gm design award “best gm vehicle” – tjin edition road show camaro +

The Tjin Edition RoadShow Chevy Camaro wins the convenient GM Design Award for Best GM Vehicle at the 2009 SEMA show.

The halls at the 2009 SEMA show were filled to capacity with thousands upon thousands of newly built incredible pieces of automotive machinery and the 2010 Chevy Camaro was easily the most talked about and visible vehicle on the show floor.


As we were making our way around the show we ran into numerous Camaro’s that caught our attention, but we were stopped dead in our tracks when we came up to the Tjin Edition RoadShow Camaro which was laid out in the Air Lift booth.

There were several key things that instantly drew us in to the Tjin Edition RoadShow Camaro including its custom two-tone Dupont green paint scheme, the massive carbon fiber and brushed iForged wheels and Falken tires, its incredibly low stance, thanks to a fully digital air system from Air Lift, the purple 8-piston SSBC / Tjin Edition calipers, and all the subtle and clean modifications made to the Camaro’s body.


This one of a kind Camaro was the complete package featuring a 415 cubic inch motor with JE Pistons and K1 Technologies internals, a Vortech supercharger, BDL Automotive fuel rails, Nitrous Express set-up, American Racing headers, a custom MagnaFlow exhaust and S.P.E.C twin disk clutch.

The interior of the Camaro was completely redone and is highlighted by carbon fiber Status Racing seats, a custom one-off gauge pod featuring four GlowShift digital gauges and an AZENTEK smart mirror.
The stock audio components and battery were replaced with top of the line equipment from Realm Audio and Odyssey batteries.


These key components not only caught our attention, but also those of the GM designers, who unanimously awarded the Tjin Edition RoadShow Camaro the prestigious GM Design Award for Best GM Vehicle of the show.

This isn’t the first GM Design award won by Neil Tjin and the Tjin Edition team, as they won the GM Design Award for Best New GM Exterior with their Pontiac G8 GT at last year’s event.

On Thursday morning we participated in the GM breakfast / awards banquet where Tjin and his team were awarded their GM Design Award.


Bob Kern, GM SEMA relation’s manager, started off the banquet and was then followed by GM Design Studio design manager Dave Ross who presented the Tjin brothers with their award.

Before Dave Ross handed out the Best GM Vehicle Award he explained that “My standpoint is probably what we consider the Best of Show for us, and that is the Best Lug Nut award, just kidding, that is the Best GM Vehicle and that goes to Neil Tjin and the Tjin Edition Camaro. That car is just an incredible piece of work, the level of finish on that car; the colors really have a cool look. It was the one car that unanimously every one of the designers that judged the cars walked by and said that was the best car at the show and truly a great effort. Tjin comes to the show every year with some really awesome stuff and I really want to congratulate him on the effort and the quality of the piece that he put together, it’s just a beautiful car and we appreciate that work!”

After Tjin received his award we asked him his thoughts on the feedback that he had been receiving about his Camaro throughout the show. Tjin was still a bit in shock as we were talking, but he did manage to give us a quick quote. “Winning the GM Design Award for Best GM Vehicle is an incredible honor and blessing. We are just thankful for the opportunity to work closely with GM and we look forward to topping ourselves next year. Hopefully, we will be back at the GM breakfast in 2010, because my brother and I really love the OJ and toast!

I just want to say first and foremost a big thanks to God for all his incredible blessings, and a special thanks to my amazing wife for being so supportive on this build and for taking care of our son Collin while I had to spend 20-hour days at the shop. Speaking of the shop, this project would not have been possible without the determination and hard work put in by the guys from Real AutoWorks!”