R35

[LSX-438]

The greatest aspect of the R35 for me is, you can slap on some decent rubber, flash in your E85 tune (thaks M ) and run near supercar like times at the track. At the end of the day, road tyres back on and literally drive home in leather clad comfort, climate control and all the fruit. Not to mention TRUE road manners.

This sort of versatility is surely unmatched, let alone at this price.

BUT.. for you regular track goers, are any of you worried about not having a cage?

I wonder did Nissan anticipate this at all.

And btw, did they run a cage in their Nordschleife record setting attempts?

Does anyone have any info or data on the strength of the car?

They spent a lot of time engineering this car, I wonder how strong it is, or how it would "perform" in a decent shunt?

Who would know you think?

Edited August 14, 2010 by LSX-438

[Duncan]

glad you are asking that question....your lap times at Eastern Creek are excellent but they reflect that the car is going extremely quickly. In fact you and Marek would have the fastest non-caged cars ever at that track I bet.

The reality is it will only take a single critical component failure and you are into the wall at 250+. I broke a castor rod there years ago, and I understand Stu had a wheel bearing seize just last week. It does happen, and then all you are is uncontrolled momentum.

I only know 3 gtrs locally that have been written off (Leehmuis, Quinn and Jones), all had full cages and all walked away from a destroyed car. Kel was in the car for one of those crashes and can confirm it hit hard but kept it's cabin protected.

No idea how you can judge the comparitive safety of caged vs uncaged, except remember that the uncaged car is designed to deal with the sorts of accidents that happen on the road, not things like big rollovers or straight on into a wall at well over road speeds.

[handbrake]

I agree with both Duncans.

I have been increasingly concerned of my own mortality. You can keep pushing the limits in this car so far and it feels so safe but as Duncan says, even if you keep within the limits of your experience, you are traveling so fast into and through some turns that all you need is one critical equipment failure to turn things around real fast. Especially if you are punishing the car regularly and therefore more likely for something to go snap.

I am getting a full cage at the end of the year, and have the boys at mercury trackside as well as inspect everything pre/post track days.

[Martin Donnon]

We caged our GTR for this very reason. There is a point.....where you simply MUST have a roll cage thats to FIA spec to ensure you walk away from a track accident. We used some interesting design ideas to keep our cage compact, light, and strong without having it intrude overly on the driving experience. Everyone has their own thoughts on this, but I got out the old Statics manual and laid out the best truss I could for maximum stiffness and strength along with lowest bar count

[09GTR]

We caged our GTR for this very reason. There is a point.....where you simply MUST have a roll cage thats to FIA spec to ensure you walk away from a track accident. We used some interesting design ideas to keep our cage compact, light, and strong without having it intrude overly on the driving experience. Everyone has their own thoughts on this, but I got out the old Statics manual and laid out the best truss I could for maximum stiffness and strength along with lowest bar count

Martin, what exactly is involved with putting a cage in. Is my daily driver gone?

[Martin Donnon]

Depends who does the job and designs the cage I suppose......

[09GTR]

Depends who does the job and designs the cage I suppose......

i was asking your opinion!

[Martin Donnon]

Everyone has their own idea of what makes a cage.....

DD is possible, however you need to know what you are doing with the design to make it work. A traditional roll cage will make your car a PITA. A well thought out one will make it DD. Its a tough question to answer, like 'how long is a piece of string'....DD is perfectly possible

[White 35]

you can forget about re-sale after you chop the car up for a roll cage... recon it will halve in value.

sell your aussie spec car and buy a jap import then put a cage in it...

[Martin Donnon]

A good FIA standard CAMS approved cage shouldnt seriously detract from the value of the car. It will make it more desirable to those that want to use it in Tarmac rallying as this kind of cage is a minimum requirement

To give you an idea - we were able to integrate a structural roll cage into our GTR - without cutting any trim, save for around 5mm adjustment of the glovebox. The stock door trims fit, the stock seats fit (if you wanted them to), the front legs go past the dash without any cutting or 'chopping' The only thing you cant put back in without modification is the rear seats, however the idea would be to pad out the back Spec V style. As I said there are roll cages....and then there are roll cages

[Trozzle]

I only know 3 gtrs locally that have been written off (Leehmuis, Quinn and Jones), all had full cages and all walked away from a destroyed car. Kel was in the car for one of those crashes and can confirm it hit hard but kept it's cabin protected.

Peter Leemhuis?

[Adriano]

I guess the next question is Martin, are you going to sell street legal cages?

[Martin Donnon]

No we dont 'do cages'

However we know some very good folks that do. Ask LSX-438 he has had a good look at ours

[Duncan]

Yes, Pete (sorry about the spelling lol). and that car was repaired and is doing gt cup now afaik. the other 2 are spare parts at best.

I would suggest checking carefully before assuming you can have a cams and road legal cage in the car. CAMS cages have to either be built to one of a couple of standard designs, or be fully modelled by an engineer to prove it meets the requirements.

I don't know the road engineering rules in each state but there are requirements about removeable side intrusion bars and minimum distance from bars to driver's head.

Best to talk to an engineer in your state to confirm how or if a cams cage can be legal.

Finally, under CAMS rules scruitineers can knock back a car with a non-approved cage, even if a cage is not a requirement for the event (ie they deem a non-compliant cage may be more dangerous than no cage at all). Make sure it is CAMS approved.

[LSX-438]

No we dont 'do cages'

However we know some very good folks that do. Ask LSX-438 he has had a good look at ours

indeed!

and very nice too

[fake400r]

indeed!

and very nice too

the guy that dida willall's cage is who i am getting to do the cage in my 34. Work is second to none.

[NickR33]

surely you could get away with a much less comprehensive cage for a track car? (as opposed to one used for tarmac rallies)

most tracks have pretty good run off these days and tyre walls do a pretty good job at absorbing impact... that said there are some places at Sandown I wouldn't want to have something on the car break!

so are you mainly worried about a rollover?

would the 35's benefit from a bit more stiffness... they seem like they're pretty good in that area already?

[Trozzle]

Ah interesting, wasn't aware Leemhuis raced a GT-R....loved playing soccer with his son back in the day and having him turn up occasionally in a Ferrari....hawt