aluminum driveshaft

[sleggarg20]

Question has anyone made a aluminum driveshaft for there spider ive been thinking about trying to make one....or is this another one of my crazy ideas

[81SPIDERMATT]

interesting .... I imagine it would be kinda be like a lightened flywheel ...reducing the spinning weight of the drivetrain .... could polish it up and it sure would look cool for shows and such .... a quick search show a few companies make them and lots of pics of fast cars on their sites ..... if I had the know how and ability I think it would be cool just for the fact that when talking about the car you could throw out "aluminum driveshaft" in the conversation .... I wonder what the actual gains would be .... but every little bit helps I guess

[sleggarg20]

interesting .... I imagine it would be kinda be like a lightened flywheel ...reducing the spinning weight of the drivetrain .... could polish it up and it sure would look cool for shows and such .... a quick search show a few companies make them and lots of pics of fast cars on their sites ..... if I had the know how and ability I think it would be cool just for the fact that when talking about the car you could throw out "aluminum driveshaft" in the conversation .... I wonder what the actual gains would be .... but every little bit helps I guess

Yes matt my thoughts exactly about the gains on less rotating mass I havent talked to a driveline shop yet just wanted to see if anyone has attempted such a task

[bobplyler]

I imagine the angular momentum of a driveshaft is minimal, considering it's diameter. It would save some weight.

[v6spider]

This would definately be good mated with the twin cam. However, my Vortec V6 would probably twist it into a pretzel!

Cheers!
Rob

[divace73]

I have read somewhere that carbon fibre is now being used for tail shafts???

[BEEK]

aluminum drive shafts can and will handle alot of power, Ford puts them in all their suv's and pickup trucks. Carbon fiber, i have one of those in my 3000gt vr4, light and strong

[cormac]

aluminum drive shafts can and will handle alot of power, Ford puts them in all their suv's and pickup trucks. Carbon fiber, i have one of those in my 3000gt vr4, light and strong

Beek - have you ever put an aluminum drive shaft in a spider and/or made any modifications to driveline, one piece vs. two piece, anything of the sort

[BEEK]

no i havent, i did replace a 3 piece steel shaft in the 3000gt with a 1 piece carbon one,so it can be done. the fiat transmission does not have a slip yoke fit in the tailhousing , unless you are using a 131box, there is some engineering that must be dont, so the diveshaft has proper movement,as the rear end goes up and down, the driveshaft needs a place to go, it will be sliding in and out of a yoke somewhere or something will break

[cormac]

no i havent, i did replace a 3 piece steel shaft in the 3000gt with a 1 piece carbon one,so it can be done. the fiat transmission does not have a slip yoke fit in the tailhousing , unless you are using a 131box, there is some engineering that must be dont, so the diveshaft has proper movement,as the rear end goes up and down, the driveshaft needs a place to go, it will be sliding in and out of a yoke somewhere or something will break

thanx

[Holshot]

aluminum drive shafts can and will handle alot of power, Ford puts them in all their suv's and pickup trucks. Carbon fiber, i have one of those in my 3000gt vr4, light and strong

Never knew you had or are into VR4s! I've had 4 of them over the years and loved them. I can tell you that going to the CF shaft on two of mine made a HUGE difference with throttle response as I'm sure Beek can attest to but the VR4 is an incredibly long drive shaft and very heavy compared to a tiny little Spider shaft but like others mention it's rotational mass so any time you can cut down on that is always good for freeing up some HP. There's the Drive Shaft Shop that seems to be one of the more popular custom driveshaft and axle shops around and I've heard good things.

Both my CF shafts were from a company called ACPT and I was actually the first one (6spd) with it as I sent them my original to use as the mock up. I've actually toyed with the idea myself if I ever got my hands on an extra Spider shaft to have one made up in CF or Aluminum. If done in CF they could use both the front and rear sections of the original where as an aluminum shaft would require custom milled pieces to be able to weld to. Since there is only so much you can do with realistic power in these cars and the fragile transmission and rear ends we have to work with negates the point of going to crazy I thought of maybe approaching things like weight savings which is also easier on the driveline. Flywheel, pulleys, driveshaft, wheels and tires, knife edge/lightened crank ect... Any other thoughts or things I'm forgetting chime in!

[v6spider]

Thanks for the education guys! Although I don't see a need to do this with my spider. Not to mention I have more power than I really need in the first place. What's the cost of building one? I spent $150 roughly on having my conventional steel drive-line built and properly balanced.

Cheers!
Rob