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StarLight presents the Japanese Vemac RD200. Not a regular car but a British inspired truly hardcore machine.
The Vemac is a sports car, the one you will call a race-bred track car that can be used every day on the road.
Idea for this car given by Slender_Man
Vemac is a subsidiary of Tokyo R&D, a Japanese consulting firm that builds concept cars for major Japanese car manufacturers and carbon fibre composite parts for rockets. Chairman Masao Ono has a CV remarkably similar to that of Lotus founder Colin Chapman, as he's a former F1 and Le Mans racecar designer who started his own company to help cutting-edge technologies get into everyday road cars.
The Vemac is a Honda-engined sports car developed by Chris and Luke Craft of Rocket fame and featured way back in EVO 044. It’s on sale in Japan since 2004 and also available in the UK since 2007.
The original Vemac was powered by the old Japanese domestic market Integra Type-R’s 1.8-litre four placed longitudinally with a bespoke gearbox. These days it’s powered by the JDM Civic Type-R’s 2-litre ‘K20’ unit, sitting transversely in the car, allowing the Civic’s superb six-speed to be retained, but at the cost of raising the car’s centre of gravity a fraction. That should hardly be noticeable, but the power hike from the old 180 to 220PS (217bhp) certainly should be.
Standard equipment includes electric windows and air-con strong enough to cope with Japan’s 40C, 90 percent humidity summers, and enough leg- and headroom to accommodate anyone up to 6ft 4in comfortably.
The V-TEC motor positioned directly behind the driver’s head makes plenty of noise. Keeping the V-TEC in its 6000rpm-plus sweet-zone is easy thanks to that slick type-R box, and acceleration through the gears is as smooth as it is rapid. You can easily find yourself bouncing off the 9000rpm rev-limiter. Vemac doesn’t have an official 0-60 time for the RD200, and our chosen course wasn’t flat enough to find one fairly, but suffice to say that it could keep up with the Exige S (0-60 in the low 4s) on the straights below the cloud-line, if not above it.
Through the high-speed bends, the Vemac felt good, the Vemac hunkered down and ripped round the corner, displaying an incredibly neutral balance. Steering is light, transmitting every ripple and dip in the road through the wheel, which is a good thing at speed on well-kept roads, though it can lead to tramlining on well-worn highways. The suspension features fully adjustable Showa dampers.
Specifications
Year of make: 2004
Car make: Vemac
Model: RD200
Power output
Horsepower: 217.0 bhp @8000 rpm
Torque: 206.0 Nm (152 lbft) @7000 rpm
Transmission: 6 Speed Manual
Engine
Type: S-4 DOHC / 16 valves total / 4 valves per cylinder
Displacement: 1998 ccm
Layout: RWD
Engine location: Mid
Body
Weight: 890 kg
Length: 3970 mm
Width: 1720 mm
Height: 1120 mm
Wheelbase: 2400mm
Tires
Front tires: 195/50 R 16
Rear tires: 215/50 R 16
Performance
0-60 mph: 6.3 seconds
THE OTHER VEMAC IS HERE:
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