Prince Midas
Engine, chassis, interior and all that glitters
By James Tate
Photography by Devin LeFevere
John Malinowsky had to ask himself a question: how to re-create street bike-type thrills in something more reliable and less dangerous? It's not likely you had a successful road racing stint--on a sport bike--and had to quit after realizing that laying a bike down at speed is neither pleasurable nor cost-effective. It's also unlikely that you have the ability to pick up a box-stock Evolution VIII from your local Mitsubishi dealer, sell everything you don't need down to the seats and drop it off with AMS. Then tell them to give you the works, because money simply isn't an object.
Having ticked off essentially every option in the AMS catalog, Malinowsky had found the way to satisfy his need for speed, while retaining relatively good daily driveability. Allegedly.
This gold Evo is able to carry anyone with a 26-inch waist (or smaller) in relative luxury, thanks to the Bride seats. And it actually has a fairly compliant ride, with the help of the cockpit-adjustable TEIN Flex system with EDFC. Sure, the 295/40R18 rubber on all four wheels doesn't make for a particularly quiet ride, but hey, compared to the wind noise of an R6 at speed, it ain't so bad.
Pulling off a 928hp dyno run after a 24-hour drive with a manifold that had been welded together just 10 minutes before is pretty impressive. The truth of the matter is that it wasn't until John found himself pulling away from a tollbooth later that night that a piston suddenly punched a grapefruit-sized hole through the block. When he called, he reported that the car felt "down on power."
Of all of the custom parts that can fail in a 1000hp Evo, the culprit ended up being a throttle position sensor. Upon failing, it sent a signal of back to the ECU, causing it to run lean. Which is an undesirable condition when accelerating from a tollbooth at 45psi on race gas.