NAME THAT TUNE

The UK is home to a thriving industry of respected aftermarket tuning firms. Illya Verpraet samples breathed-on examples from three of them

Car manufacturers like Ford, Toyota, and Mazda spend billions and employ small armies of highly trained engineers to create polished products through years of development and millions of miles of testing. It would be hubris to think that some people on an industrial estate can improve on those cars, wouldn't it?

Well, there are plenty of smaller but well-established companies that disagree, with thousands of customers to back them up.

After all, the car manufacturers always leave something on the table because, while their adverts are populated by suave, well-mannered people, they know some of their cars will end up in the hands of less genteel enthusiasts who don't rate the concepts of mechanical sympathy or regular servicing. Meeting emissions targets and needing to make a profit aren't conducive to making big power, either.

Here to argue the case for tinkering, then, are the Toyota GR Yaris by Litchfield the Mountune Ford Focus ST M365, and a previous-generation Mazda MX-5 2.0-litre with BBR GTi's Stage 1 Supercharger kit.

Now, these three cars were very different propositions when they came out of the factory - we've got a five-door front-wheel-drive hot hatch, a three-door four-wheel-drive one and a two-seat rear-drive roadster modified to different extents.

And while all of them, on a basic level, have been made faster by their respective fettlers, there are actually three rather different philosophies at play here.

Mountune's recipe is ostensibly the simplest: it's a Ford Focus ST, but more so. Mountune is an engine builder, historically, and has designed uprated powerplants for various race series, so a more potent 2.3-litre four-cylinder is clearly what this Focus is all about.

To produce 360bhp instead of a mere 276bhp, Mountune doesn't actually need to touch any of the internals, although it does recommend some breathing mods to keep everything in one piece.