BMW Show at Santa Pod 2014

A week has flown by since Players 8.0 and brings us to the BMW show at Santa Pod. It has been 4 years since members of the PBMW Forum and Custom Cars have attended this show. This show has clashed with Players and the last attendance back in 2010 leaving a little to be desired, Players has been heavily favoured for variety, volume, trade stands and general vibe and atmosphere.

This year things are little different with the show date being moved and not having presence for the last few years it was a good time to attend and finish off the year.

For those that don't know Santa Pod hosts a drag strip for those wanting to test their 1/4 mile times or earn drift points with their dedicated drift area.

First started 9 years ago, the show was quite big, well received and had many forum clubs attending the show. The last few years haven't seen big numbers and has gone down a bit of a downward trend, partly due to show clash, lower numbers and has had disappointing comments and reviews as a whole within the BM community. With an unusually warm late September day this year did appear to have a better turnout even with the increased ticket entry price.

In attendance were Custom Cars, E30 Zone, M3Cutters, BMWForums.info amongst others displaying various BMW's models.

Mike known as Mykez on E46 Zone owns this E46 and recently installed his air suspension setup, with classic BBS wheels it was sitting pretty at the show.

Tates E92 M3 was looking good as ever in the show and shine area.

This Imola Red E46 M3 was simple but effective with a perfect drop on Rota wheels.

It was good to see some classic BM's on show and this E21 was nicely done.

Dips from Custom Cars M3 was very well received at the show and with a new addition to the car sitting on a set of rare fully polished 18" BBS RC wheels. Going an inch down in wheel size has given it even more lows and with a nice bit of camber it attracted many admirers throughout the day. Look out soon for a PBMWForum feature blog.

The E60 M5 is an impressive machine and although some may not like the Chris Bangle styling of the car it still looks good and doesn't really need much. With the right choice of mods however and it can change to something a bit more eye catching like this Interlagos Blue example. Featuring custom Iforged 3 piece wheels, a CSL-esque custom bootlid amongst other trick styling it looked visually impressive.

Throughout the day various BMW's were testing out the strip from stock cars modified to full on dedicated drag racing cars including the infamous Santa Pod jet engined race car.

There was also a show and shine area with trophies up for grabs with PBMW Forum regular Kos who also runs C-Unit http://www.c-unit.uk.com/ winning best retro car with his stunning E24 635i. A congratulations to Kos for a thoroughly deserved win.

The show had some decent cars on display with reasonably priced food that was available on the day. However I do have some reservations about the longevity of the show. Trade stands were lacking and £18 entry is quite steep when you compare similar ones throughout the year like the BMW festival at Gaydon or the Uxbridge Auto Show which provide better value for money then what this particular show has to offer.

Although moving the date is a welcome change and perhaps has helped with getting some numbers back for the show, the organisers behind this should consider dropping the price down. Cars make shows and having spaces filled will likely bring back people to the show. At £18 I can't see many returning next year and a bit more variety with the trade stands wouldn't go amiss either. With a few tweaks this show could once again be the show to attend in the BM calender.

Picture coverage from the show can be found on our forum, www.pbmwforum.com and our Facebook page, www.facebook.com/pbmwforum

Picture credits goes to Aaron Smith and Cameron Dpraser.

Players 8.0 at North Weald Airfield

The annual Players Show has been running for a number of years. Players 8.0 is hosted at the North Weald airfield in Essex bringing in a huge variety of cars with all tastes and styles catered for.

As was expected there were queues to enter the venue early in the morning. We arrived around 8.15am and didn't get into the grounds till nearly an hour later. This I hope is something that the guys at Players can hopefully address for next year by getting cars into the show a bit quicker.

With this show there is no real sort of forum or club stands where you request a spot for X amount of spaces so it is just come in together as a group and park up in a spot. As the grounds are big there is no shortage of space and you can pretty much rock up and have your car on show.

Custom Cars were in attendance and had got a very good spot near the front with a wide range of BM's.

This E36 owned by Kash had a new addition sporting the classic timeless and sought after Hartge Design C splits and looked every bit perfect with them on.

This drop top M3 owned by Elkerimo looked on point with its AC Schnitzer type 2's. Measuring at a whopping 12x18 and a cheeky poke it looked epic.

Tej's Santorini E30 M3 featured in Performance BMW magazine was looking graceful as ever and those Type 1 AC Schnitzer splits make this car.

The infamous 6 owned by Kos from C-Unit made its much welcomed appearance after a long lay off and was good to see it back on the road.

Dips from Custom Cars bagged E46 M3, recently added a new front splitter giving a more aggressive look and finishes off the front end so well.

Shaun's E92 is always impressive and recently changed his wheels to these beauties.

Taking a stroll through the concrete area there were a huge number of cars but they were a little too cramped and bunched together which meant you couldn't really properly appreciate looking at these cars. Trying to take a decent photo was not easy to do and looked more like a car park then a proper display of cars.

Onto the hangers there were some great cars displaying on show like these ones below. Only gripe being the cars that were placed at the back rows either side were hard to see and again anyone trying to take a decent photo would have encountered difficulties.

This Polo was recently resprayed by Dips from Custom Cars and looked visually stunning.

This E28 took the centre of the hanger and rightfully so, pure class.

It was good to finally see the Players widebody art car on display. A car you need to appreciate to see in the flesh.

This particular VW was certainly something else. "Pipey McGraw" who previously owned the Performance BMW magazine featured slammed E46 M3 with Fluid Motor Union stacks now owns and has extensively modified this pretty unique car. Literally slammed on a VW Beetle chassis and MK1 Golf body with a rear mounted rotary engine it got a large amount of attention.

Nicks E30 M3 on form as always.

All in all aside from the few things mentioned which I hope Players will sort for next year it was a very good day out. With plenty of cars on display and decent trade stands it certainly is a show to put in the calendar for next year.

Picture coverage from the show can be found on our forum, www.pbmwforum.com and our Facebook page, www.facebook.com/pbmwforum

Also check out our Instagram and follow us @pbmwforum