Engine Swapped1990W201
I’m Nate Vincent. I run motorsport at FCP Euro.
We did not buy an Evolution II. We bought a tired 1987 190E and built the car Mercedes would have built if DTM had kept going and the parts bin had stayed open.
The engine is an M133: the 2.0 turbo out of a GLA 45. It never sat north-south from the factory and it never had an H-pattern. We turned it lengthways, put a 716.6 six-speed out of our W204 C300 race car behind it, and sent it to a limited-slip out back. MoTeC runs the show. The first time it went around our own lot I thought: this idea is not stupid.
The skin is replica Evo II aero and a DTM livery. Underneath it is W204 C63 corners, a BMW rack, C63 Brembos, a cage, a Sparco seat. Display wheels are 19-inch Rotiforms. The ones that actually get heat in them are 18s.
It is a tribute. It is also a parts-bin argument: the W201 still takes a modern AMG heart if you are willing to cut. Nine months. A thousand hours. Then Watkins Glen, Lime Rock, Gingerman.
I wanted people to look at a 190 and think they could still go racing in one.
-Nate Vincent, FCP Euro
Your car belongs in this registry. 372 of the 500 founding files are still open, numbered in order of intake.
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Dec 2022 (The list) Driving it at the limit told us what it needs: anti-roll bars, a thermostat for cold and hot days, the variable-flow oil pump programmed through the MoTeC, work on the steering, and some rubber in the driveline and exhaust mounts so it is easier to live with. Unfinished, but running, driving and fast.
22 Dec 2022 (Shakedown) First proper test at the FCP Euro Proving Grounds at Lime Rock on a cold December day. Tape over part of the grille to get the oversized radiator up to temperature. Antilag crackle and turbo flutter across an empty park. Once the fluids were warm Nate started putting in quick laps.
Dec 2022 (Dyno) New throttle body fitted. Nate drove it onto the trailer on the base map and we took it to The Shop CT, where Karim tuned it on the rollers. It left with a near-flat torque curve and power building in a straight line to redline. Peak power was never the target in a car this light with a short diff. It also has antilag, which the Cosworth cars never did.
Nov 2022 (First fire) The harness arrived just before the car went to AAPEX. Back in Connecticut, Karim, Nate and Cory Calvin checked every pin with a multimeter and a repinning tool. Fuel and brake lines went in underneath. We filled it with race fuel left over from the GT4s and Karim loaded a base map into the MoTeC over TeamViewer. It cranked: the starter we moved, turning a flywheel we had made, through a hole we cut in the bellhousing. It would not fire. Plugs out, fuel present, vacuum leaks sealed, connectors repinned. Then someone spotted the tired throttle body snapping open and slamming shut. Nate feathered the pedal and it lit. A screwdriver held the throttle open long enough to keep it running while a new throttle body was on order.
Oct 2022 (Waiting on the harness) Karim came back to plan the harness install and fit the PCM. We made some adjustments front and rear on the suspension and subframes. Once the harness is in, it needs the engine and fluids. First start pencilled in for the end of October.
Sep 2022 (Oil and plumbing) Even with an M274 pan and pickup, the pickup touched the bottom of the pan. The oil pump on the transverse engines sits lower. We had a custom pickup made on the OEM flange. Nate ran AN fuel lines back to the cell and deleted the M133 PCV system, with breathers going straight to the Radium catch can. The OS Giken diff went into its W203 housing, and custom axles pair W203 inner CV joints with W201 shafts.
Aug 2022 (Circuit Legends) We rolled it off the trailer at Lime Rock on Thursday evening, finished on the outside for the first time. It sat at the mouth of A Paddock all weekend for the first GRIDLIFE Circuit Legends. At Sunday's FCP Euro Sunday Motoring meet we pushed it out onto the Sam Posey Straight at sunrise. Next time it goes out there, it drives. Episode 1 of the Golden Era series went live the same weekend.
14 Aug 2022 (Five days) The car came back from paint on the night of 14 August, white inside and out with the Evo II kit fitted. Reveal on Thursday. The list: front and rear glass, dyed black interior panels, an engine refresh and a stand to show the engine and gearbox, the suspension properly assembled, C63 brakes on all four corners, ride height set for the Rotiforms. RabidWraps put on the 8380 Laboratories livery in Schaeffler colors while we built the rear subframe for the last time and made brackets for the rear calipers.
Summer 2022 (Body and block) The Evo II widebody from Vuik Motorsports needed fiberglass work to fit, and the steel fenders behind it were cut back for tire clearance. JPC built an exhaust that exits on the opposite side to the factory one and the charge piping to the rotated turbo. The engine came back to Milford for new ignition parts and a fresh cooling system. Then the starter: its factory position does not work with the engine turned and a manual bellhousing. We cut a section out of the block so the starter can reach the flywheel and mounted it with longer bolts and reinforcing collars.
Summer 2022 (Cage) Before the car left Milford we stripped it close to bare metal: dry ice for the sound deadening, door cards and headliner out, and Nate welded a plate over the sunroof. The weld-in cage came from overseas and JPC had to cut and splice it to fit. Bars tie the front and rear strut towers into the cage, which stiffens the shell and gives the C63 rear dampers a proper mount. With Nate's floor plate for the Tilton box in, JPC set the seating position: Sparco Circuit II seat and bracket, Sparco harnesses, and the column moved to bring the R325 wheel into reach.
Summer 2022 (Wheels) Rotiform recommended their R113, a six-spoke, with custom sizing and drilling to clear the C63 brakes. Painted gold. Square 18x9 fitment on Kumho Ecsta V730 tires.
Summer 2022 (Rolling chassis) E90 M3 inner tie rods extend the E46 rack and thread into the C63 outer rods. The C63 knuckles also bring a bolt-in Schaeffler hub bearing in place of the old press-fit one, and the rear got fresh Schaeffler bearings. The upright tank behind the rear seat came out. We cut the spare wheel well for a Radium fuel cell and Nate welded a frame with captured nuts so the cell drops in after bodywork. Karim of KARS Engineering started working through the factory M133 loom to build a harness from scratch. Old wheels off the C300 went on and the car went on a trailer to JPC Fabrication in Pennsylvania for the cage and exhaust.
Spring 2022 (Rear axle and driveshaft) The 190E 2.6 diff in the car had the same 3.27 ratio as the 2.3-16, but no limited-slip and not enough strength for the M133's torque. We went to a W203 C240 diff: stronger, and still short at 3.46. OS Giken's Super Lock internals fit the W203 housing with some work on the axles. The two-piece Mercedes driveshaft was replaced by a one-piece carbon shaft from The Driveshaft Shop, with custom discs for the three-bolt flanges at each end. A thicker rear anti-roll bar went on too.
Spring 2022 (Flywheel, clutch, shifter) The single-mass flywheel from the C300 race car had a different bolt pattern and extra parts for W204 electronics we did not need. AASCO made us a new single-mass flywheel and supplied their Rally twin-disc clutch. A welded plate hard-mounts the tail of the gearbox to the tunnel. Later 716.6 boxes use two solid shift arms instead of a cable and a rod, so we made our own arms running to a hard-mounted Coolerworx shifter. As far as we know this is the first M133 mounted lengthways with a manual gearbox.
Spring 2022 (Intake and intercooler) SwoopsBuilt machined two parts for us. A 90-degree adapter keeps the stock intake manifold and points the M276 throttle body at the intercooler. A shorter billet oil filler neck lets the hood close. The factory neck is part of the PCV system, so the billet piece takes factory gaskets and has a fitting that vents to a Radium catch can. The factory air-to-water intercooler is gone. A DO88 core made for a Volvo C30 sits on brackets above the radiator, behind the grille, boxed in so the air goes through the cores, a trick from our TCR GTIs.
Spring 2022 (Engine in, crossmember out) An M274 oil pan bought some room under the engine, but the front crossmember still had to go to get the M133 low enough. The steering box and center link went with it, replaced by the E46 M3 rack and an E90 steering shaft. Turned lengthways, the M133 needed its plumbing reworked: a weld-on extension on the thermostat housing turns the coolant toward the radiator, and an adapter plate rotates the stock twin-scroll turbo 180 degrees so the cold side faces forward. Nate welded a front engine mount that bolts to the face of the block and ties into both frame rails. It solid-mounts the engine, braces the chassis we had just cut, and lets the drivetrain come out quickly.
Early 2022 (Brakes) C63 hubs mean C63 brakes: six-piston fixed front calipers on 360 mm discs, a straight bolt-on. No ABS, as in period. A floor-mounted Tilton pedal box gives the driver more feel and let us size up the master cylinder. Custom brackets put C63 calipers on the factory 190E rear knuckles as well. The 190 weighs about half what a C63 does, so these brakes have plenty in hand.
Early 2022 (Front suspension) A W201 runs its front spring beside the strut, sitting between the lower arm and a bucket in the body. We wanted a true coilover. The front now runs the same Bilstein Clubsport coilovers as our C300 race car, on W204 C63 knuckles and hubs. The C63 knuckle puts the steering pickup at the front, and with the crossmember and steering box coming out anyway, an E46 M3 rack lines up with it. Deleting the spring bucket freed enough room in the wheel well for C63 brakes. The rear keeps the factory multilink with Ground Control adjustable arms and Garagistic aluminum subframe bushings.
Early 2022 (Gearbox) We looked at a straight-cut dogbox and at keeping the AMG dual-clutch. We wanted the car usable on the street too, so it had to be a manual. Overseas parts diagrams showed an M274 W205 with a factory manual, which suggested the M270-based M133 shared the bellhousing pattern. We pulled the 716.6 six-speed out of our W204 C300 endurance car and tried it. Near enough a straight bolt-up. The 716.6 also came in W203s, SLKs and the Crossfire, so spares are easy to find.
Late 2021 (Why the M133) The DTM M102s were built to win a few races and then be rebuilt. We wanted the same character with pump fuel and parts we keep on our own shelves. The M133 is a 2.0 turbo four with forged internals and a big turbo: about 375 hp at 6,000 rpm and 350 lb-ft from 2,250. The road-going Evo II made 235 hp at 7,200. Yes, it breaks the old rulebook on displacement and induction. We know. Cosworth took a plain M102 and made it breathe. AMG did the same to the M270. Same job, thirty years apart.
Late 2021 (The ingredients) Nate tracked down a rust-free 190E in Rhode Island that had lived most of its life in California, so the floors and sills were clean. Danny found a GLA 45 AMG being parted out in New York. That gave us both halves of the idea: a W201 shell and an M133.
Late 2021 (The idea) I did not want another Cosworth tribute with the original four. I wanted a 190 that used what Mercedes actually learned after DTM ended. Buy a tired shell. Put a modern AMG four in it the way the 1992 cars used a four: for the front axle, not for nostalgia. Facebook. A 190E. We brought it home.
Late 2021 (The vision) DTM was won in the back room. Mercedes, BMW, Ford engineers sitting up after the shop had gone home, working the edge of the rules and sometimes through them. Engines that lasted a handful of races. Geometry nobody had put on a street shell before. That is the era. Not the wing. The war room. We thought: take that brief, give it a modern heart, and do the late nights here in Milford. Old 1987 190E. M133 out of a GLA 45. Six-speed 716.6. C63 corners and brakes. Help from the ancestors, from the rivals, from the people who still answer the phone after dinner. The hero cars of 1992 would not have been allowed half of this. That was the point.
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