- Yokomo BD7 2016 -

The world’s fastest touring car improves AGAIN. It’s another challenge for glory. The challenge was to increase both corner speed and drivability beyond what’s ever been achieved before in touring car racing. The BD7 2016 raises the bar once AGAIN. The theme behind the new BD7’16 for chief engineer Yukijiro Umino was "Super flat". It was a bold idea and a big risk to reconsider the current world championship-winning platform. Yukijiro and his team had to ensure they achieved a super low centre of gravity without affecting the car’s winning ways.

With extensive and thorough testing, we found the smaller front and rear pulley’s enabled us to position parts lower on the chassis, which in effect provided more lateral grip and equated to higher cornering speeds whilst not compromising stability. The idea was to minimize movement whilst also increasing throttle response, which we have achieved with the new BD7 2016.
The new car has the option to run new short big bore shocks, and or standard shock for a wider setup opportunity. We’ve also included front universal double joints on the new car to ensure the ultimate racing chassis.

Every single part on the new BD7’16 was scrutinized, to ensure the new car provided the perfect combination of balance and performance. This is the racing spirit of Yokomo.
The most important aspect for a cars handling and stability is the centre of gravity. Both behaviors are responsible for a cars response and feel. The idea behind a lower CG is to reduce the amount a car pitch’s when it transfers the load front to back, this in turn creates a far smoother car that provides more overall grip. All current touring cars in any brand are increasingly becoming harder and harder to stabilize due to the high grip and speeds reached in today’s racing, hence a lot of work going in to the absorbers and sway bars in recent years to try and minimize this pitch.

The most important aspect for a cars handling and stability is the centre of gravity. Both behaviors are responsible for a cars response and feel. The idea behind a lower CG is to reduce the amount a car pitch’s when it transfers the load front to back, this in turn creates a far smoother car that provides more overall grip. All current touring cars in any brand are increasingly becoming harder and harder to stabilize due to the high grip and speeds reached in today’s racing, hence a lot of work going in to the absorbers and sway bars in recent years to try and minimize this pitch.

The front and rear drive pulleys are 6 mm smaller and the axles are now 3mm lower. This reduces the gyro effect (This effect decreases the direction of the rotation axis) which in effect translates to a sharper cornering experience, whilst also increasing throttle response. This is due to a lighter drive train / pulley’s.

The front and rear bulkheads are lowered 3 mm at the top of upper bulkhead. The upper deck is also 2mm lower overall and contributes to a lower Centre of gravity, reducing the grip at excess roll.
This new design enables to you set up the car without relying on sway bar settings, which will give you a more neutral steering feel.

The short shocks are simply shorter in length but not in capacity, this was achieved by extending the cylinder bores.

The previous shock’s diameter was 10.2mm with the new one at 11.2mm, which is significantly larger than the previous generation short shock.
Due to high speeds we feel the previous short shock was a little twitchy and unstable, with the new larger diameter short shock this has significantly improved the cars stability as well as viscosity change which occurs during a race, caused by heat and movement.