Kraft Haus Technik (Completed company)

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##1966 Brooklands

By the year 1965 Kraft Haus was doing well, epanding it’s facilities and improving on the assembly line. The next logical step was to finally try themselves out in motorsport. Research was quickly done, and the upcoming 1966 BRC season in Britain was chosen as the debut venue. Kaspar Becker, one of company’s founders and test driver, was chosen to be the representing pilot, and the build commenced. None of the cars KHT produced at the time were a viable option, so a brand new chassis, now a monocoque type was created. Power was supplied by the now proven reliable Typ 850 5 liter V8, modified and finetuned, coupled with a new Getrag supplied 5 speed manual transmission. Materials specialist Claus Hoch insisted on a full aluminium body, instead of the preferred fiberglass before it, and working together with chief designer Viktor came up with a MR body. The MR layout was chosen seeing great success of Colin Chapman’s team lotus racecars, and despite company’s lack of experience in building MR cars, the result pleased everybody. At the same time the race car was built, it was deemed wasteful to build a racecar exclusively for the track, so at the the facilities were also modified to mass produce the road going version. The name Brooklands and the racecars’ British Racing Green colour were chosen in respect of the country that hosted the championship.

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A fully restored road going Brooklands at a classic car meet in 2015

The road going version hit the market at the same time the BRC season started, powered by the same v8, although slightly de-tuned to run on lower octane fuel, it still produced 250 hp, which was good enough to propel a 1.150 kg car to 100km in 5.3 seconds and top out at 245kph. Returning a 15 liter / 100km fuel consumption. Priced at $46,000 it was still selling extremely well, and is now regarded as the car that really shaped the Kraft Haus Technik into the company it is today. Unlike the racing version the road going car had aerodynamic enhancements front and back, better cooling, wider tires, comfortable sporty interior and highly improved safety, re-worked design, although, still no in car entertainment. This was explained as “All the entertainment you will need is the driving experience”. Also for no apparent reason, the British Racing Green used by the racing version was not available as a colour for the road cars.

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Private owned road going Brooklands, used in vintage racing events regulary. 2012

Exposure gained in the BRC proved a successful marketing strategy, as this put Kraft Haus Technik on the map and right into crosshairs of bigger car companies.

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Can I roleplay that KHT Brooklands in street-legal spec is in Airborne’s car collection? (placed at museum in “Collector’s Base”, which is another addition to main building, features for example AMW Vulture V8)

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Sure, go ahead. Also you should have a separate thread where you post cars that are in your museum :slight_smile: Pics and everything, and why you put those in the museum, maybe some history on that specific car that’s in the museum etc etc

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Great photoshop work there! I should really ask you do to something for Automationeer… oh… wait… :stuck_out_tongue:

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Yeah you really should… :sunglasses: :stuck_out_tongue:

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##2016 Diabolica

In late October 2016, as AMWEC 16 season was slowly coming to an end Kraft Haus Technik and Gryphon Gear finally revealed the Diabolica. Based off a Sepang chassis with a number of additions and revisions, and not even pretending to be eligible for any racing series, the machine was built with one guideline only - it should be fast. The nature of the collaboration between two rivaling companies was also revealed. As an experience exchange program KHT allowed GG access to a wide array of contacts and facilities and man power, while GG provided the know-how, expertise and a new perspective on how more speed can be achieved. The exercise was beneficial to both parties, but instead of tedious seminars, the approach chosen was building a joint project.

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The result is a carbon fibre chassis covered in carbon fiber body, with active aerodynamics, suspension and cooling. Powered by a GG tuned v8f series twinturbocharged 6.3 liter engine producing 1238hp, and weighing exactly the same. Run from 0-100km/h is dealt with in 2.6 seconds, aided by the launch control courtesy of Gryphon Gear bespoke management system, crafted by Waxwell. Top speed of 372 kph, which is reached in just under a mile of straight line acceleration. Keeping things planted is the new pushrod suspension, not available to the original Sepang chassis, set up on Nordschleife, Bathurst and Spa Franchorchamps, and should things get too fast - upgraded AP1 spec carbon brakes put things to a halt and making many unprepared people in need of a paper bag. The new body is a work of the Kraft Haus Technik design team, as well as all the hydraulic systems, chassis and interior. 6 speed double clutch sequential transmission is an outsourced bespoke unit. Most of the interior is also naked carbon fibre, includes racing bucket seats, an AP1 spec steering wheel and instrument cluster. Unlike the racing cars this derived from, the Diabolica spots a basic in car entertainment system, created by Gryphon Gears’s ICE designer Boden.

At the presentation of the car motoring journalists were once again given the chance to be driven around the track by KHT and GG test drivers Miles Phillips and Kai Kristensen. The two, however got competitive in the process, trying to one-up each other, as Nurburgring GP (where the presentation was held) times tumbled. A few days after the presentation the car has been given a proper battle christening, as Kai took the car around the Nordschleife scoring a 6:36.48, smashing the record for the production derived cars, taking the crown away from the Zonda R. Weeks after than, Kraft Haus test pilot Phillips went on to set an unofficial dunsfold lap time of 1:05,33. Through out the next couple of months, the car was sent to various tracks, setting laptimes.

Disappointing to the richest petrolheads of the world, the car is a one off, and was never meant to be produced to be sold to the public. Few motoring journalists were allowed to drive it, as well as a few racing drivers in promotional campaigns. Of which most notable are Jay Leno, Chris Harris, Jeremy Clarkson, Sebastian Vettel, David Coulthard and a few more. Despite the best efforts from Pastor Maldonado’s manager, he was not given the option to drive the car, which resulted in a tweet war, but that is another story.

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Lap times of the Diabolica

Nordschleife - 6:36.48
Spa Franchorchamps - 2:34.35
Dunsfold - 1:05.33
Tsukuba - 54.22
Imola - 1:39.69

Credit to Strop for engine, cahssis and supension tune, as well as these awesome photoshops. Gryphon Gear can be found right here link

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Maybe you could bulit a road legal version and sold it to public. That would be interesting.

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How many were build? Because… it will be a shame… if something bad happened… to the car…

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This would require all the v8f engines to go through special tratments, assembly lines to be modified, outsourcing a large scale CF body and chassis contract, striking a deal with a major tire manufacturer to make tires to spec, outsource gearboxes, mass produce the electronics and the newly implemented hydraulics. As a result, I believe we would lose money on each one we sell.

The one in the picture is chassi #001, the last chassis of the Diabolica series? :smiley:

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Oh neat, imgur actually hosts it full size. I would encourage everybody who has the connection for it to do so, I literally painted the carbon-weave and its varying grain on, and it was a PITA :smiley:

(Fullsize was originally 2560pp but that would have been excessive for most except, say, Lordred).

I am loving the details of this writeup, like barring Maldonado from driving the car. Twitter wars are something our company gets pulled into a bit too frequently :stuck_out_tongue:

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Honestly, the effort you put into your pictures is worthy of its own award. The detail is fantastic, and your cars look so good. I can’t get enough of the Sepang, c’est tres bien!

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http://images.akamai.steamusercontent.com/ugc/50979744345046697/8AEF3DF9F586093A86CABBED4D356717B08FFF65/

THANKS! :smiley: I just think cars on the same backdrop using regular in game wheels get boring too fast, that’s why I started doing this :slight_smile:

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I really wish I had the skill to edit pictures like that (or the patience :laughing: ) Love the car as well

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##1968 Mulsanne prototype

Looking at the surprising success of Brooklands road going version, which was brought on by a mix of a much desired sportscar by the population and it’s moderate success in BRC 1966 Kraft Haus Technik saw an opportunity to capitalize on that philosophy. A racing chassis was built, utilizing much of Brookland’s technology. A steel monocoque chassis now featured double wishbone suspension in the front and a MacPherson strut in the back to make more room in the engine compartment. The same v8 pushrod 5 liter engine that was featured in the BRC spec Brooklands found it’s way into the back of the Mulsanne prototype, now mounted longitudaly, instead of transversely. The body was an all aluminium job, with the design being the final work of Kraft Haus Techniks’ designer Ralf Hoch was completed with the help of his protege Marco Noto, who took over the KHT design team in late 1967.

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The 1968 prototype was first built as a potent race car, with all the fine-tuning done on the track, before toning it all down to the street version, which was scheduled to be launched a few years later, as Brooklands’ sales were still good, and introducing a rival product to it’s own successful one was not a good idea. The BRC spec engine was allowed a better flowing intake and a better flowing exhaust, which were used to restrict the power down to comply with the BRC reglament, now boasting 290hp instead of 260. a 5 speed transmission received different gearing, and a contract with Avon tires was arranged to produce 255mm wide tires for the car. This required flared wheel arches, which were bolted on after finding out that tires will not fit the originally designed body. 0-100km took just 5.1 seconds, and top speed was reaching 270kph, proving a much faster alternative to the road going Brooklands. Eventually only 3 Mulsanne prototypes were built, which differed quite a lot from the production version yet to come.

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By 1969 a problem with the engine contract arised, as communitasia parts became rarer and rarer, and the manufacturer was slowly forsaking their cheap car and taking parts off the market to make room for other machinery. This was quite a bit of a shock to KHT who were accustomed to order cheap communitasia engine blocks and assembling v8’s out of 2 of those. Before Mulsanne could see the public roads a new engine supplier had to be found.

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you seem to really like the communitasia, don’t ya, and i’m amazed you got the storyline quite correct, as i would’ve taken it off the market around then, seeing as such, replacement to the communitasia, coming soon :slight_smile:

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I figured it was a logical thing to do. No factory makes replacement parts forever. :smiley:
Also my BRC entry is powered by an engine derived from communitasia blocks, so you can say that Communitasia has true motorsport roots now.

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Really loving your photoshop work and the cars have cool styling touches too! Do keep up the good work :slight_smile:

edit. That’s one mean stance on the Mulsanne and otherwise the car looks like it could eat Lamborghinis for breakfast! Really nice.

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[quote=“TurboJ”]Really loving your photoshop work and the cars have cool styling touches too! Do keep up the good work :slight_smile:

edit. That’s one mean stance on the Mulsanne and otherwise the car looks like it could eat Lamborghinis for breakfast! Really nice.[/quote]

Thanks. We will see how it runs once I get my hands on one of those 8C35-73 JSC engines

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I am curious :smiley: , do Kraft Haus Technik earn enough money to survive as a small company ?

I see KHT is more like a ‘‘Independent Performance Specialist’’ which use other manufacturer platform , and i find it hard to earn.

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[quote=“Starfish94”]I am curious :smiley: , do Kraft Haus Technik earn enough money to survive as a small company ?

I see KHT is more like a ‘‘Independent Performance Specialist’’ which use other manufacturer platform , and i find it hard to earn.[/quote]

Barely enough. Our markup is at about 100-300% in the markets tab, and we’re using pretty outdated and low tec solutions, sometimes cheaping out on things. The only section of KHT that works with the best possible materials and funding is our racing division.