the minimum of 10 points in this category. Steve’s 240SX scored second to last with a judged score of 54/100. The judges gave Quentin’s R35 GTR 55/100 points since there were only a few areas on the judging sheet that were relevant.
The RX-7 and Civic ended up receiving the same judged score of 72/100 points. Both were well-built and contained quite a bit of fabrication but were lacking in a couple areas. Unused wiring (common on swapped vehicles) and some cleanliness issues lowered their scores. They both finished this category with 56.8 points after being converted to the IMSCC point scale.
A car that scored lower than anticipated was the R34 Skyline. Under acceleration while drag racing the night before, its catch can filled with oil which ended up spilling over into the engine bay. The judges reduced its points for cleanliness and also for execution because of this issue. It still managed to receive a respectable score of 77/100 (67.4 points) because of how well put together the rest of the car was.
Mark’s Galant was one of the oldest cars of the group and as it was being raised on the lift the judges didn’t know what to expect. They were pleasantly surprised when they got under the car. “The Galant was a very well-executed build and I have never seen a DSM anywhere close to it in terms of form, fit, and finish,” Kelly said. This was enough to put the Mark’s Galant in third place of this category with an 83/100 that earned him 80.2 points.
The Supra and the WRX both scored very well in the build/fabrication quality category and were the only cars that received over 90 points. Katie’s WRX was spotless on the underside and nearly every aspect of the car had been addressed. Her car received a final judged score of 92/100.
Stu’s Supra ended up taking first place overall for this category with a 97/100. The Garrett turbochargers in the stock housings and every other aspect of the car impressed both judges “Both Stu’s and Katie’s cars showed attention to detail, overall design/craftsmanship, and they were both very clean with no leaks or problem areas,” Kelly explained.
Stu received 110 points for build/fabrication quality and Katie received 99.4 at the end of the event.
Click here to read about how the points were determined.
Car Show
Once all of the vehicles had been judged for build/fabrication quality, it was time for a second set of judges to pick them apart. David Fotheringham and Russell Rogers (experienced judges from NWMotiv—regional car show event organizers) spent a good portion of their evening inspecting each car. Everything from how well the parts fit the theme of the car to how dirty the hoses in the engine bay were was taken into account. The main criteria they judged on was: exterior, interior/entertainment, engine, and overall. They even used their NWMotiv 320 point long form judging sheet to make sure that each car was judged in extreme detail.
This was the category that many of the competitors were concerned about since they had just spent that night before racing and the morning on the dyno. Many took the opportunity after they were done earlier in the day to clean their cars. Some didn’t and it ended up hurting them when it came to points in the car show category.
Mostly stock cars, cars with dents, and those that were dirty were impacted the most in this category. Quentin’s R35 GTR was mostly stock and ended up being lowest in terms of judged points (91/320) so he received 10 points total.
Steve’s 240SX and Nathan’s Evo performed slightly better but with both cars being mostly stock on the exterior/interior it was difficult. The 240SX had dents/minor damage which brought its score down substantially. Steve received 102/320 points (22.9 points) and Nathan received 25.2 points with a score of 104/320.
The Civic and RX-7 placed similarly in the car show category. Their lack of significant exterior mods hurt their scores compared to some of the other cars but they still performed well enough to receive a decent amount of points.
The fact that it was fully restored and modified with rare parts helped Mark’s Galant place third in the car show with 168/320 points (100.1 points). “The Galant was a refreshing display of timeless clean modifications. The owner took meticulous care to completely detail the car. It looked amazing for its age and rarity,” David explained.
Katie came prepared to the car show portion with her WRX spotless. She was also the only one to bring a display board showing off the build which earned her extra points. The judges gave her 170.5/320 points which translated to 103 IMSCC points. “Katie’s WRX checks a lot of the show “boxes”. It has some major suspension work, as well as many small touches that add to it. None of the parts on it take away from its theme. The WRX was a well-rounded show car with a ton of room to grow,” Russell said.
The first place finisher in the car show was Johnny with his R34 Skyline. The theme and the fact that nearly every aspect of the car had been touched or modified helped the car receive 176.5/320 points and the maximum of 110 points total. “The R34 Skyline had many pieces that truly set it apart from the rest. From the full engine swap to the custom fuel system to support it, the car follows many strong tuning strategies that are sought after in the community. The wheel fitment was excellent and the overall look of the vehicle was correct,” Russell explained.
Click here to read about how the points were determined.
Overall Points – End of Day Two
By the end of day two Johnny and his 2000 Nissan Skyline GT-R remained in first place but his lead was reduced to less than 30 points. Stu Hagen and his 1997 Toyota Supra placed first in build/fabrication quality and high in the car show which allowed him to stay in second place. Mark and his 1991 Mitsubishi Galant VR-4 placed very well in both of these categories and moved up to third place.
The final day two categories helped Katie Smith and her 2004 Subaru WRX significantly and she moved up from last place to sixth place.
Both sets of judges scored Nathan’s 2009 Mitsubishi Evo at the lower end of the group which ended up moving him to last place.
Previous IMSCC Result Posts:
Day One: Retail Price & Drag Racing
Day Two Part One: Peak Horsepower, Power Delivery & Ride Quality
Special Thanks to Our IMSCC Sponsors:
2 Comments
Galant VR4s are not DSMs!!!! The 91-92 Galant VR4s were imported from Japan, not like DSMs built in the US solely for the North American Market.
Such a new car, so many options for this car to look great.