What is it?
When we first drove the Radical RXC it wasn’t difficult to spot its weakness. So superb was its chassis balance and so eye-popping the level of downforce available from that Le Mans-style bodywork, it was clear before the tyres were warm that the car could handle more than its current 350bhp. A lot more. This, the new Radical RXC500, is the answer.
You’d think the clue was in the title, but in fact the new car has 530bhp, courtesy of a new 3.5-litre Ford Ecoboost motor breathing through a pair of water-cooled Garrett GT28 turbochargers.
Although the all aluminium engine is a stock Ford part – indeed you can buy one for your F150 Pick Up - Radical has developed the plenum intake to incorporate 12 fuel injectors instead of the usual six. Radical has also come up with its own twin-phase wastegate actuators for more precise boost management and heat shields to contain the additional heat of the engine.
The rest of the car is as before, with a carbon-steel spaceframe chassis clad in composite bodywork which, with the carbonfibre rear wing, generates 900kg of downforce at 185mph. The pushrod suspension is by double wishbones all round, while braking comes courtesy of four chunky fully floating discs clamped by six-piston calipers.Radical’s primary goal for the car is to use it to extend the company's 10-year reign as holders of the Nürburgring lap record for a road car.
Radical first broke the record in 2005 with an SR8 LM driven by Michael Vergers, who went on to set the existing record of 6min 48sec in the same car in 2009. The attempt will take place in August with an as yet unnamed driver at the wheel.
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bomb
Looks like an 80's Group C2
jmd67
13" wheels?
jmd67
13" wheels?
eseaton
Great, no doubt, in so many
Peter Cavellini
Ho hum........
Peter Cavellini.
russ13b
silly question, but...
TBC
F40
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