Lightweight Body Parts for Stagea 260rs

[flying fridge]

Hi there, I’m trying to figure out how go get the weight of the fatboy 260rs down. 
I would love to buy some lightweight body parts but there is not much that I find, except for a bonnet. 
Are there front- or rear doors or a Tailgate out of carbon or aluminium? 

What other options are there beside the obvious „throw out everything“? Did someone swap the glass windows for polycarbonate? 
Any help is appreciated, thanks guys

Edited July 24, 2023 by flying fridge

[Duncan]

A stagea isn't a great place to start for a lightweight car. To help work out what can go, what are you planning to use it for?

 

[GTSBoy]

3 hours ago, flying fridge said:

Are there front- or rear doors or a Tailgate out of carbon or aluminium?

LOL. I nearly spat my coffee.

[Murray_Calavera]

It would be so much cheaper to just buy an evo or similar light weight car. Removing weight to the point that it is noticeable in the way the car drives will be an eye watering expense. 

[joshuaho96]

5 hours ago, flying fridge said:

Hi there, I’m trying to figure out how go get the weight of the fatboy 260rs down. 
I would love to buy some lightweight body parts but there is not much that I find, except for a bonnet. 
Are there front- or rear doors or a Tailgate out of carbon or aluminium? 

What other options are there beside the obvious „throw out everything“? Did someone swap the glass windows for polycarbonate? 
Any help is appreciated, thanks guys

Sell the car and buy something optimized for lightweight. You could replace all the body panels with dry carbon and only save maybe 140 kg while spending more on those body panels than the car itself. To actually reduce weight requires a complete rethink of the chassis, not window dressing. Look at how Lotus did it in their Elise and you have some idea of what it means to substantially reduce weight. 

[flying fridge]

14 hours ago, Duncan said:

A stagea isn't a great place to start for a lightweight car. To help work out what can go, what are you planning to use it for?

 

Yes I’m aware of that, but as a Skyline Wagon it‘s perfect for me, fast and practical together. 
Will be my car for everything if it got enough comfort for daily use left after the weight reduction, if not I got the option for another cheap car as daily. 

[flying fridge]

11 hours ago, Murray_Calavera said:

It would be so much cheaper to just buy an evo or similar light weight car. Removing weight to the point that it is noticeable in the way the car drives will be an eye watering expense. 

It‘s this car, none else. Doesn’t get much better for me. 
Love the looks of it, it‘s practical, got a huge trunk and is fast. 

Im not afraid of throwing some serious cash for the purpose of getting it lighter/better.

[flying fridge]

11 hours ago, joshuaho96 said:

Sell the car and buy something optimized for lightweight. You could replace all the body panels with dry carbon and only save maybe 140 kg while spending more on those body panels than the car itself. To actually reduce weight requires a complete rethink of the chassis, not window dressing. Look at how Lotus did it in their Elise and you have some idea of what it means to substantially reduce weight. 

The goal would be to land around at 1400-1500kg if that‘s possible, so we’re talking about what I consider a normal weight for a sporty car. 
I guess that should be possible to achive, don’t need to go crazy like 1200kgs.

[Murray_Calavera]

12 minutes ago, flying fridge said:

The goal would be to land around at 1400-1500kg if that‘s possible, so we’re talking about what I consider a normal weight for a sporty car. 
I guess that should be possible to achive, don’t need to go crazy like 1200kgs.

So you want to pull 220kg to 320kg worth of material out of the car? That is an absolutely huge range, kinda like saying you want to make somewhere between 400kw to 1500kw from the motor. 

As you start to pull weight out of the car, every next kg gets harder and more expensive to achieve. 

Even on your conservative, 220kg weight reduction goal, it's 100% not realistic. Even if you said you were happy to spend $100,000 to achieve that goal it wouldn't happen... Unless you turn it into a death kart. Then sure I'm sure you'll find 220-320kgs of material to cut out.

[Murray_Calavera]

Just as a visual. When you turn this - 

Into this - 

You save about 300kgs.

[flying fridge]

14 minutes ago, Murray_Calavera said:

So you want to pull 220kg to 320kg worth of material out of the car? That is an absolutely huge range, kinda like saying you want to make somewhere between 400kw to 1500kw from the motor. 

As you start to pull weight out of the car, every next kg gets harder and more expensive to achieve. 

Even on your conservative, 220kg weight reduction goal, it's 100% not realistic. Even if you said you were happy to spend $100,000 to achieve that goal it wouldn't happen... Unless you turn it into a death kart. Then sure I'm sure you'll find 220-320kgs of material to cut out.

See I know that it‘s possible to pull that amount of weight out since a guy already did it. He stripped the whole interior completely and got to 1500kgs but lost all driving comfort since going to the extreme. 
I don’t want to go that extreme as he did. 
 

I wonder if it‘s possible to achive the 1500kgs if putting in some serious cash for carbon/titanium/Aluminium items (doors, bonnet, tailgate, driveshaft, brakes), maybe change the tailgate and rear cargo and rear seat windows to polycarbonate etc etc

Edited July 25, 2023 by flying fridge

[Murray_Calavera]

Just now, flying fridge said:

See I know that it‘s possible to pull that amount of weight out since a guy already did it. He stripped the whole interior completely and got to 1500kgs but lost all driving comfort since going to the extreme. 
I don’t want to go that extreme as he did. 
 

I wonder if it‘s possible to achive the 1500kgs if putting in some serious cash for carbon/titanium/Aluminium items (doors, bonnet, tailgate, driveshaft, brakes), maybe change the tailgate and rear cargo and rear seat windows to polycarbonate etc etc

If you stripped out the entire interior, and I mean everything, it would not even weigh 220kgs. Whoever this 'guy' is that claims to have achieved 1500kg while still having you know, a dash and at least a drivers seat, is clearly full of $hit. 

So rather then just referring to some 'guy', I'll talk from personal experience. 

I stripped my swift down to a dash and driver / front passenger seat. When you look up, bare metal. When you look down, bare metal, when you look back, bare metal everywhere. It saved fk all weight. I weighed stuff as it came out. I saved maybe 20kgs? Turns out plastic trim pieces and foam seats don't weigh much. Go figure. Sound deadening and carpet was around 10kgs. 

My R33 is half stripped. Everything from the driver/front passenger seat is stock. Look over your shoulder, everything in the back is bare metal. The only reason I did this was to fit a half cage and make adjusting the rear coilovers easier. I had learnt from my previous experience that there is fk all weight to be removed from inside the car and it is not worth doing. 

[GTSBoy]

2 hours ago, flying fridge said:

carbon/titanium/Aluminium items (doors, bonnet, tailgate, driveshaft, brakes),

These thing do not exist. You would have to handmake any and all of them. Except brakes. Better brakes are heavier, not lighter.

[Duncan]

All I can say is, instead of trying to reduce weight in my stagea, I added power. The handling is OK on better suspension and good tyres.

[Stick180]

On 25/07/2023 at 9:52 PM, flying fridge said:

Yes I’m aware of that, but as a Skyline Wagon it‘s perfect for me, fast and practical together. 
Will be my car for everything if it got enough comfort for daily use left after the weight reduction, if not I got the option for another cheap car as daily. 

Its not a skyline wagon

[Stick180]

On 25/07/2023 at 10:39 PM, flying fridge said:

See I know that it‘s possible to pull that amount of weight out since a guy already did it. He stripped the whole interior completely and got to 1500kgs but lost all driving comfort since going to the extreme. 
I don’t want to go that extreme as he did. 
 

I wonder if it‘s possible to achive the 1500kgs if putting in some serious cash for carbon/titanium/Aluminium items (doors, bonnet, tailgate, driveshaft, brakes), maybe change the tailgate and rear cargo and rear seat windows to polycarbonate etc etc

The RSV is 1520kg wet. The majority of the extra bulk in the RS4S and 260RS is in the driveline. 

[Murray_Calavera]

14 minutes ago, Stick180 said:

The RSV is 1520kg wet. The majority of the extra bulk in the RS4S and 260RS is in the driveline. 

That would make a lot more sense. If that car that the OP linked there was a NA RWD Stagea, the weight reduction numbers would line up perfectly, a whole 20kgs of interior removed brining the car to 1500kgs. 

[flying fridge]

On 26/07/2023 at 12:02 AM, Duncan said:

All I can say is, instead of trying to reduce weight in my stagea, I added power. The handling is OK on better suspension and good tyres.

Yeah it‘s certainly the easier and cheaper way to improve performance. What tires and rims do you use?

[flying fridge]

16 hours ago, Stick180 said:

Its not a skyline wagon

I know, it‘s a Stagea 260rs…

[flying fridge]

15 hours ago, Murray_Calavera said:

That would make a lot more sense. If that car that the OP linked there was a NA RWD Stagea, the weight reduction numbers would line up perfectly, a whole 20kgs of interior removed brining the car to 1500kgs. 

20kgs is the spare tire alone almost lol. 
So what you think, what weight reduction down from 1720kg is possible without ruining the car?