Triple Eight’s Red Bull Ampol Racing Mustangs. Image: Supplied
The Brisbane-based business, which features a dedicated manufacturing facility down the road from its race shop, already dabbles in a variety of other industries including automotive and aerospace.
It recently achieved AS9100D certification – an internationally recognised quality management standard developed for aerospace and the defence sector.
Although details are confidential, Triple Eight MD Jamie Whincup said it opens the door for Triple Eight to take its operations to the next level.
“Designing and developing motorsport parts has been the cornerstone of Triple Eight since day dot, and that will never change,” Whincup told Speedcafe.
“What we’ve done recently is make a strategic decision to put equal emphasis on taking our expanding capability, and more than 20 years of knowledge and IP, into other industries.”
Triple Eight has been producing parts for Qantas for several years but only previously dabbled in the defence sector.
“We’re proud to support the aerospace industry through our work with Qantas,” added Whincup.
“We’ve also supplied defence in a small capacity in the past, and now that we’ve achieved AS9100D certification we’re gearing up to ramp that up considerably.
“Within defence, our main focus will be the automotive and land-vehicle side, where our motorsport experience translates directly.”
Triple Eight has invested in this five-axis CNC machine. Image: Supplied
The ramp-up of Triple Eight’s engineering division includes the recent purchase of a state-of-the-art machining tool; a DMG Mori DMU 75 monoBLOCK five-axis CNC.
Whincup said the major investment is an example of Triple Eight’s dedication to exploring new opportunities.
“I toured the Oracle Red Bull Racing headquarters and saw these DMG Mori machines in action,” he said.
“They impressed me so much that I had one on order a couple of days after I got home.”
Whincup said that chasing work outside of motorsport won’t impact Triple Eight’s commitment to its own race team or the quality of parts it supplies to other Supercars squads.
“I’ll take the opportunity to remind the rest of pit lane that we’re still fully committed to supplying them to the Triple Eight standard,” he said.
“As we diversify and learn from other industries, that will only improve the quality and consistency of our race car parts.”