For years Hotchkis Performance has been a leader in aftermarket performance suspension setups for a variety of vehicles across the automotive spectrum. While on a recent trip to Southern California, I stopped by their Santa Fe Springs headquarters and met with Mark Rossetti to get an inside look at how Hotchkis produces their performance suspension components.

Hotchkis recently moved into their current facility, bringing multiple facets under one room in an effort to improve productivity.

When I first walked in I was greeted by this beautiful Porsche 962 owned by the companies founder John Hotchkis. If you’ve never had the chance of meeting me, know that I am a Porsche fanatic so seeing this gem front and center was a nice surprise.

To Support a 962 vintage race car requires many spares, as these cars are still raced in many vintage series throughout the world such spares become increasingly sparse. Stockpiled behind a locked gate were crates full of everything imaginable for the car, including a spare tub!

In front of the wall of spare parts was a complete spare engine,these turbocharged 3.2L engines make approximately 740hp an incredible feet in 1986 for endurance racing. It was amazing to see how much modern technology was used on these power plants, including carbon fiber shrouding, something I can’t imagine the cost of in the mid 80s.

When I got back to Florida, this gem of a video was waiting in my email inbox, it’s an in car camera view from the Hotchkis Porsche 962 with John Hotchkis behind the wheel.

GTP: Hotchkis Porsche 962 In-Car, Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca from GrandTouringPrototype.com on Vimeo.

I’m still drooling on the vintage Porsche Race cars, but back to the tour. In the back corner of the shop is a huge R&D area where test vehicles have prototypes produced and fitted. Most cars are then torture tested and re-checked before any product is sent into final production.

There were many great displays showing off the brands products for various vehicle and applications.

Their warehouse was filled to the brim with product ready to be shipped out to anxious customers, and a staff ready and willing to make sure that happens as efficiently as possible.

The Hotchkis Performance E-Max 1970 Challenger in the parking lot is used to test and demonstrate the companies commitment to the muscle car market. Their suspension systems have been designed and manufactured to give muscle car owners twenty first century handling without the need to hack up their vintage chassis.

I want to thank the whole team at Hotchkis for taking the time to show me around their facility, Titan Motorsports is a leading distributor of Hotchkis Performance Products and can supply you with any of their premium components, from Modern Muscle to European car and everything in between.

During a recent trip to my hometown of Punta Gorda, I took a few hours to checkout a new attraction generating some buzz, Muscle Car City. Over the past 40 years.Rick Treworgy had assembled one of the largest private collections of cars. After running out of space at various warehouses the cars were scattered across, he decided to purchase an abandoned Walmart and bring his collection into the public eye, and Muscle Car City was born. The collection includes at least one Corvette from 1954-1975, these aren’t run of the mill Vettes either,most are equipped with 427s, manual transmissions and other rare options. The collection isn’t limited to just Corvettes, there are plenty of other 60-70s GM products, assorted hot rods, modern muscle, and even some retro rods sporting modern creature comforts while maintaing a vintage look. If you’re an automotive fan visiting Southwest Florida I suggest blocking off a few hours to check out this one of a kind collection, it’s worth every bit of the $12.50 admission fee.

For More Information or directions : http://www.musclecarcity.net

Yesterday I had the pleasure of checking out the amazing supercars at the Forza Collezione. I had previously been to the gallery when the space was known as Luxautica and used for private and charity events, however those days are now gone and the space has been turned into a private office with the amazing collection of cars off limits to the public. Thanks to my good friend Jon for inviting me over to experience and photograph some of the worlds finest cars all assembled under one roof.

This weekend we traveled to Rockingham, NC for the ADRL race. One of the benefits of racing all over the country is the ability to visit other shops in the local area. Our wholesale department is one of our largest divisions, we supply many key components and parts to other tuners and often work to create custom solutions to parts problems for their lineup. This trip we decided to check out Underground Racing in Charlotte, NC about 80 miles away from Rockingham.

Underground Racing is known for producing the fastest street Vipers in the country and have recently begun producing twin turbo kits for the Ford GT and Lamborghinis. The quality of their work is impeccable and they run a great operation in Charlotte, NC. After seeing what they’ve done in the Viper market, I’m sure they are likely to succeed in the Exotic arena as well. We look forward to working with them on future projects.

I would also like to thank Kevin and Casey for allowing us to tour their shop and use a lift to PPI our 996TT project. We look forward to working with Underground on future projects and wish them much success.

On our way to race ADRL in Martin Michigan, we made a stop to a few metal foundries. The foundries have an ability to manufacture raw parts from your prints or design/modify prints in their engineering departments. Even when you provide your own specifications the foundries in-house engineering departments run a battery of test’s prior to “pouring metal” which allows maximum quality control through the entire development process.

Once a part has been fully designed and engineered, it is poured in the foundry before going to the machine shop. All casting patterns are developed in-house. In conjunction with 3-D solidification software, castings are produced using CNC to yield the tightest tolerances.

Aluminum and steel castings ensure consistent results from every pour. For more intricate parts or those where finish is paramount without machining, there are Lost Wax and other casting options.

Once cast pieces are verified, any parts that require finish work are moved to a state-of-the-art machine shop. All machining for castings or parts are performed in their high-tech machine shop using all CNC to guarantee repeatable machining as well as exactness of tolerances, dimensions and finishes.