Firehawk's N2 racecar project

[firehawk]

A fellow member from Toyota Club of Finland made the sleeves and both the upper and lower spring perches. He asked 75eur for the whole set so I think it was quite reasonable as they're also zinc plated and the threads are very neatly made.

@Team_Dandism: Wow! That's one wild '86 you have there! I really like the suspension arms you have - that front lower arm looks especially delicious. The guy who makes the FRP stuff said that as soon as he has his own car in a more finished state, he can start taking orders on FRP bits.

I used to have a CRX some years ago and really loved it but wanted something similar in RWD so I sold it to get cash for buying an MR2. When we started building a new endurance car last year, I managed to convince my teammates that a CRX is the way to go. The class rules are quite strict on what can be done to the car so we've concentrated on the suspension, brakes and engine internals. Fuel economy is an important issue in endurance races (each pitstop for refueling costs about 3 laps and you can only fill 20 liters per stop) so we haven't gone all-out on the engine; D16A9 1590cc 16-valve DOHC engine, 75mm bore, 90mm stroke. Compression is upped to 11.5:1, 270/11.2mm intake cam, 264/10.0mm exhaust cam, stock manifolds. Under the car, double wishbone suspension with coilover shocks, 12kg/mm springs front, 10kg/mm rear, polyurethane bushings all around, Wilwood 280mm 4-piston brakes in front w/ Hawk HT10 pads, stock brakes w/ Hawk HP+ pads rear. Turns and stops really quickly and is actually even a bit too prone to oversteer - I'm going to try to change the springs and play with the rear toe before the next race to see if I can make it a bit easier to drive.

I have plenty of photos of the parts and the car under construction here but here's a few fresh photos I took last saturday at the race;