I’m Matt, 32 years young from Lincolnshire and I’ve just bought an m140 to be a second road car for us and occasional posh track car!
I’ve owned and enjoyed all sorts of cars and have a rather costly habit of modifying them. I love trackdays and try to get as many in as possible, but too many project cars and a house move have limited that a little in past couple of years. Now we’re settled again hopefully I’ll be able to get back to doing one or two a month.
One thing we should talk about early on, is my penchant for hairdresser’s cars, and by that I mean MX5s. At the moment I’m down to just 1.5 of them, but I really do enjoy driving them on track, so you’ll have to excuse my love for them and either endure or embrace any digressions in that direction in this thread!
So, the 140, what brings me here... well we very nearly leased an m135 a few years back, instead plumping for a 435d and having driven a few at that point, I was hopeful that I’d own one sooner or later. More recently we leased (and still do) an M4 and it has completely and utterly spoiled me! It has made other cars feel rather obsolete and had me REALLY wishing we could afford to own one outright and track it. Sadly as things are that’s simply not the case (though it’s always nice to have things to work towards), so enter the m140 as, to my mind at least, the closest thing we could afford, to the M4...
With a plan hatched I readied the Z4 and Clio it replaces for sale and started looking for one. Having been somewhat treated by the 435d and M4, a well specced car was a must have and I soon realised cars with everything I wanted were few and far between!
Having done my research, the plan was Adaptive Suspension, M4 LCAs, lowering springs and spacers, in order to achieve some competence on track as well as the look I desired. Given the difficulty I was having in finding the right spec car at the right money, I soon hatched another plan, forego the Adaptive for adjustable coilovers and it would open up more potential cars, whilst perhaps removing the need for LCAs and lowering springs.
With the net loosened a little I was finding more options at the sort of price I was happy to pay and eventually I found and bought a car through this forum.
My longer term plans were to add noise and power in that order once the dynamics of the car had been sorted. I fancied a nice big decat downpipe first, in order to help the turbo work with as little restriction as possible and increase the noise. If this wasn’t loud enough still, the BCS mid pipe looked ideal, whilst retaining the factory rear silencer and importantly the ability to close valves and go unnoticed!!
Of course when a car turned up with both of these already done and with a JB4 to boot, my interest was piqued!! It had the options I wanted, was a 3dr (honestly I preferred a 5dr), but had some exciting parts and to my eye looked pretty badass with lowering springs, spacers and a lip too!
Going to view the car I was fairly sure the exhaust was going to be too much for me, and having been there before I really didn’t want a droney, annoying car again. When the seller started it, the cold start was sooo loud and my heart sank, it either wasn’t to be, or work would be required to refit standard parts. Remarkably though, once the idle settled and especially once inside the car, the noise level was absolutely fine! We did an extensive test drive and at motorway speeds and just cruising about in comfort it was just lovely, quieter than the M4 I would say.
So with my fears allayed on the noise front, I’m now the proud owner of a black, 3dr m140, with too much power and quite the snarl!!
yours looks great in that pic, like a gokart I should imagine.