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GT-R35 road race project (code name NGT-R)

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80K views 190 replies 63 participants last post by  PixelJanitor  
#1 · (Edited by Moderator)
Greetings to all gtrlife community
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I'd like to join this forum and share some information about GTR road race project.

First of all please forgive me for my broken English - I will do my best but it may not be good enough anyway.

I'm coming from professional motorsport (worked with GTs, LMPs, Formula 3, GP2, touring cars etc.) where my main areas was chassis and suspension design, aerodynamics design, data analyses/setup work using simulation tools, on track engineering work (setup etc). Most of the time we where fabricating most of the stuff in house - suspension, composites etc. One day I became a bit tired (or better say my Wife did) of hectic schedule and too much politics involved in professional racing and I decided to open my own shop providing engineering expertise to pro teams and manufacturers but also oriented towards track enthusiasts - non professional racers. Target is to bring professional motorsport technologies and practices to enthusiast community.

Zonda R was kind of inspiration in terms that it wasn't bound by strict technical regulations and guys could design and build it the way they like it. I also believe that if we make something that we really like the way we like it than there's a chance that someone might like it as well
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My partner is GTR35 enthusiast and raced his car occasionally so we decided that we should build a full blown race car which would be used as development vehicle, showcase what we can do and give us tons of fun when we race it. The way we build it now - we decided to call it NGT-R (N referring to group N
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) because for now we keep standard engine and gearbox as a base.

Project started at the end of September 2012 and about a couple of weeks ago we trial fitted carbon fiber bodywork. In order to adjust the gaps etc. Before we started to do that I could not resist to take some pictures. Please, keep in mind that this is not finished product - many parts are missing (but coming along nicely) like: two element high downforce rear wing (with measured Cl/Cd performance), grill and front ducting (ducts from bumper to radiator, intercoolers, brakes and from radiator/intercoolers to engine hood), side seals, mirros, etc. Car is standing on narrow 28/71-28 michelins on 11" wheels while it is designed for 31/71-18 (same as nismo/jrm used in FIA GT1 and now GT3 programm) on 13" wheels. So it looks funny and wrong but tires should be here fairly soon. Parts between rear bumper corners are missing and rear diffuser would be trimmed to it's final shape. It (diffuser) is also missing vertical strakes and vortex generators. I guess that because snow reflecting too much light or because of my non existent photographing skills it's not really visible that antire bodywork is clear coated (ultraviolet protection) carbon fiber... But in the flash it's visible very well
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In fallowing posts I will share ideas/purpose behind various elements/solutions and go through some aspects of design/build process but for now I'm happy to share how it looked like (work in pprogress) during trial body fit

































Thanks
Ted
 
#32 · (Edited by Moderator)
Cooling system

In the case of factory standard GTR there is conventional road car cooling scheme - water radiator is placed vertically, just in front of engine. Two intercoolers are stacked right in front of radiator. In terms of efficient cooling this arrangement is less than ideal. For effective heat exchange one needs to let cool ambient air come to radiator (this is done) but not less important is extracting hot air out of radiator. Higher amount of air pumped through radiator = higher rate of heat exchange/cooling. If there's no sufficient exit for flow coming through radiator than it becomes problematic. In case of factory GTR problem is amplified by intercoolers - air that gets to radiator is already preheated. This setup works fairly well in normal street conditions with standard power but in case of increased power output (= increased heat generation) and race track conditions it proved to be less than adequate.

In a race car one would always want to design cooling system that will allow air flow entering radiator and will take care about evacuating it out of there. With front engined cars most common place for radiator outlet is upper surface of engine hood. This work well because usually we have a lower pressure zone on that surface (one would always want to take air from higher pressure zone and evacuate it into lower pressure zone as this would allow for highest possible flow volume) and high pressure zone on bumper front face. This has another side benefit in reducing lift on front axle (or increasing downforce if you're so lucky). Air doesn't really like to make sharp turns but hood surface and bumper front surface are positioned approximately at 90%. So one would try to arrange inlet and outlet ducting so the air travels at around 45 degrees (relative to horizontal). Radiator is positioned at 45 degrees as well (but in opposite quadrant) which places it at 90 degrees relative to flow direction. This also has some side benefits - allowing to package taller radiator and slightly lowering its COG. All the above is over simplified but that should make it easier to read.

Our cooling package was designed according to above considerations. Radiator was ordered from Ron Davis - I gave him necessary data (power output and packaging constraints) and they calculated what would work. Same way with intercoolers (ordered from Bell).

Last Saturday we did a mockup installation of front cooling ducts and took some photo's:





Radiators and intercoolers are placed so that they do not shadow each other. On the above images it's easy to see outlet ducting - radiator in the center and intercooler exit ducts on its sides.





Below - couple of images of radiator/intercooler inlet ducting.





Grill is a mockup part so far (it's way too rough and ugly) - final grill is still in production and it will also have two inlets to feed intake air filters.

That's how it looks (so far) when assembled together. Grill is fixed to front bumper by hot glue (it was a trial fit as I mentioned earlier) which is visible in the gaps but that's OK for now
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Also this arrangement allowed to make intercooler piping shorter and straighter which in turn should improve throttle response.

Thanks
Ted
 
#39 ·
We use vacuum infusion process and than post cure in the oven at elelvated temperatures. Without a clave with prepreg there will be usually slightly worse surface quality (because of very high viscosity resin used in prepregs).
All the cad design of parts, than master models/plugs, moulds and finally parts where made inhouse. As well as all the chassis, suspension etc. work. We're a small 4 people team and budjet is restricted. It took longer than I'm used to when working with race teams with large budgets. However now, when all the tooling is in place I can reproduce this car to turn key race ready in about 6 months. It can be done faster but it would be more expensive because I would need to hire more people.

Thanks
Ted
 
#40 ·
What kind of resin systems are you using, are your laminates balanced symmetric, what are your tools made out of? When initially designing the car did you start off using a tire and then building your geometry around that or did you aim for a general change in camber/caster/toe? What were your initial static corner loads for the car? I might have missed it but does this car retain the stock car's awd system?
 
#44 ·
West system. Yes we use balanced plys. Tools are made of glass fiber with epoxy resin plus some proprietary tricks. At this point we're using standard car subframes and suspension uprights. Main reason lack of time. We will be testing sume modifications to rear suspension geometry - similar to those used in JRM GT3 as an initial update. I'm working on clean sheet design of front/rear suspension and if resources permit we'll test it during next season. Yes we use tire data when designing suspension.

Thanks
Ted
 
#48 ·
Ted -

Here you go. I compared both kits with downpipes, manifold, turbocharger, outlet pipe and inlet pipe.

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Thanks!

Michael
 
C
#54 ·
sorry if you mentioned in thread and I missed it.

are you running this as rear wheel drive?

what series are you campaigning the car in?

What is your weight target for finished car?

Our cars weigh a little less than 2600 lbs they are rear wheel drive

approx 600 hp on 14 lbs boost

We have guys over in meetings at JRM this week comparing notes
the CRP racing cars we are involved with seem more developed in many areas but we are not allowed the much more sophisticated the FIA GT3 aero bodies cars used used oin Europe and Japan
 
#55 ·
This version will be 4WD retaining original engine and gearbox. There are some other versions in pipeline.

We'll race it in some time attack events initially. Leter into the season we plan to enter it in local Open GT series and some races in Dutch Super Car Challenge.

Weight target - it will depend on what would be final specification (budget pending) but it would obviously be heavier - gearbox is 321lb compared to 176 (hewland LS-6) and than there's rear to front prop shaft, front diff, front shafts, heavier front hubs etc., etc. I think that at the start of testing we'll be just under 3000lbs and will keep shedding weight off - hopefully another 100-150lbs.

We'll run it at little over 800hp.

It's nice that you have some collaboration within Nissan racing program with JRM guys. We plan to start talking to Nissan within a couple of months. Honestly my marketing/sponsorship skills are non existent - we'll see where it takes us
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Thanks
Ted
 
L
#61 ·
Wow this is amazing!!!

Wish i had more time to spend in Holland next week to see the car... Maybe i will fly again soon there to check it out.
 
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#77 ·
There will be some updates soon, Currently lots of things are being done:

Side seals:
Master models done. Moulds done. Parts are out of the mould and ready for post cure.

Parts that go between rear bumper corners and rear diffuser side winglets (don't know how to call them
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) - master models ready and moulds are curing now.

Side window frames - working on master models atm.

Part under windshield which is covering gap between engine hood and windshield - working on master model.

Lots of other work going on - titanium blade type arb's etc,. etc.

Hope to post images soon.

Thanks
Ted
 
#66 · (Edited by Moderator)
Sorry Anna - there's no pictures of seam welding. Something could be seen on roll cage pictures (unpainted). Also your can see some details on the process in the post #22 of this topic. If you have specific questions - let me know and I would do my best to help. Main things - clean the areas to weld up to bare metal and clean off all the sealant (otherwise it will burn and cause contamination in welds). For sheet metal - use mig welding (as opposed to tig welding used for cage tubes). I would recommend acid dipping the chassis if you have it available.

Thanks
Ted
 
#68 ·
Tudor_M said:
Sorry Anna - there's no pictures of seam welding. Something could be seen on roll car pictures (unpainted). Also your can see some details on the process in the post #22 of this topic. If you have specific questions - let me know and I would do my best to help. Main things - clean the areas to weld up to bare metal and clean off all the sealant (otherwise it will burn and cause contamination in welds). For sheet metal - use mig welding (as opposed to tig welding used for cage tubes). I would recommend acid dipping the chassis if you have it available.

Thanks
Ted
Click to expand...
Isn't there some inherent danger in dissolving some welds doing acid dipping?
 
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