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Eric Hsu posted on October 24, 2011 22:15 
Pictures of Chris Rado's FWING 1.0 AWD Scion tC
by Eric Hsu
Unfortunately these pictures below were taken with a cell phone so the quality isn't all that great. I went to Rado's shop for a "Time Attack Summit" to discuss the future of Time Attack in the USA back on September 7, 2010. I wasn't expecting to take pics of the then fairly new FWING 1.0. None of this is top secret or anything since you could have seen the car at the track in the World Racing (WR) pits, but it's interesting to see how WR executed some of the car's details. Also keep in mind that since these pictures were taken over a year ago, that parts of the car may have changed since then.
The body of the WR Scion tC is beautifully crafted in carbon fiber. No expense was spared either. I suspect WR has some expensive molds hidden away somewhere for a Scion tC widebody. The paint and panel fit and finish are also very nice so the car definitely scores show points there. Sometimes aesthetics are overlooked and can lower a car's overall image. This car is pretty damn nice. It has air jacks on it which makes it convenient for the mechanics. For another time attack project I am working on, I axed the idea of using air jacks to reduce vehicle weight, but it will be a bigger pain in the ass to get the car in the air. You have to evaluate the pain in the ass vs. potential weight savings ratio I suppose.
I thought the fact that you could remove the rear quarter panels was cool too. 100% purpose built race cars are of course better than converted street cars with widebody fenders molded to the steel unibody with globs of bondo or hours of welding and grinding. The quarter panel is technically unnecessary since it is no longer a part of the unibody in cars like this. The cage is doing all the work. In this case it looks like the entire aluminum wheel well can be removed for cleaning too. You can see right in front of the wheel well is what appears to be a Odyssey 925 battery mounted low.
Ultra light dry carbon doors. WR fabricated the window frames that hold Lexan windows.
I'm not sure why this little hatch exists since there isn't much on the inside of it. Perhaps it's a pressure relief hatch that pops open when the cabin pressure gets excessive? You can see that even this little license plate sized hatch is made out of some kind of sandwiched honeycomb composite.
Monday, October 24, 2011 2:25 PM
I see some Election day Ductwork
Monday, October 24, 2011 4:58 PM
Holly cow... The article was great... The Scion is insane. In all the details. But this youtube clip is just mad! Rage driving for blowing the start?! :)
Monday, October 24, 2011 5:21 PM
Stuff like this is why Motoiq and Eric Hsu bring the goods! I looked for info on this car for a while but could never find much until now. That distal upper link on the rear looks like it's going to bind with the coil from my limited point of view. I keep waiting to see if the 1.0 AWD can bring the goods on the track but all I ever see is the 2.0 with the fwing so high, I want to take a sawzall to it, grr. It'd be pretty lame to see all these dollars get cast aside and not run after SSe's Buttonwillow record. Since you brought it up Eric, I can't find fault in the new xB like I could in the old one. A nice set of wheels goes a long way here BUT if I got smoked by a turboed one of these, I'd be buying parts tomorrow. I'm just too prideful :) PS That camo hose is sick. It's so camo I had to go looking for it again after I read your caption!
Monday, October 24, 2011 5:35 PM
Eric thanks for sharing. That "sandwiched honeycomb composite" you're talking about is called "baltek". http://www.corematerials.3acomposites.com/home-emea.html I worked with Baltek before. To put it into easy words, it looks like a card-board with honeycomb pattern like you said. It's very flimsy and flexible, but once you apply resin/ hardening to it, and sandwish it between carbon layers, it becomes nearly indestructible.
Monday, October 24, 2011 5:51 PM
My question is a bit dumb, but... Obviously this car is built with no expenses. Brembo GT-R brakes, MoTec standalone, $100K Weismann tranny... So why not using Wiggins clamp instead of those unorthodox 3/4 bars with APR studs? Don't Wiggins clamp hold up to 125PSI of boost? I mean, I'm not an engineer or anything but instead of using wrenches to take apart the I/C piping and get to the tranny and what not, a simple Wiggins clamp can be opened with two fingers, making the chore fast and simple.
Monday, October 24, 2011 6:00 PM
The Toyota Tacoma 2-3RZ are great engines :) Iron block, closed deck, forged crankshaft. Think a smaller version of the 2JZ, with far less weigh :) I believe Chris 3RZ (2.7L) was built (or uses) parts from LC Engineering, AZ, and the engine was also stroked to 2.8L. I heard it put down some 1600hp or something like that, not too shabby.
Monday, October 24, 2011 7:33 PM
Wiggins clamps have a low tolerance of angular misalignment. But that sure seems to be a lot of retention!
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 12:25 AM
VP: I had to put Rod Millen's Tacoma video up since I was talking about the 503E. There's nothing like an old school super peaky power band, big power, AWD, turbo car on the verge of control driven by a driver who wants to show the British wine and cheese crowd that maybe F1 doesn't have the buffest cars in the world. I loved that vid since the first time I watched it. Bruce: I hope WR refines the FWING 1.0 also. Like you said, there's too much money and man hours in it to not refine it. The new xB is a little big for me, but it did become a bit more practical probably for the mid/late 20's crowd whereas the old xB was teen to mid 20's crowd. I think the Nissan Cube took over the old xB's spot. Either a turbo new xB would be a cool daily driver. You could smoke some of those EVOs or STIs (you know the ones with the mud guards) and pay 1/4 the insurance they do. Alex: That Baltek stuff sounds cool. If you have any extra sitting in the garage, send me some. I don't know about the Wiggins clamp thing. I'll ask the World guys next time, but I'm guessing it isn't due to a cost issue.
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 2:09 AM
Hey Mike, I'm not sure I'm understanding what you said. Here is a video of a guy that installed those Wiggins on a Bimmer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76CEWVXru3M How much more flexibility you need? I'm sure WR is running some pretty stiff engine mounts (if not solid), so the engine rocking shouldn't be an issue. And like Eric said, their decision to use aluminium rods with ARP it's buff and all, but a bit inconvenient when working and disassembly the engine. I'm sure their decision has nothing to do with $$. Eric, I have some sheet of Baltek left. Gotta clean the garage then I'll send you some :) (it's freaking light, no expenses for the shipping:)
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 10:19 AM
Posts like this one is why I love motoiq!!! Kudos for bringing us all the info and pics! That vacuum setup for the crankcase pressure relief has me thinking, just how much vacuum highly boosted engines really need, this motor is running dry sump after all, AND still a vacuum assist... I've been suspecting my dual -10an fittings at my valve cover are a bit undersized... sort of regret not going with -12's or -16's even...
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 11:50 AM
The charge air hose retention methods they use fits pretty well with the rest of the car to me- overbuilt suspension, off-road truck 4WD system, 4 massive ignition coils... this thing is not a simple car! You hear a lot about how simple designs are the hardest to come up with... I feel like this car shows what happens when you throw money at something but don't take a lot of time to apply engineering principles. The fabrication is outstanding, sure, but the overall design concept is lacking to me.
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 2:57 PM
Forgive my naivete, but why the dual wastegates and BOVs on a single turbo setup? Is it to cope with the sheer volume moving through the systemÉ This car is super cool. I'll bet it sounds pretty mean, and I wonder if the windshield or bodywork has any issues with the heat from those pipes sticking out of the hood.
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 4:11 PM
@ ErikO: Dual wastegates would be used on a twin-scroll turbo to keep the exhaust pulses separated. Dual BOVs exist for the same reason 4 ignition coils exist: overkill. @ matt: While I mostly agree with you, the fact remains that there just aren't many 1500+ HP road racing machines out there. If I were writing the checks, I'd rather not chance a calculation error to save a few lbs with my life. Yes, the 4 ignition coils, multiple BOVs may be unnecessary, but after seeing the speeds that car achieves on the straights, I'd over build the suspension, AWD system, and a lot of other things to. Nothing simple about 4-digit power and road racing, IMO.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 12:42 AM
Alex: You got any resin and hardener to go with that Baltek? Or know where to get it? Tony: Glad you enjoyed the article. I never technically got permission from WR, but Chris and the guys are pretty cool and they saw me taking a ton of pics. Engines don't need vacuum at all in the crankcase. As long as you have large enough breather hoses and catch cans to catch all of the resultant blowby and crankcases gases, your engine should be fine. But if you want to take advantage of less windage losses and less blowby, then you want your dry dump pump to be big enough to be able create a vacuum in the crankcase. It could be that they did not have enough room to run a 6 or 7 stage pump so they needed the secondary vacuum pump to assist. If you know the capacity of your dry sump stages and the overall volume of your crankcase, you can calculate how big of a dry sump pump you'll need to hit a target vacuum. Theoretically, anyhow. ErikO: This car sounds crazy when it rips down the front straight at Buttonwillow. Rockwood: Well put.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 7:05 AM
ErikO, you can see that unlike Rockwood's response, this is a single scroll turbo. They runs dual WG's for better boost control (low pressure and high).
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 8:57 AM
This is probably my favorite feature car since the Porsche GT3. Everything about it is ridiculous. jdmized is there any chance you count point us to some technical information on this baltek stuff in comparison to CF, fiberglass, aluminum, steel, etc? I'd look up info for myself but I won't be near a desktop for another week probably and I can't stand doing anything on this laptop!
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 10:01 AM
A few other observations: - Would the Motec controlled throttle solenoid be for anti-lag? generally a drive by wire system can use the standard throttle motor for anti-lag, but this could be a different. Perhaps that spring under the valve is for a cable throttle, which would explain it. - Perhaps the carbon bottle under the dash is a fire suppression system tank, although that would be pretty high up for a heavy vessel like that. Imagine that thing at night with anti-lag. The flames would shoot a few feet in the air I bet. Lordy.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 10:25 AM
@ Micah: Doh! Didn't even look that closely at the turbo. Looking back, you can't even see the turbine well enough to really tell, but the wastegate tube's position on the manifold tells you it's not a twin scroll (or it's set up wrong, which I doubt). I just saw dual wastegates as I scanned the images, and then I saw Erik's comment and responded about why you'd use dual wastegates.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 1:45 PM
**Would the Motec controlled throttle solenoid be for anti-lag? generally a drive by wire system can use the standard throttle motor for anti-lag, but this could be a different.** That was my first thought. Prior to the days of DBW throttle bodies, all rallycars with anti-lag had a solenoid on the throttle body. When you retard the timing 30+ degrees during anti-lag the idle will drop to nothing (or stall)...the solenoid opens the throttle plate at the same time the timing is retarded in order to maintain an idle.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 2:09 PM
RE: Anti-Lag and flames from the exhaust. look at the picture of the F-Wing on this page. No idea if it's anti-lag, but whatever it is, it's nuts! http://www.descendant-racing.com/history.html The Descendant turbo kit looks impressive! Project xB anyone? =)
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 3:06 PM
I think they call that a throttle jacker in Europe. Conceivably, you could use the same solenoid for both throttle jacking and throttle blipping if your ECU can support it.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 5:27 PM
I do not have any at the moment, but TAP Plastics does. (TAP Plastics also sell different types of carbon cloth). www.tapplastics.com (the ratio is 1/4, resin/ hardening). There are many types of resin and hardening on the market. As you might know, working on big carbon fiber pieces (such as doors, fenders trunk and such) require a slow hardening solution. That way once you're done applying resin/ hardening to the object you're working on (stir the resin/ hardening together SLOWLY and don't create bubbles, that's the key), once they're mixed, and you apply the compound, by the time you're done on one side of the fender, the other side is should be still wet, which is good. You don't want to have a fast-hardening element on big pieces (meaning that once you're working on a side of the piece the first part you applied hardening is already stiffening up, that's no bueno). You should be done applying all the resin/ hardening and the entire piece should still be wet. Then put whatever piece you're working on in the oven for 45 minutes at 175 degree (if I recall it). Obviously the oven has to be big enough to accept the piece (I used to use my kitchen oven.....very good toxic shit mixed with chicken = no a good recipe). If you check my flickr account under "Tacoma" I have step by step on how to work with it. Pretty straight forward, but it's time consuming.
Thursday, October 27, 2011 9:43 AM
nothing short of amazing. the one thing about chris that blew my mind is his charisma. when i was at GTA NJ, some dude was talking 'ish about the fwing on his car. no later than 5mins with chris was that dude a convert. the cars are amazing and so is the team. i really hope scion continues their support of rado and his team because i cant think of too many drivers that i would associate with that brand. rado, abatte, gushi and aasbo.
Monday, October 31, 2011 5:59 PM
That carbon fiber bottle is, hopefully, filled with carbon dioxide for wastegate control. Something he probably borrowed from his drag racing experience.
 
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