Factory build lightweights, yeah right !

[Martyn-123]

Hi,

keep seeing manufacturers advertising the release of lightweight versions of their cars saving a few pounds here and there by replacing a few bits of trim with carbon fibre but you have to dig so far down into the sales blurb to try to actually find the overall weight of the car leaving me to think it's nothing more than a sales gimmick most of the time and a excuse to charge more as well.

So come on lets see your real lightweights (give me your power info to) to put some of these manufacturers to shame.

Here's mine,

820kg confirmed at the weighbridge this week, 5.0 V8 BHP not yet measured

[rawkyjnr]

That is the business that.

[oj121]

I understand lightweight but at the expense of paint??? Thats extreme!

[Martyn-123]

Yes i was waiting for that one, work in progress

[PaulG40]

Just think how much one paint can weighs, then probably times that by 6 or 7. All adds up, lol!

Superb car!

[Disco You]

How much weight have you saved from when it left the factory (/shed).?

[Altrezia]

Nice car OP - like that a lot.

My cars are a mini and an elise. Both under 800kg each. Both lacking power, though.

[Martyn-123]

Hi,


None, it was a factory built lightweight model for the track.

I know what you mean about the factory being a shed though, typical backyard british engineering?

[Ponk]

My supercharged Rallye was circa 210bhp and weighed 850 kilos on the weighbridge at Mallory Park with a half tank.

The standard Rallye weighed circa 930 kilos. Bear in mind the cage added around 30-40 kilos I was pretty happy with that. It's no Marcos but it was a hoot!



Sadly it spent a little too much time like this so it's being returned to standard (ish) to fund a kit car build.

[mwstewart]

Ponk said:

My supercharged Rallye was circa 210bhp and weighed 850 kilos on the weighbridge at Mallory Park with a half tank.

The standard Rallye weighed circa 930 kilos. Bear in mind the cage added around 30-40 kilos I was pretty happy with that. It's no Marcos but it was a hoot!



Sadly it spent a little too much time like this so it's being returned to standard (ish) to fund a kit car build.

That's a shame. What kind of problems did you have?

[Ponk]

mwstewart said:

That's a shame. What kind of problems did you have?

The supercharger bracket and tensioner setup was a piece of junk so boost levels often fluctuated. 210 bhp was at circa 16 psi but i sometimes saw as low as 6-8 psi.

A few fuelling problems also meant that power peaked at 6000 rpm, typically with a Rotrex setup you would expect peak power at max rpm (certainly that's how I geared it). 250 bhp should have been a realistic power output really.

On top of this a fair few things broke due to the extra stresses involved, clutch cable arms, crank pulleys, nothing major but each needed some thought to correct.

In the end I had the choice of sinking several thousand into it to fix everything, redesign the bracket and tensioner setup and get it remapped, or call it quits and try something new. Onwards and upwards! The Rallye will live on a standard (ish) spec.

[Disco You]

Martyn-123 said:

Hi,


None, it was a factory built lightweight model for the track.

I know what you mean about the factory being a shed though, typical backyard british engineering?

Cool. So what's the weight of the standard versions?

[Martyn-123]

Hi,

Not really sure but think most were in the region of 950kg which is still light, it's more the major manufacturers i was having a dig at,

Mine has really thin bodywork, kevlar bonnet, only one windscreen wiper, no heater, radio, air con, perspex,rear screen