now... will you have to PROVE you own an LFA to get a replacement CF hood prop, or will any schmuck (like me) with several hundred dollars be able to walk into their friendly lexus parts dept and buy one? #lexuslfa
Gas struts are totally the wrong thing for this car. For one thing, you can't easily make one in carbon fiber. But here's the clincher:
Gas struts wear out. Just sitting around they slowly lose their charge over time. That's physics, can't change it. And just sitting around, the prop rod keeps on being a prop rod. It weighs about the same as a single gas strut - a carbon fiber one probably weighs less - and right there you've got a weight savings. One prop rod displaces two heavy, fallible gas struts.
Is a prop rod fallible? Sure. It can rust into nothingness - oops, not this one. It can bend and break under load - oops, you'd have to do something stupid, like bend the car around a phone pole to do that. It can pop out of the catch hole and drop the hood on your head - oops, that's gonna leave a mark. But with $400K invested, you're probably not going to lift the hood outside of your climate-controlled, hermetically sealed, Mafia insured eighteen-space garage. So no wind. The Mafia wouldn't allow it.
At 88 miles an hour, the two solenoid cases pop out of the Alien intake and start eating the oil coolers. #lexuslfa
@Ryanrule: Any car that cost more than $20k shouldn't have a prop rod. That is one of the things that really pissed me off about the wife's Trailblazer, a $34k (sticker) vehicle that uses a damn metal broom stick to hold up the hood. I've driven GM vehicles built from 1973-2004 and it is the only one that can't hold the hood up. Even the lowly G-bodies got proper hood hinges with springs. #lexuslfa
@skaycog: I'm personally a fan of the matte black look. Mainly because I can apply it with a rattle can to my freshly ground, previously rusted 1991 civic hatchback.
I guess that looks nice-but if I was buying a 400k car I'd expect a bit higher tec to hold up the hood than the CF version of a broom stick. This is like having forged titanium handles for your hand-cranked windows. #lexuslfa
@ProstWest: An F40 owner is tugging his rope because he bought and paid for a racing car with license plates, i.e. virtually no human comforts that might sully the power/weight ratio. Plexiglass windows (the early models had sliding door windows), no sound deadening, no carpeting, no power steering or brakes, full racing seats, and etc.-basically no amenities other than AC.
The LFA is designed for and marketed to someone looking for high performance as well as all the highest-tech and greatest creature comforts that his 400,000.00 can buy. Your analogy is like comparing a Veyron to a Le Mans Prototype. Other than that, it was....perfect. #lexuslfa
@powermatic: No, my analogy was like comparing an ultra high performance street car to an ultra high performance street car. Is it perfect to invoke the zenith of Maranello's efforts when discussing a car from the company that brought us the Paseo? Likely not, but let's face it- the Toyota buyer who just left 400 large at the dealership is not checking his own washer fluid. Therefore the engineers made a smart, easy decision and spec'ed the epitome of lightweight engine-bay access technology: the prop rod. Enzo's boys came to the same conclusion, albeit as part of a package that compromised a great deal more than the LFA in areas that actually affect the driver's comfort. #lexuslfa
@powermatic: All right, let me try again, with your gracious encouragement. The car should have a prop rod because it's faster that way. The prospective owner is not negatively impacted by economizing both weight and expenditure in this design area. #lexuslfa
@bzr: Wow. The transparent hood would be a great canvas for some frosted glass etching. Maybe "turbo" tastefully etched diagonally across the entire hood?
@tempesjo: dear god no. im not a fan, of transparent hoods. heres an idea, take your regular hood off if you need to show off your engine bay to the world. #lexuslfa
@autocannibal: But your idea wouldn't cost any money, and goes against the whole foundation of this industry, which is tricking people into buying ridiculous "performance upgrades" for their cars. #lexuslfa
@FrankGrimes: It is the starting point for expensive technology to be integrated into cheaper cars. Like how airbags were once expensive options and now the cheapest econobox has at least two. #lexuslfa
Basically, Toyota has created a automated process that can wrap an aluminum sub-frame in carbon-fiber. Hitherto, sheets of CF where laid out layer-by-layer by hand and permeated with resin before its cured in an autoclave. Toyota has developed an obviously expensive bespoke machine that can weave dry fiber around a three-dimensional object.
The first obvious benefit is that its one contiguous sheet of carbon-fiber and not separate layers. There is an important QA/QC element to any carbon fiber product, this is especially important for load bearing components, and having CF layered one upon the other by hand makes it susceptible to defects like micro-cracking and other errors that can make itself apparent later in the products lifetime.
Secondly, the binding of carbon-fiber to aluminum (or any metal) has always been challenge. The conventional method is using simple threaded inserts that bind the CF to the aluminum. Toyota have found a unique method where it has a flanged collar where the dry fiber is weaved around the aluminum using this machine.
For larger volume production cars, this method is beneficial because it allows for carbon-fiber usage only on components where it is necessary and still allowing the usage of conventional metals like aluminum/steel. Atop that, this method is automated and not done by hand. For future Toyota products, some key-components can use this CF process sparingly to strengthen specific metal components without the raising costs dramatically. #lexuslfa
@Scaramanga: Wow thank you. I thought this was just some stupid machine that simply weaved the fibers to make a carbon fiber pillar for bragging rights.
Thanks to your post I now see the many benefits and respect what a breakthrough it is. #lexuslfa
@Scaramanga: Excellent reply, which once again goes to show that much like the space program, the real point of the LF-A is the inevitable spin-off technology that trickles down to the average Joe. #lexuslfa
@LuciferV8: This will take decades to trickle down. Impressive, but the fact that there are only 2 in the world points to the fact that this is a very complicated process. It is one thing to make 500 for an overprices pseudo supercar, it is a whole other thing to do it on a mass scale. #lexuslfa
@rigidjunkie: There are more than two carbon-weaving rotary looms in the world. See above. There are only two of Toyota's version. You're right, though. It's difficult to conclude - at least from the video - that this technology is scalable to mass-production.
I think the whole "trickle-down" argument for the LFA's existence is a ruse. Toyota uses it to justify to its shareholders, potential customers, and a gullible automotive press the pouring of thousands of man-hours and hundreds of millions of dollars in research and development into things like this loom - which seems to serve no purpose other than constructing a couple of bits for a very limited-production car. This, in turn, is used to justify the $100K-$200K premium over its competition. That premium, in reality, has nothing to do with the superiority of the result, but everything to do with Toyota's attempt to recoup the losses from an excessive, meandering, decade-long exercise in over-engineering. #lexuslfa
@atlasfugged: Good points, I just laugh every time I see another article about this thing, I have even started to use its correct name LAF (pronounced laugh) #lexuslfa
@Racin_G73 - dirt track legend (some day ... maybe): Ah, the memories. My NES and I went through a lot together, from playing RC Pro-Am in grade school to hundreds of hours of RBI II with my roommates in college. When I reclaim the home office, it's going to have a turntable, and I think I'm going to dust off the NES too. #lexuslfa
11/04/09
11/04/09
Gas struts wear out. Just sitting around they slowly lose their charge over time. That's physics, can't change it. And just sitting around, the prop rod keeps on being a prop rod. It weighs about the same as a single gas strut - a carbon fiber one probably weighs less - and right there you've got a weight savings. One prop rod displaces two heavy, fallible gas struts.
Is a prop rod fallible? Sure. It can rust into nothingness - oops, not this one. It can bend and break under load - oops, you'd have to do something stupid, like bend the car around a phone pole to do that. It can pop out of the catch hole and drop the hood on your head - oops, that's gonna leave a mark. But with $400K invested, you're probably not going to lift the hood outside of your climate-controlled, hermetically sealed, Mafia insured eighteen-space garage. So no wind. The Mafia wouldn't allow it.
At 88 miles an hour, the two solenoid cases pop out of the Alien intake and start eating the oil coolers. #lexuslfa
11/04/09
+1 on the gas struts.
Nothing like having marginal ones and finding today was the day it was too cool to hold the hood up when a 2 mph breeze touched it.
/learned not to place hand in hood's travel without a broomstick as a backup hood prop...the hard way #lexuslfa
11/04/09
Supercars are NOT reliable.
11/05/09
This was done for weight alone. And it passed the cost-benefit analysis algorithm that Toyota doubtless subject the entire car to. #lexuslfa
11/05/09
11/04/09
11/04/09
pfft
11/04/09
11/04/09
11/04/09
Civic dx?
Is there any other kind, baby? #lexuslfa
11/04/09
11/04/09
11/04/09
11/04/09
The LFA is designed for and marketed to someone looking for high performance as well as all the highest-tech and greatest creature comforts that his 400,000.00 can buy. Your analogy is like comparing a Veyron to a Le Mans Prototype. Other than that, it was....perfect. #lexuslfa
11/04/09
11/04/09
vaya con dios #lexuslfa
11/04/09
11/04/09
Wow. #lexuslfa
11/04/09
11/04/09
11/04/09
11/04/09
11/04/09
@tempesjo: No, you'll have to get the transparent hood for that! Adds madd street cred too, yo. #lexuslfa
11/04/09
11/04/09
11/04/09
11/04/09
11/04/09
11/02/09
10/30/09
10/30/09
10/30/09
Basically, Toyota has created a automated process that can wrap an aluminum sub-frame in carbon-fiber. Hitherto, sheets of CF where laid out layer-by-layer by hand and permeated with resin before its cured in an autoclave. Toyota has developed an obviously expensive bespoke machine that can weave dry fiber around a three-dimensional object.
The first obvious benefit is that its one contiguous sheet of carbon-fiber and not separate layers. There is an important QA/QC element to any carbon fiber product, this is especially important for load bearing components, and having CF layered one upon the other by hand makes it susceptible to defects like micro-cracking and other errors that can make itself apparent later in the products lifetime.
Secondly, the binding of carbon-fiber to aluminum (or any metal) has always been challenge. The conventional method is using simple threaded inserts that bind the CF to the aluminum. Toyota have found a unique method where it has a flanged collar where the dry fiber is weaved around the aluminum using this machine.
For larger volume production cars, this method is beneficial because it allows for carbon-fiber usage only on components where it is necessary and still allowing the usage of conventional metals like aluminum/steel. Atop that, this method is automated and not done by hand. For future Toyota products, some key-components can use this CF process sparingly to strengthen specific metal components without the raising costs dramatically. #lexuslfa
10/30/09
10/30/09
Thanks to your post I now see the many benefits and respect what a breakthrough it is. #lexuslfa
10/30/09
Very informative, thank you!
*props* #lexuslfa
10/31/09
10/31/09
11/02/09
11/02/09
11/02/09
I think the whole "trickle-down" argument for the LFA's existence is a ruse. Toyota uses it to justify to its shareholders, potential customers, and a gullible automotive press the pouring of thousands of man-hours and hundreds of millions of dollars in research and development into things like this loom - which seems to serve no purpose other than constructing a couple of bits for a very limited-production car. This, in turn, is used to justify the $100K-$200K premium over its competition. That premium, in reality, has nothing to do with the superiority of the result, but everything to do with Toyota's attempt to recoup the losses from an excessive, meandering, decade-long exercise in over-engineering. #lexuslfa
11/03/09
11/06/09
10/30/09
10/30/09
10/31/09
10/30/09
10/30/09
10/30/09
Also, I watched the video and it appears the loom is being run by a second generation ipod. #lexuslfa
10/30/09
@tempesjo: I setup my loom to run off my old NES... I wasn't using it anymore, except to play RC Pro-Am. #lexuslfa
10/30/09