Now onto the show and tell…

First off, I wanted to share with you a picture I happen to like a lot. I formatted it into 2400 res with no watermarks for anyone looking for a nice background image. There’s not much point of watermarking a photo of a car that already has my logos all over it.

Top Secret Nardo Supra V12

Now onto the rear mounted radiator in question:

Above you can see just how they finished it off from the trunk view. Notice the carbon panel and the glass window. Just classy.

That picture shows a better perspective.

From underneath the car you can get a better idea.

The rear profile is subtle with regards to this mod. All you see is a central located vent. Much like the same way they kept the fuel cooling fans subtle on the S15 D1 car with the rear bumper vents…sometimes vents just look cool, but sometimes they serve a real purpose like here.

For those wondering about how they did the piping for this job, here’s an underside of the car view.

Lastly this picture shows how they direct air to the rear mounted radiator. It is a good comparison photo between the gold race car and the white street car. If you notice, the rear side window is removed on the race car. You’ll also notice a duct in its place. Those ducts on both sides of the car are routed to feed air to the radiator. If you look inside those holes you’ll see ducting.

All of this leads me to a question - Of all the magazines that have featured this car, I don’t recall anyone talking much about this topic. I don’t know what that says about the audiences of magazines, but to me…it is details like this that make some of the best tuned cars in Japan fascinating.

One of these days I’ll post about one of the most impressive engineering designs Top Secret has ever done that nobody ever really has talked about… I just need to dig up the photos on my computer.

PS: I didn’t get a chance to talk about it, but most rear radiator mounted front engine cars have a hard time running the plumbing so they often run it through the inside of the cabin.  While OK for a race car, its a terrible idea for a street car. Top Secret is one of the very few I’ve seen that kept all of that mess out of the interior, yet another great way to keep the car easy to drive daily and street legal.