...is something that we might be saying in the not too distant future according to Evo magazine.


"Firms are looking at ways of productionising the process of making carbon" for all makes due to the "many advantages it offers". Weight saving is one of the main incentives as it will help reduce emissions in the eco crazed world we live in.

Already BMW has started making their "production and process cost affective and faster" creating carbon-aluminium monocoque chassis due in 2013.

We'll see but sounds good so far.

 

Lighter is generally better so to that!

TX.

 

Lambo have got a new process for making carbon as strong but much lighter. Their next top end car could weigh less than 1,000kgs - which for a product of VAG is a true featherweight!

 

It's going to take a long time to make it anything like as cheap as steel. Steel Mills just bang out multi-tonne coils by the truck-load for press-shops to bash into bodywork panels. These are just robot-welded together on the production line in a jiffy.

Carbon fibre needs to be formed in an autoclave (oven), fitted with a suitable mould made out of nickel-iron Invar (for best results, but very pricey), or Aluminium or more carbon fibre. It all takes a long time. It then needs to be carefully bonded.

Sure it will seep down the range of cars. I remember visiting the factory in Italy that made the whole tub and bodywork for the Ferrari F50 out of carbon fibre back in the 1990's, so it's nothing new, just needs to get MUCH cheaper. As for a carbon Corsa? I still think some "nice" Halfords accessories are your best bet!

 

...but as they are saying in evo there are new processes coming that will change thing significantly...

 

Im sure i read somewhere the other day that Lambos next supercar will only be 980kgs using carbon everywhere

 

Not sure tbh, the raw material is borderline unavailable when large companies wade in. For example when I was building part of ATLAS (LHC experiment) which had a load of carbon fibre cylinders, there were significant delays because boeing had bought up the global supply. If all the car manufacturers jump on the band wagon, we'll need a much larger supply infrastructure.