Daily Slideshow: A Look At Top Fuel's Insane S2K Racer
This highly-tuned S2000 is amongst the best in the time attack world.
The Start of a Journey
Back in the mid-2000's, Japanese tuning specialist Top Fuel began developing a turbocharger kit for the F20C Honda S2000 engine. In order to effectively evaluate the real world power gains provided by the turbo, lead technician Mr. Morimoto and Top Fuel team opted to take their test car to the racetrack to establish a performance baseline in a relatively controlled environment. While their initial goal may have been to fine tune their products that would eventually be sold to S2K enthusiasts, it led them down a path that would see them competing in time attack competitions against some of the best cars and tuners in the world.
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Blistering Pace
Top Fuel's S2000 quickly switched from a development car into a full-on track build as they set out to contest the rear-wheel-drive record at the Tsukuba Circuit. Their car had been boosted to nearly 600 horsepower and was mated to a sequential transmission and featured numerous goodies like the wide-body kit of their own design that was made entirely of carbon fiber and moved massive amounts of air for maximum grip. Coined the 'Type-RR Turbo AP1,' Top Fuel would eventually hold the RWD lap record at Tsukuba in their S2K that weighed several hundred pounds less than a stock AP1, yet produced 2.5 times the horsepower.
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A Legendary Partnership
The economic downturn and subsequent financial crisis hit Japan hard in 2008-2009 (as it did for most industrialized countries), so Top Fuel decided to shelve the project for the obvious costs associated with racing. Fast forward several years to 2011 and the Top Fuel team was enticed to get back in the game with their Type-RR, but this time they had their sights on competing in the World Time Attack Championship (WTAC). That said, they felt their already tricked-out S2000 would need some serious upgrades in order to fight for victory, so not only would they have performed work to do on their end, but would need to enhance the aero package as well. For this, they would partner with the legendary Japanese aerodynamic company, Voltex.
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Its All In The Air
Voltex's president, Akihiro Nakajima, had apparently been working on the ultimate S2K aero design when approached by Top Fuel, so the partnership was ultimately a match made in heaven. Pulling from his years spent in Formula 1, Akihiro and his team quickly got to work by fitting a new wide-body aero kit to the car that included an entirely new front bumper (with a radical splitter and layered dive planes), super-wide fenders with accompanying side skirts, a massive rear diffuser and an equally enormous wing. The car was then placed in the wind tunnel to ensure maximum downforce with minimum drag. With the aerodynamic package checked off the list, Top Fuel upped the ante with additional modifications of their own.
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Pumping The Power
The engine underwent a complete rebuild in which the block was sleeved with Darton ductile iron cylinders in the standard 87mm bore, but the motor was stroked with a Brian Crower 97mm crankshaft for a new displacement of 2.3 liters. Chrome-moly forged connecting rods were coupled with CP 9:1 compression pistons. Top Fuel left their previous cylinder head intact but simply gave it a refresh before reassembly. To take advantage of the extra displacement, a larger Garrett GTX3582R turbocharger pushing 32 psi of boost was fitted to a Top Fuel exhaust manifold. The air charge is cooled by a beefy HKS front-mount intercooler before making its way into the stock intake manifold. Sunoco 260GT Plus 104 octane race fuel is pumped through a set of 1,000cc/min Bosch fuel injectors which are controlled by an HKS F-CON V Pro engine management system. These upgrades netted Morimoto and his Top Fuel team an additional 165 horsepower to make for a total of 765 ponies at 7,600 rpm while producing 587 lb-ft of torque at 6,700 rpm.
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Harnessing The Beast
To cope with the aero upgrades and additional power output, the suspension and drivetrain components were revamped. A set of fully adjustable Endless Zeal Function coilovers that were revalved by Top Fuel and fitted with custom Eibach spring rates were installed on the car as were Ikeya Formula control arms. Endless forged monoblock 4-piston brake calipers were fitted to each corner along with 2-piece floating Endless rotors. The gear ratios were altered by installing an all-new RD6S Holinger sequential transmission and the clutch was beefed up with an ATS carbon twin disc clutch setup. The rear-end is a limited-slip unit out of a Mazda FD3S RX-7. The extra flare of the widebody allows a set of 18x11" Advan TCIII wheels with 295/35 Advan A050 tires to fully fill the fender wells.
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A majesty to behold
The Top Fuel-Voltex S2000 was completed just in time to compete in the 2012 WTAC event, but with only minimal testing, victory eluded them as they finished a respectable fifth place. Driver Nobuteru Taniguchi and the team kept plugging away at the 2013 WTAC event as well as the 2013 HKS Premium Day event to fine tune the car, but their spot in the limelight would finally come at the 2014 HKS Premium Day when they set a new tuning car lap record of 1:40.195. As time passes, records are inevitably broken as tuners push the performance envelope to extreme levels. Their Fuji record would eventually fall, but the Top Fuel S2K would resurface again in 2016 at Tsukuba Circuit where Nob Taniguchi was once again pushing close to record pace. The hunt for speed is an endless journey, but thanks to the awesome work of tuners like Top Fuel-Voltex, car enthusiasts are treated to some incredible technology and exciting racing. Rest assured that this screaming S2K is lurking and waiting for the right moment to ambush a lap record or two in due time.
>>Join the conversation about the Top Fuel S2000 right here in the S2ki Forum!