Quote:
Originally Posted by Occasionally6
Perhaps it's worth some indication of how much weight is in doors to be saved. On a 1400kg 4-door car I have weighed the empty door shells: 20kg front; 18kg rear.
In terms of safety, a foam filled, double skinned door in composite could be pretty good I think. I'm undecided about the value of a - triangular - tube frame inside the door linking the hinges and door latch.
|
Again though, there are so many other panels on the car that are WAY cheaper and easier than the doors. Once you do the battery, wheels, roof, quarter panels, hood, and trunk in CF, and then racing seats (still better bang for the buck than CF doors, especially if you're going to add foam or other reinforcement), then maybe you can look at the doors.
The carbon doors I've seen are something like 2k each, never seen one under 1k. Let's say you can do all 4 doors for 6k, and somehow your windows and whatever still fit. Now you need to make some custom crash bars most likely, plus maybe some foam so fragments of composite don't stab you if you get hit from the side. You said your doors were 38kg total, so let's say you can drop 25kg from that. That's about 200 dollars per pound.
For 200 dollars per pound savings, there are more things than what I listed above that would be easier to install than a CF door. For example, aluminum brake calipers or aluminum hat rotors. Aluminum suspension arms. Lightly used secondhand coilovers. Titanium exhaust parts (you can drop about 1 pound for 100 dollars from aluminized steel parts).
Don't get me wrong, doors are a really big place to save on, but it's only for the really serious dieter. If you can make your own door for a reasonable cost and amount of time, then sure but I would guess not many people are capable of that.