Product Spotlight
Macht Schnell Anodized Battery Tray
There's no arguing that street cars just keep getting heavier. So if you like to hit the track with your also-street-driven vehicle and enjoy seeing ever-increasing returns on your lap times, one of the easiest and most cost effective ways to do so is by reducing weight. Short of tearing out your back seat, there are a couple key areas you can look at to quickly shed mass and improve ETs.
If you drive a BMW, one of those areas is the factory battery, sunk into the spare tire well at the bottom of the trunk (or what used to be the spare well if you drive a Bimmer equipped with run-flat tires). By using a lightweight battery you can instantly lose upwards of 50 pounds. Of course, using a smaller racing battery will necessitate strapping it down in some way-a loose battery inside the trunk is not a good fix, whether it's loose on the street or on the track.
Macht Schnell has an ideal solution, this anodized billet battery tray. It's designed to accommodate eight different models of "no weight" Braille batteries, from the 11.5-pound B14115 to the 21-pound B3121.
You sort of have to hold it in your hands to really appreciate this piece; it's built like the proverbial tank, with both longevity and corrosion resistance in mind. It is digitally CAD-designed down to the old-school Macht Schnell logo etched into the holder brace. Based on the digital schematics, which are fed into a Dimension 768 "3D printer" prototyping machine, a three-dimensional prototype is built from thin air (albeit in plastic) for inspection.
When the design is finally approved for mass production, said production begins in earnest. Only then is the piece CNC machined to the exact determined specs; 6061-T6 aerospace aluminum is the order of the day, of course. This is then black anodized for additional strength and wear resistance. The only parts not CNC machined or black anodized are the fastener bits, which are of the corrosion resistant class 10.9 variety.
The result is an ultra-tough (and admittedly slick-looking) tray and brace assembly whose overall footprint matches the exact physical dimensions of the OEM battery. The tray itself weighs about 2.5 pounds, which definitely lends it a satisfying, hefty tactile feel... you don't want to drop this thing on your foot. But combine it with an 11-and-a-half-pound battery and you've reduced the overall weight of your electrical power source to a mere 14 pounds.
This is an ideal upgrade for the grassroots racer who also frequently drives the same car to work. The top-mounted terminal indicator can be easily reversed for left/right positive terminals. And if you don't like the thought of using a race battery on the street, or if the car needs to sit for a spell, the whole assembly can be easily swapped out for the O.E. battery in minutes. The tray can be applied to any 2006 and newer E90/92/93 3 Series (including the M3), as well as the 2008 and newer 1 Series. -Karl Funke
Macht Schnell
866.797.0484
machtschnell.com