Why can you not overcome the light weight

We are really good in cheating physics. Although cars are increasingly heavier, technology to hide their weight improves. Adaptive and active comments, transgressing torque, electronic differences, traction and stability control tools, and crumb brakes constantly make all cars look much lighter than they are. New BMW M3 It weighs about 4000 pounds, but you will not believe this by the way that flies in a corner on the right track.

However, in my experience, you cannot overcome physics. We call them Newton laws For some reason, driving a lightweight car really brings this to a sharp concentration.

Welcome to RabbitA column every two weeks, where a great editor Chris Berkins explores his latest car obsession with car technology. He talks to the best work to understand how cars work and how the future of cars looks.

This car is really lightweight. It is the Porsche 912 that was restored by the 1966 Hungarian company Kamm Manufaktur. Its founder, Miklós Kázmér, bought 912 to do what many do with these cars-take out the four-standing standard and put a 911 engine hot.

But lower weight and weight distribution better for the four cylinders 912 magic, wondered to what extent could take one. The answer is “very”.

Kamm claims 1,654 pounds amazing for this 912 ° C. This is about 700 lighter lbs lighter than a new maiata, and this car is in some of the specifications of “round”, complete with the electric air conditioning that works well. “C” in 912c returns to carbon fibers, and most of the body of this car is made of things, except for the ceiling and rear fenders. Kamm will build a full carbon car, which knocks on an additional 100 pounds.

“I knew that it was from a 2.0 -liter engine I will not be able to get a tremendous power without the turbocharged shipment,” explains Kázmér. “So I had to lose weight.”

Kázmér is not the first to face this problem. Each establishment of a race car, when it is against effective energy limit, must search elsewhere for speed. The Cologne Chapman’s obsession with weight came from not reaching the most powerful engines in the first days of the Lotus team.

There are two large liters as much as you can go with a 616 -type Porsche before you end up with something that does not simply want to review. Don’t forget, this is a pushrod engine. Kamm’s all went with these four flat, with a claim of 190 hp in 6800 Revs, more than twice the original 90 hp. You have got strangled and modern engine management system with two motor modes, and “Drove Me Crazy”, which increases the stifling map and opens the exhaust valves.

It is a very powerful engine given its roots, but it also plays in a world where 911 Restomods own more than 400 hp. To get the maximum benefit from the entire package, you need to lose weight.

On an early summer day outside New York City, the clear thing immediately with 912c is riding quality. This, of course, by intention – Kázmér wanted something from a tour of a tour, 912C features an electronic adjustable unit – but it is also a natural secondary result of low weight. Engineers often talk about the virtuous cycle to reduce weight.

Less weight means working less for suspension, so you can use a tape less than spring, inhibitory and anti -state. This also means that you need less tires, which cuts the weight itself and improves the quality of the passengers, and the same with the brakes. The benefit of reducing weight compounds on itself.

I took 912 on the ways I know well. These rural roads in the suburbs can be suffocated by a little traffic, but they are not very far from New York City, and many of them have a large limit in a speed of 55 miles per hour. They are the ways of its fuel in my private car – the Volkswagen Golf Golf 2017 – its boyfriend cars, and many loaned car manufacturers.

There is no car with any sports allegations that made bumps and defects here look very important. You can seize sections of the road where it disappears instinctively, knowing what it will feel when you roll. But there is no need in 912c. Even with adjustable residue in its most solid settings, they are just buoys on them.

This, I think, is where you really feel the difference. It may seem that the M3, which I mentioned in the beginning may challenge its weight, has become great, but it is cruel. Feel the amount of work on the comment to keep the mass under control. Hell, even my GTI is not a heavy car, but it can’t do what 912C do. The active suspension systems are just like those in Ferrari and Porsche to what a truly lightweight car can do, but there are often moments when you feel weight.

Modern suspension, brakes and tires do a very good job to control weight, but it’s completely impossible to hide it. The first time I led Ferressi Borussang, it was detonated by controlling the amazing body, and most of the time, I forgot that I was in four -wheel drive vehicles. However, under braking, you suddenly feel that you are very heavy, and that the car is making a ton to control it. I had a similar sensation path that tested Taycan Turbo GT, but this may be exaggerated from the speed that does not soften that car in particular.

That moment does not come in a car like this. It is not as if 912c is too slow-the ratio of power to weight is almost the same as Porsche 718 Cayman S. You will not have a problem with a new Cayman to keep pace with new Cayman, with Yokohama tires with an area of 195 years.

The Kamm is proudly shown the Kamm car. The motor of the car and the front fenders has a beautiful transmission between the shiny shiny carbon fibers and the paint that you cannot feel by hand. The hood is placed by two hungry, such as motorsport, and its engraved aluminum joints. There is no sacrifice or anything that it also carries.

Inside, there is a wonderful carbon fiber trim for custom door cards, rush, and seat spots, but they are not Spartan here. There is also green leather in this particular car, and deads such as the hidden Bluetooth sound system, wireless phone charger, and the pre -mentioned A/C system.

Of course, you will have to pay greatly for this light weight, 350,000 euros ($ 410,000) in addition to the cost of the donor. A lot of money, unless you have a very specific itching of scratching.

But from something to try, a good reminder of what you can do the weight of the car.

It was easier to get a lightweight car. The original miniature weighs more than 1,300 pounds, and it was considered a small family car. Now, light weight is a type of specialized object. You need Miata, or if you are lucky enough to live where it is sold, which is the Alpine A110. Both are about 2,400 pounds, which, although today’s standards are low, nothing is like old, lightweight schools, but both have this wonderful liquidity of real light weight.

All of these cars, from MIATA of $ 30,000 to $ 400,000-912C, reveal an important fact-you can not overcome the law. Newton’s laws, at least.