R-Developments http://www.r-developments.com Better Faster Harder Stronger Tue, 15 Jan 2013 10:56:03 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 2011 what a year! http://www.r-developments.com/2011/12/2011-what-a-year/ http://www.r-developments.com/2011/12/2011-what-a-year/#comments Fri, 30 Dec 2011 12:17:04 +0000 Bas http://www.r-developments.com/?p=1779 img_1138 At the end of 2011 it’s time to look back on the year. And what a year it was, starting off i would like to thank all our suppliers and customers for their business. We are very pleased to see a large number of returning and new customers. Resulting in a good year for R-developments, for 2012 we want to expand our business even more then in 2011. Our main objective being tuning cars for circuit and street. Consequently, we believe a car needs to be balanced; its power, handling, reliability, feel, comfort all need to be balanced together to provide an enjoyable driving experience. A successful circuit car is not always the most powerful one, but the one which has the best overall balance and is consistent.

Thus we are committed to bringing you proven, high quality products. We realize that every situation and need is different and we are committed to helping you find the best solution for your needs. For 2012 we are going to expand the product range but our mission will remain the same, bringing you the best the market has to offer!

Last but not least we would like to thank everyone (you know who you are) that helped us get to the point we are at. And we hope that 2012 will bring us an even better year!

Through this way we would like to wish everyone a successful and healthy 2012!

Team R-developments!

 

]]> http://www.r-developments.com/2011/12/2011-what-a-year/feed/ 0 The Numbers http://www.r-developments.com/2011/11/the-numbers/ http://www.r-developments.com/2011/11/the-numbers/#comments Fri, 11 Nov 2011 16:05:23 +0000 Bas http://www.r-developments.com/?p=1760 img_1140 Time for some numbers, thats what many of you where thinking! Well yesterday it was time to run the car in and afterwards do some power runs. It was quite a stressful day. We started around 14:30 @ DP Engineering Nijmegen where they have a great Dyna Pack Hub Dyno, Martijn took place in the passenger seat to work his magic. First task ahead was slowly run the car in on low revs. Allowing for the block to run in. Everything went quite okay, but soon we found we had a small cooling issue. The temperature sensor of the water pump controller was in the wrong place. Resulting in very big temperature drops and rises. Luckely Dave and Pieter came up with a solutions, and in 1 hour time we where back up and running! My Honda is now equipped with a Peugeot part ;-) .

As it was getting kinda late, it was time for food. After a good healthy meal (ROFL) we continued mapping the car up to 5k rpm without Vtec. Then it was time for an oil change and Refuel of the car. As the E85 Bio Ethanol was running out quickly. After some fresh oil and E85 it was ready for the first steps into the Vtec area.

Then it was time for the more serious stuff, POWER RUNS! The power build up of the engine is great. And the engine feels really responsive, you can see that Ian @ Clockwise worked his magic on the engine. The peak torque of 269.2 N/m is @ 7300 Rpm, the max power is @ 8300 Rpm resulting in a whopping 300,3 bhp (255,3 @ the hubs) NA power. I’m very very please with the results, a picture of the dyne sheet (going to scan it soon as well for higher quality):

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Time for some video:

]]> http://www.r-developments.com/2011/11/the-numbers/feed/ 0 It’s Alive! http://www.r-developments.com/2011/10/its-alive-2/ http://www.r-developments.com/2011/10/its-alive-2/#comments Sat, 29 Oct 2011 08:41:07 +0000 Bas http://www.r-developments.com/?p=1755 Yesterday the heart of the project Finally came alive, after 3 years of hard work and countless of hours of labour we’ve been rewarded with a proper first startup.
As video’s say more then words:

Please keep checking the site for video’s and updates on the trackday Civic… DP Engineering here we come ;-) .

img_1096 ]]> http://www.r-developments.com/2011/10/its-alive-2/feed/ 0 The spagetti incident http://www.r-developments.com/2011/10/the-spagetti-incident/ http://www.r-developments.com/2011/10/the-spagetti-incident/#comments Thu, 13 Oct 2011 06:56:13 +0000 Bas http://www.r-developments.com/?p=1740 civic-bas-van-melis-012-1 Not only the 5th  (quite dissapointing)  albumof the legendary rock band Guns N’ Roses, but also what comes to mind when i think of electronics. A chaos of wires running everywhere, cuts, solderings, stripped out looms, all potentials failures when doing trackday racing. A faulty piece of wiring can easaly ruin your € 400 trackday, resulting in a failed day and a lot of aggravation and stress.

 

So after discussing the issue’s with Martijn @ Bekerom Tuning we decided that we needed a full custom loom. We then turned to Patrick beek @ Beek Classic wire as he is well known for making full custom wiring looms for several, Race, Rally and Classic cars. He starts with a blank canvas when creating the wiring loom, so no cutting, old wiring and faulty connectors. He uses a modular fuse box as a base, that consists of all fuses, relais, mini ralais and maxi fuses.

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He uses full motorsport spec wiring and connectors, as some of you might have noticed the car has a detachable front. So thats why we are using connectors to be able to take it off when neccesary. If you interested in a wiring loom for your car be sure to give Patrick a ring, currently my car is still on the lift and pictures of the end result will follow asap! As you know the electrics where the last critical issue on the to do list, so when these are finished the Dyno vids will follow very soon! some more pictures:

]]> http://www.r-developments.com/2011/10/the-spagetti-incident/feed/ 1 Day at the races http://www.r-developments.com/2011/10/day-at-the-races/ http://www.r-developments.com/2011/10/day-at-the-races/#comments Sun, 02 Oct 2011 18:27:49 +0000 Bas http://www.r-developments.com/?p=1721 img_1024 Today we had a great day @ Spa Francorchamps we where invited by the Spirit Racing Team. Check their website: www.spirit-racing.nl we had a look around on the paddock… Well i should say we had a drool around the paddock, jeeez those guys do have the material!  The sound of the cars reflecting from the hills in the ardennen gave me sheer goosebumps! It was also cool to see our windows being used by many teams on the paddock i.e.. Spirit Racing, FE racing, Penucci Racing and many other teams. It’s always nice to see where the products end up.

We even got a crash course in Data logging by their personal Data log analyst!

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Walking around in the paddock I’ve often noticed that a lot of teams are struggling finding a decent way to mount bumpers, splitters etc. etc. Some use Dzus clips, others use tie wraps and a few where even using bolts which take massive time in case of a pit stop. We’ve been searching for a proper system to use as quick release, after looking at SRR quick release kits and some others we came across a nice QuickLatch system. After receiving some samples i got really excited about the system so we ordered some to see if you like them as much as us!

Some pictures:

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The ball fits to the bodywork and the disc fits inside your bumper (flush) it’s a 1 button click on click off and they can take a lot of weight so there are no issue’s when getting a severe beating!

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They click of in virtually 1 second and click on in the same time!

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All materials used are finished to high standards. If your interested in a set for your car send an inquiry to: info@r-developments.com they retail at € 45,= for a set of 2.
We are also finishing our EK trackday project very soon, at the moment a complete new designed wiring loom is being made up, more updates later this week!

Keep checking the site!

Team R-developments!

 

]]> http://www.r-developments.com/2011/10/day-at-the-races/feed/ 0 Fast Car Festival 2011 http://www.r-developments.com/2011/08/fast-car-festival-2011/ http://www.r-developments.com/2011/08/fast-car-festival-2011/#comments Tue, 30 Aug 2011 06:14:50 +0000 Bas http://www.r-developments.com/?p=1682 fast-car-21 Last weekend the first Fast Car Festival was held at the Zandvoort circuit in Holland. The Fast Car Festival is host to the Toyo Tires Superlap series, a new serie similar to time attack but not car-brand depending events and with different class regulations. We wanted to present the Trackday Civic fisnished at this festival, unfortunatily the wiring loom was a big hurdle to take in the short time span. So we decided to “skip” this event and hopefully present the car in the near future. Luckily Frank van Koppen was more then willing to take my place in the superlap battle with his Integra type R. As you can see in the picture on the left.

Unfortunatily the whole of summer in Holland has been somehow of a let down, rain rain and ooh yeah it rained as well. This day was no exception, but a lot of people where there to check out the racing and cars that where on display. @ the R-developments pitbox we had a great time, through this way i want to thank Kay, Robert, Theo, Johan, Martin, Frank and Machiel for the great time.

An overview of the pitbox:

SONY DSC SONY DSC SONY DSC

Robert (the driver of the EG SIR) was well pleased with his 2:04 time on a damp circuit, a great result!

SONY DSC fast-car-23 SONY DSC

2 fried rice please :-) .

I was passenger on Kay’s 20 minute track session, we had a great time driving the Civic D16 turbo around te track,

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Frank on his “hot lap”:

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Overall we had a great day driving the cars @ Fast Car Festival, the gallery of the day can be found below.

Pictures used in this article are taken by: DJ CRX, Dimer van Santen photography, LF photography

]]> http://www.r-developments.com/2011/08/fast-car-festival-2011/feed/ 0 With a little help from my friends http://www.r-developments.com/2011/08/with-a-little-help-from-my-friends/ http://www.r-developments.com/2011/08/with-a-little-help-from-my-friends/#comments Mon, 08 Aug 2011 05:59:13 +0000 Bas http://www.r-developments.com/?p=1656 img_0016 Get by with a little help from my friends, thats the best way to describe last weekend. It always makes me think of the Joe Cocker track. Last weekend we worked on the Trackday Civic as we are trying to get the car ready for the Superlap event. A few weeks ago i asked a few of my friends if they had time to help out and do a little work on the car. As most of you know i’m handicapped and can’t do all the work myself. So it goes without saying that i want to thank, Kay, Johan, Theo, B-eg, Snobbert, Kevin and Machiel for helping me this weekend on the car. We started work on saturday 09:00 and worked until around 23:00, saturday there was a lot of fabrication to the floorboard. As i’m using an AP Racing Pedal Box we needed to modify a lot to make it drivable, worth it? Yes! Because it’s turned out to be rather nice. As pictures say more the words i’ll just put a gallery below so you can have a look at what we’ve done!

 

On sunday (page 2 and 3 of the gallery) the car started to come together, all parts and tabbed up parts where falling into place. This may sound a bit gay but the car was really evolving into a proper trackday car! Some highlights:

The Pedal box, with linkage system and the brake reservoirs fully bled for use!

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The tank breather system / external fire extinguisher handle are placed in the filler cap to prevent jokers pulling the T-cable on a car park.

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The almost finished engine bay…

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Most of the Fuel and brake lines in place…

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I hear you thinking, why haven’t we got (dyno) video’s yet? Well there is quite some work left I.E. the interior electrics (which are in the trusted hands of Martijn @ Bekerom Tuning). Putting some Bio Ethanol in the tank, and a lot of small finishing touches. We’re aiming to finish the car for a test day on the 24th of august and then compete in the Superlap event. But we’re only going to compete if the car is up to our standards, as a saying goes “you can only make one first impression”  so lets make it a good one!

Joe Cocker song :-)

]]> http://www.r-developments.com/2011/08/with-a-little-help-from-my-friends/feed/ 1 Another day at the office… http://www.r-developments.com/2011/07/another-day-at-the-office/ http://www.r-developments.com/2011/07/another-day-at-the-office/#comments Sun, 31 Jul 2011 17:38:00 +0000 Bas http://www.r-developments.com/?p=1644 adato2 It’s been a while since our last update. Mainly because we have been working to get our garage / warehouse ready for use. Together with Bekerom Tuning we’ve moved into our new premises. With our new garage we can offer a wide range of services to our customers, being track preparation (corner weighing, alignment, fitting Intrax suspension, brake overhauls etc. etc.), engine swaps / engine modifications and fitment of lightweight lexan windows. Please enquire with your wishes!

An overview of our workshop:

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We’ve also been working on the trackday Civic trying to get the car ready for the Superlap event the 28th of august. We are pushing hard but we have quite some work ahead of us.

Some pictures of the progress:

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The new floor plate ready to be mounted in the car, we will mount the AP racing pedal box to this plate.

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The Switch panel where all buttons will be mounted so the driver can easily reach them when strapped in the Willans harnesses. Jos Combee is currently incorporating the switch panel with the oem dash console. Afterwards everything will be of course fully flocked. If your interested in flocking your dash (or other interior parts) please enquire via our contact form or email info@r-developments.com. More updates to come soon!

]]> http://www.r-developments.com/2011/07/another-day-at-the-office/feed/ 0 May update http://www.r-developments.com/2011/05/may-update/ http://www.r-developments.com/2011/05/may-update/#comments Fri, 27 May 2011 08:50:09 +0000 Bas http://www.r-developments.com/?p=1632 It’s been a while since our last update, mainly because we have been really busy expanding the business. And due to a couple of long term projects. Short to say things are going well. Together with Bekerom Tuning we’ve recently signed a rental contract for our new garage. At the moment we are decorating the garage and putting all tools in place.

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Furthermore we did a set of custom lexan windows for the State of Art Classic Porsche team, they are going to do several Rally’s using our lexan window kits.

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Last but not least we started work on Thomas his trackday Integra, this car started life as a DTCC Integra (Dutch Touring Car Class). But due to it’s hard use (70.000 trackday km’s) Thomas decided it was time to change a few things in the setup. Starting off with a full suspension overhaul, Thomas decided he wanted to stick to Rubber bushings so we sourced him a set of Hardrace Bushings for the Integra. Hardrace is a company that specializes in replacement hard rubber bushings. At the rear we installed a set of Function 7 lower arms, combined with an ingalls camber correction kit. In the front a Skunk 2 Pro camber correction kit was installed. A picture of the overhauled front lower arm, please also note the R-developments Castor rings for increased castor on the front:

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Furthermore he wanted to loose the original Fuel tank, to be replaced by an ATL one, complete with Swirl pot and Custom Fuel lines, Furthermore we decided to upgrade the engine side of the Fuel system as well using an AEM Fuel rail. In the near future we will also upgrade the engine, starting off with an Edelbrock Performer X intake, bigger Throttle body and a set of wilder cams, with spring and retainers and ofcourse a retune by our inhouse tuner Martijn van de Bekerom @ Bekerom tuning. Some pictures:

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Please be sure to check back for more updates :-) .

]]> http://www.r-developments.com/2011/05/may-update/feed/ 0 Charged EP3 http://www.r-developments.com/2011/04/charged-ep3/ http://www.r-developments.com/2011/04/charged-ep3/#comments Sat, 23 Apr 2011 08:50:51 +0000 Bas http://www.r-developments.com/?p=1617 dp5 Who remembers the “Razor sharp EP3″? Last year we hooked Hans up with a proper Intrax 1k2 trackday suspension kit. Hans is a no nonsense guy and if he works on his car he does it right or doesn’t do it at all. In his search for a quick trackday car he was looking for some more power. as he wanted to retain the “power build up” and rev happiness of the K20A2 we opted for a TTS charger kit (which R-developments is the Dutch distributer for). Hans bought the system and over the winter he installed everything. Including the custom intercooler and an awesome custom aluminium radiator.

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Last thursday we went to DP engineering in Nijmegen to setup the car on benelux his only hub Dynapack. An ideal Dyno where you can tune the car in optima forma. Martijn @ Bekerom Tuning was responsible for the tune. And the results, well what can we say, a whopping 396 bhp @ the hubs and 456,6 bhp @ the crank. Great figures keeping in mind that the engine is still a bone stock engine with no work done to the bottom end or head. Only some bolt ons like the R-developments Baffle sump and RBC intake. A little video of the dyno session:

If your interested in a TTS supercharger system for your car please do not hesitate to send us an email on: info@r-developments.com or use the contact form on the website!

]]> http://www.r-developments.com/2011/04/charged-ep3/feed/ 0