ManwithSupra

I have The Nitron NTR Race R3 on my track car. It was simply the best upgrade I have done and quite simply the best suspension I have ever used. However just buying good suspension is not enough... you have to have them set up properly.

I will make one of these again one day, although I will have to bring the Supra on a trailer...

After repairing the Tube mould I started putting the barriers on the scuttle panel.

Cheers would be up for doing a track day for sure.. Happy to offer any advice where I can.

You are actually talking about a mould system which they use for making carbon tubes but its a slightly different approach. Bladder mould give really good results and are used to make carbon fibre bike frames etc. usually the tooling is all made of aluminum rather than FG.

This method is not good for boost pipes no, Low pressure pipes using the two part construction is fine, boost pipes really need to be made as a single piece, either woven carbon sleeve or the use of quasi-isotropic carbon fabric using a roll wrapping method and the use of wax plugs for the shape instead of traditional moulds, this is so the material can be applied externally rather than in a negative of the original part and the wax is there so when you post cure the wax melts out leaving the carbon part. I will be looking to doing the boost pipework a bit further down the line but I need to make a rig to accurately test the pressures up over 2-3 bar. I have some ideas about doing this and how long I will need to test the parts for to make sure they are useable.

Yes, the mould will be going into a resin infusion vacuum bag, the same method used for doing the panels After that is done the parts will be post cured, trimmed and then the two halves bonded together with structural bonding epoxy.

Quick update, OK so done the other side of the mould, added gelcoat, then coupling coat and then the 4 layers of Fiberglass and waited for it to cure, then I drilled the securing holes, trimmed the mould and then split it. It came apart very well However on splitting the mould I found that somehow the paint on the pipe had shriveled (probably due to the heat of curing) This obviously caused an issue with the surface inside the mould and after inspection I found that I will need to do some minor repairs to the Gelcoat once I have done those repairs I will flat back the surface and polish again in order to get a good finish. As you can see on the left hand side there are some marks on the inside of it. I have cut the Carbon fabric to size so as soon as I have finished sorting the mould I will be able to make the tube.

Too rich, you will be getting Bore wash with that level..

Lovely

What helmet is it?

Sounds like a good all round day mate. Always nice to hear from a Pro driver what their thoughts are on the setup etc. I would love to have such a driver in mine to see what they think, all I get is track instructors wanting a go What was the let down with the helmet?? I know what you mean about putting cameras up, yes its nice to show some in car/external footage but man its annoying to manage.

Trimmed and demoulded the first half tonight. After a quick clean and removal of some of the filling wax it looks to be a good base for the next part of the process. I have also applied some release agent tonight ready for the next half of the mould to be done.

I think you will find this club more biased towards the Supra... I don't think many owners on this site have had the RT10 so would be hard to get a comparison Probably best ask that on a Viper forum mate

Did a little more over the weekend, Added the first layer of Fiber Glass and Coupling coat. Then after 4 hours I added 4 layers of heavy Glass fiber with the Tooling Resin, I didn't get any pictures of doing this as the working time of the resin is only 15 mins before it starts to get hot and cure, so had to work really fast in order to get all the layers of Glass fiber down. This is the end result It should have fully hardened now (as I did this on sat) so tonight I will trim up the edges and get on to the 2nd half of the mould which is basically the exact same thing as what you do with the first, I wont document that as I will only be repeating myself. Once the other side is at the same stage then I can finally get on and make the Carbon tube..:D

I would say that the benefits of the flat floor is noticeable at speed (over 80mph), the car feels nicely planted when going around a high speed bend such as fordwater at Goodwood (high speed long bend 100+mph), when it comes to top speed (terminal) any additional downforce will decrease your top speed in a straight line, however on a track it would make you quicker say compared to other cars without the downforce as they would struggle with grip levels in the corners. Engine bay temps are not really any different to what a normal Supra is, in fact the heat management may be a little better.

Correct, although adding a couple of vents would not be hard to change on the design

Added Reference dots for when the mould goes back together. Added first layer of Tooling Gelcoat Wet sanded the scuttle panel After one Polish After 4 polishes and 5 layers of wax.. So tomorrow once the gelcoat has hardened I will add the first layer of Fiber Glass with a coupling resin, then after 2 or 3 hours will add the rest of the layers of Fiber Glass with the Tooling Resin. Then once that has set that's the first half done.

Haha only that I don't have one I made earlier

Added the support framework last night and the main barrier. Today I will be adding the location dots, sealing the barrier to the part and adding the tooling gel coat.

Right I have been having a nice chat with a fabrication company who are interested in doing the Ti exhaust, and on early indications seem to be well priced for a UK based company, I have to take some measurements this weekend but it looks good so far. I feel that things may move quicker than I thought on this

Cleaver stuff... Keep us posted on how effective it is

Yeah I am pretty sure thats what he means too, I wanted to know how he had done it on a non Fly-by-wire system? Usually you use your foot to do it on the downshifts...

Auto blipper?? please expand...

Nice one, when you have moved let us know or if you want to pop over anyway thats cool with me Did not have much time at the workshop last night so only managed to add the Wax barriers to either end of the Turbo intake tube and the oil breather hole. These wax barriers are only there so I can make a fully enclosed split mould. I now need to create the framework for the center line of the split mould so I can do the first half of the mould. The Scuttle panel still needed more work so had to rub it down again, it seems I am either too picky or someone keeps putting imperfections in it overnight