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Filed under: Aftermarket , Tech , Tokyo Auto Salon Weds Sports, a Japanese wheel-maker, has created a full carbon fiber wheel -- rims, spokes, hub, everything -- that weighs 2.76 kg. Coming out to about 6.1 pounds, that's about half the weight of the Dymag carbon fiber wheel with a magnesium rim that you'll find on a Callaway Corvette, and just over a pound more than Dymag's all-carbon race-specific front wheel for a motorcycle. According to a rough translation of Weds' literature, they use a dry carbon fiber process that makes the wheels strong enough for... well, we're not really sure. While the rims look absolutely ace, we can't find any other company that makes an entire wheel out of carbon fiber, and Weds apparently hasn't yet put them in production, which leads us to think that these babies were meant only for the scales at the Tokyo Auto Salon. But if you have $12,000 for a set of four, and you live in an area with no potholes and no curbs, these could...
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Filed under: Car Buying , Green , Japan , Tech , Honda , Nissan Honda and Nissan are looking for ways to make cars lighter, better, and more recyclable, both for their own benefits and their customers. We've heard about the increased use of aluminum to save weight; next on the heavy R&D frontier could be carbon fiber. Both companies have teamed up with Japanese carbon fiber company Toray, and Mitsubishi Rayon -- a Japanese version of DuPont -- to research new, less expensive carbon fiber for cars. Their efforts will be helped by the government, which is injecting two billion yen into the project over five years. The plan is that by the middle of the next decade, they'll be able to mass produce a cost effective carbon fiber and use it to reduce the weight of cars by 40-percent. And when they're finished with it, they will also be able to recycle it to reduce production costs. The current price of carbon fiber makes its use prohibitive except for ornamentation or for use on...
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Filed under: Green , Japan , Tech On the surface, carbon fiber sounds like a wonder-product which can replace much of the heavy metal, especially steel, that makes up the vast majority of nearly every automobile's structure. Dig a bit deeper, however, and there are a few flies in CF's ointment that make it very difficult to use in vehicles: price, supply and the time it takes to mold a the weaved material. Japan's big three carbon fiber producers are tackling each of these issues in a number of ways. First, the price of CF is expected to become more competitive as both carbon cloth goes down and rolled sheet steel goes up. What's more, as additional CF producing plants come online in the coming years, both the price and availability should improve. Third, new molding processes are being developed which could reduce the time it takes to produce a CF part from hours to minutes. Carbon fiber is expected to ease the transition to more fuel efficient vehicles as it weights a...
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Filed under: Gadgets , Etc. , Tech , Toys Carbon fiber, that uber-cool mix of graphite fibers and epoxy that used to be reserved for exotic race cars and fighter jets, is seemingly everywhere these days. Lightweight and space-age, the material is now directly associated with speed and performance. If you are an automaker offering a high-performance vehicle, you had better slap some CF on the car just to keep up with the federation (nobody really cares if it actually helps performance). The BMW M3 Coupe sports a carbon fiber roof, the Porsche GT3 RS a carbon fiber spoiler, and the Nissan GT-R a carbon fiber underbody air diffuser (most of the mainstream automotive applications are technically known as "carbon reinforced plastic"). Taking advantage of the trend, the team over at Carbon Fiber Gear will sell you such must-have items as carbon fiber humidors, carbon fiber guitars, and carbon fiber shoes, but we like a carbon fiber product for the computer that won't lighten the...
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Filed under: Tech , Chevrolet , GM GM has an ulterior motive with the launch of the 2009 Chevrolet Corvette ZR1. The sports car offering is not only meant to be the company's ultimate display of performance, but also an experiment in carbon fiber. The ZR1 is a test mule to demonstrate the feasibility of utilizing carbon fiber parts in mass production vehicles. It also provides a means for GM to monitor the degradation of C.F. parts over time. The ZR1 is built with a carbon fiber roof, hood, front splitter, front fenders, side skirts, and spoiler. They make for a 35-pound weight saving over the standard Vette's fiberglass pieces. GM hopes that carbon fiber will be the answer to vehicle weight reduction as safety requirements, among other things, have caused automobiles to pack on the pounds over the years. However, carbon fiber is currently not an economical solution. But with increasing demands for the material from the aerospace and automotive industries it is expected that cost...
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