Associate
- Joined
- 4 Jun 2009
- Posts
- 1,675
- Location
- Solihull/Cardiff
Bit of an unusual one this, I'm a member of Cardiff Universities Formula Student team and we have been working tirelessly over the past 9 months to shave as much weight from this bad boy as possible:
That is last years car and came it at 211.5kg wet without a driver, but we can do better - thinner chassis panels, better fuel tank, carbon fibre side pods and seatback etc etc. We're aiming for about 180kg this year which will put us on a level playing field with those teams who have the budget to farm out there chassis manufacture to specialists and have full carbon fibre monocoques.
We already have a lot of sponsor stickers, numbers and so on stuck on last years car, so this year we're looking at going all the way - rap the entire in vinyl and don't bother with the layers primers and paint that last years car had. It'll look better, be simpler and last better than the paint on this years car has, and hopefully be the same weight, if not lighter.
We're looking at rapping the entire main structure of the car, with the exception of the engine bay and cockpit and side pods. Its a fairly simple design with mostly flat slab sides and top etc... It looks like a coffin
Can anyone point me in the direction of a company to rap the beast, or maybe just supply the vinyl for us to do ourselves (We did all the vinyl on last years car and at >0.5m away to looks awesome) We'd want a completely bespoke design based heavily on the dragon from last years car, featuring a nose cone in the style of the shark mouths the Americans used to paint on their A10 Warthogs and F4 Phantoms. We've come up with a few designs and have the overall dimensions of the car and were wondering where to go from there? Draw a folded flat template and draw the design onto that, then outsource? Get the company to do the rapping too?
What are the costs involved in getting a company to rap it as a posed to the DIY method, and how much help would these companies offer in terms of the design stage of the process?
Any insights would be greatly appreciated
That is last years car and came it at 211.5kg wet without a driver, but we can do better - thinner chassis panels, better fuel tank, carbon fibre side pods and seatback etc etc. We're aiming for about 180kg this year which will put us on a level playing field with those teams who have the budget to farm out there chassis manufacture to specialists and have full carbon fibre monocoques.
We already have a lot of sponsor stickers, numbers and so on stuck on last years car, so this year we're looking at going all the way - rap the entire in vinyl and don't bother with the layers primers and paint that last years car had. It'll look better, be simpler and last better than the paint on this years car has, and hopefully be the same weight, if not lighter.
We're looking at rapping the entire main structure of the car, with the exception of the engine bay and cockpit and side pods. Its a fairly simple design with mostly flat slab sides and top etc... It looks like a coffin
Can anyone point me in the direction of a company to rap the beast, or maybe just supply the vinyl for us to do ourselves (We did all the vinyl on last years car and at >0.5m away to looks awesome) We'd want a completely bespoke design based heavily on the dragon from last years car, featuring a nose cone in the style of the shark mouths the Americans used to paint on their A10 Warthogs and F4 Phantoms. We've come up with a few designs and have the overall dimensions of the car and were wondering where to go from there? Draw a folded flat template and draw the design onto that, then outsource? Get the company to do the rapping too?
What are the costs involved in getting a company to rap it as a posed to the DIY method, and how much help would these companies offer in terms of the design stage of the process?
Any insights would be greatly appreciated
That's not universal however, each Uni's set up is different.