A group of young Dunedin people are working to supercharge a Japanese supercar to beat the New Zealand land speed record.
Working at South Dunedin training centre Skillsec, the budding young engineers have been investigating what work the car will need done to it to break the record, working alongside the car’s owner, Ross Forsyth.
Mr Forsyth said he began working on the four-wheel drive supercar with his father about three years ago, planning how to alter the car for a high performance challenge.
‘‘My father passed away at the beginning of last year and I just carried on with the project we both started.’’
The car now had a full roll cage and race safety equipment installed as well as all the approvals to be able to be driven on the road, Mr Forsyth said.
To break the record, the car will need to surpass the fastest petrol wheel driven car officially timed speed of 355.485kmh set by Eddie Freeman driving a Lamborghini Gallardo Superleggera at the RNZAF Base Ohakea on October 26, 2012.
This year’s event was cancelled due to the North Island flooding.
‘‘We believe the next event will be March next year.’’
Mr Forsyth decided to invite students at Skillsec to help retool the car because he was a former automotive tutor at the training centre.
‘‘I decided to support the students and get them to see something they would never see otherwise.’’
Even without customisation the car was ‘‘incredibly quick’’.
‘‘It will do 300kmh standard.’’
Prices to buy a Nissan R35 GTR sports car was over $100,000, and Mr Forsyth estimated by the time the car was ready to race it would have cost him more than $300,000.
Student Zaniquah Marsh said she was really interested in automotive engineering, and was looking forward to working on the car.
‘‘It is pretty fast, it is real cool, we are just upgrading it a little bit because he wants to beat the record.’’
Automotive tutor Gary Potter said some of the changes to overhaul the car will include installing new down pipes, refreshing the exhaust, attaching a carbon fibre under panel, and installing a new engine.
*This story has been updated to clarify the speed to beat is the fastest petrol wheel driven car.
