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Re: rear axles

To: Bob Lang <LANG@isis.mit.edu>, rgb@exact.com
Subject: Re: rear axles
From: "R. John Lye" <rjl6n@virginia.edu>
Date: Tue, 28 Apr 1998 12:25:12
At 12:04 PM 4/28/98 -0400, Bob Lang wrote:
>Here's what I do know.

...and I'll add my two cents for the few things that I know too.

>There is at least one Nissan possibility. They had a "fluid coupled" or
>some such diff from a 300 ZX that is basically a drop in. 

snip

>Apparently, Scott Witt, of Beastly A Prepared TVR 2500M Solo II fame, had 
>done this with his car. For some reason, he took that setup out and went 
>to Jaguar IRS. Perhaps John Lye can chime in on this.

Yeah, Scott wasn't at all happy with the viscous diff.  As I recall,
his complaint was that it worked well when both rear wheels were on
the ground.  If one wheel came up off the ground, it got *all* the
torque resulting in excessive wheelspin.  Not the desired result
at all.  The Jag unit that he put in is a "salisbury" type, clutch
based diff that should provide power even if one wheel is in the air.

>I do know that Scott Witt has some serious power in his car and he was able 
>to snap axles more or less at will... a bad thing indeed.

Yeah, that was apparently partly a function of the fact that he was
using stock TVR stub axles, which are apparently a known weak spot.

>As for BMW, there is probably some possibility there, several of the 
>older cars that I've looked underneath, particularly the 633/635 cars 
>look surprisingly similar to the old Triumph Salisbury differential...

I've been told that the 2002 unit will fit in some Triumphs, but I
think that it might have been the Spit/GT-6 cars.  My memory is
failing me on this one.

>I've also heard that Subaru had a diff that is very much like the TR6 
>setup, although, again, I've only seen a few of these cars from 
>underneath and the setup did not look anything like my TR6. I presume 
>that the Subaru diff is the same unit that Nissan/Datsun had used...

Again, this is a vague memory, but I think that the Subaru rear diff
internals are the same as the early 240-Z diffs or at least that they
interchange with the Nissan parts.  Something like that.  They do look
different to me, too but that's just the external case since I've
never opened either one up.

>But I still maintain that if someone can sell a setup for $1000, there has 
>to be a way to do the same things for $500, all things considered. So. 
>I'll keep looking.

good luck,

John Lye
rjl6n@Virginia.edu

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