Procedure to make carbon reinforced body for Ecorun
Photo 1: Mr.Yamamoto is rough cutting urethane foam for under body
Photo 2: Myself happily polishing the urethane foam to perfection!
Photo 3: A little pose with my upper body spreaded with polishing paste
Photo 4: View of under and upper bodies after get coat treatment
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This year, the Ecorun race is held for the last time at Suzuka. Sponsored only by Shell, the event has been going on for 20 years without interruption with success every year. This fact has led many teams, and us included, wondering what to do for this special last event. With five months to go and Aiming 3's actual body in need of repair after a crash last year, we decided to go ahead with building a new body. Recollecting just how hard it was to make the rear wheel aerodynamic cover (and we never finished it), I feel that there will be many hours of Ecorun this year. Hum!
Kondo-san with experience in computer-assisted drawing designed the new body based on the actual dimension of the old body. We will follow the same procedure detailed earlier in the preparation for Ecorun 1999. In brief, cutting wood panels that form the skeleton and urethane foam in blocks to fill the bulk of the body for both the upper and lower body took about one month. And then, the tedious task of spreading solidifying paste (the same paste used for plastering wall) and polishing it until the surface is as smooth as a baby's skin. Again, this took about two months because the solidified paste was often porous or cracking which constantly needed repair. In September, we were finally ready to spread the glass fiber mat immersed in a resin to form what would become the mold for the final part. Unfortunately, the mold got literally stuck and the only option left was to destroy the "inside mold" and again polish the inside of the mold to that same "baby skin". Crazy and time is beginning to run rapidly!
Every evening in September and October and sometimes during the weekend, we finally managed to finish the body of Aiming 3. Ouf! But it is far from perfect and we are already planning change in the method of fabrication for next year's model. Ha ha
During all that time, Hiratsuka and his team worked on Aiming 2 with all the electronics and optimization of the engine mechanics. We are ready to roll on at Suzuka!
Photo 5: Mr. Sakai greasing the mold for the upper body prior to putting carbon mat
Photo 6: Mr. Kondoh is rolling the resin into the carbon mat to form the final upper body
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