Were the ceramic bearings available off the shelf? Were they expensive? My road race sidecar runs similar hubs on the front and side, and they spin like your old ones, but with the weight of a disc attached, they spin much more freely.
They are in components, I did not try this myself I turned to a company who has many years of building uprights for race cars to help, Inter-City Manufacturing is their name. Great guys. The time to do such custom work is the real issue, it is not a fast turn around. I provided brand new uprights for the rework and the cost was over 3k. I suspect this will vary a lot between application. Keep in mind, the radical ceramic bearing assemblies you would want to avoid racing in the rain and need to take care how you clean around the bearings. Glad you found this video of use, I will let everyone know what gains I found in two weeks at circuit of the America testing.
Very interesting and looking forward to the effects these upgrades will have! Is there no way to "easily" check the top speed of the car before and after each modifications and give a % gain of each?
Another excellent video mate 👍 the ceramic bearings do a a lot to remove drag. You’ve got to do your transmission now.....😜 What material are your uprights ? 6061 or similar ? Magnesium or duralumin would also improve unsprung weight. And I would guess your running magnesium wheels as well. Please allow me to take a guess at lap time improvement at cota . 2 tenths easily. Let’s see. Good luck. 👍🥃🇦🇺
Transmission, differential, engine bearings yes agree. Uprights are standard 6061, nothing special. I did see 0.4 lbs weight savings on each upright with the ceramics. I was going to have the races made out of titanium but the time to produce was too long. Ah, wheels - no mag, only alum. I know that would reduce unsprung weight but have not gotten to that. On lap times, I will pass along to everyone what improvements. Several changes for including a fair amount of aero trials. Should be fun.. cheers
@@NixonMotorsports thanks for the get back. 0.4 lbs with the bearings... that’s surprising ! Possibility is that you could get the uprights 3D scanned and have them made from whatever you want via Cad. And Nc. I’m sure that would be a massive difference to not only lap times but to unsprung weight and suspension dampening etc. as your aware, magnesium is good but brittle... titanium is lite but costly. Duralumin mite be the way maybe. ?was wondering why your brake rotor hats have bolts rather than light weight open buttons? Not enough room. ? Or just simpler to run bolts ? Titanium I would guess. Cheers my friend. Let us all know how the testing goes 👍🥃🇦🇺
@@geoffmcwiggan2814 All good points, lowered weight and most importantly Un sprung weight is important. I’ve been more focused on reducing drag, mechanical and aerodynamic for the time being. My minimum weight is right at the lowest point currently and as you know if I go lower it will require adding weight elsewhere in the car. Yes, that is preferable to unsprung weight. Keep the ideas and comments coming, always welcome!!
That's weird that it was so tight before. I don't have any trick bearings or uprights on my car, just factory Van Diemen stuff, seems to spin pretty well. Maybe not quite as easily as your new ones but pretty close.
They are somewhat small in diameter. Remember this race car uses 13” wheels so braking components will have space limitations. With the brakes on this race car I do see over 3g’s in braking all the time. It gets on with it that is for sure. Thanks for the comment, keep ‘em coming..
I like GM's idea to use tapered seals to pulls the caliper pistons back to reduce friction. Unfortunately, the execution of that concept was flawed. Ahhh GM...
It may not help at all for top speed we will see, at a minimum it should help a bit with acceleration. My car is hp limited so anything I can do at upper speeds is the focus. Thanks for the comment.
Were the ceramic bearings available off the shelf? Were they expensive? My road race sidecar runs similar hubs on the front and side, and they spin like your old ones, but with the weight of a disc attached, they spin much more freely.
They are in components, I did not try this myself I turned to a company who has many years of building uprights for race cars to help, Inter-City Manufacturing is their name. Great guys. The time to do such custom work is the real issue, it is not a fast turn around. I provided brand new uprights for the rework and the cost was over 3k. I suspect this will vary a lot between application. Keep in mind, the radical ceramic bearing assemblies you would want to avoid racing in the rain and need to take care how you clean around the bearings. Glad you found this video of use, I will let everyone know what gains I found in two weeks at circuit of the America testing.
Very interesting and looking forward to the effects these upgrades will have!
Is there no way to "easily" check the top speed of the car before and after each modifications and give a % gain of each?
Yes top speed is one measure we will use. We are also very interested in results. I’ll pass along what is found. Thanks
Another excellent video mate 👍 the ceramic bearings do a a lot to remove drag. You’ve got to do your transmission now.....😜 What material are your uprights ? 6061 or similar ? Magnesium or duralumin would also improve unsprung weight. And I would guess your running magnesium wheels as well. Please allow me to take a guess at lap time improvement at cota . 2 tenths easily. Let’s see. Good luck. 👍🥃🇦🇺
Transmission, differential, engine bearings yes agree. Uprights are standard 6061, nothing special. I did see 0.4 lbs weight savings on each upright with the ceramics. I was going to have the races made out of titanium but the time to produce was too long. Ah, wheels - no mag, only alum. I know that would reduce unsprung weight but have not gotten to that. On lap times, I will pass along to everyone what improvements. Several changes for including a fair amount of aero trials. Should be fun.. cheers
@@NixonMotorsports thanks for the get back. 0.4 lbs with the bearings... that’s surprising ! Possibility is that you could get the uprights 3D scanned and have them made from whatever you want via Cad. And Nc. I’m sure that would be a massive difference to not only lap times but to unsprung weight and suspension dampening etc. as your aware, magnesium is good but brittle... titanium is lite but costly. Duralumin mite be the way maybe. ?was wondering why your brake rotor hats have bolts rather than light weight open buttons? Not enough room. ? Or just simpler to run bolts ? Titanium I would guess. Cheers my friend. Let us all know how the testing goes 👍🥃🇦🇺
@@geoffmcwiggan2814 All good points, lowered weight and most importantly Un sprung weight is important. I’ve been more focused on reducing drag, mechanical and aerodynamic for the time being. My minimum weight is right at the lowest point currently and as you know if I go lower it will require adding weight elsewhere in the car. Yes, that is preferable to unsprung weight. Keep the ideas and comments coming, always welcome!!
That's weird that it was so tight before. I don't have any trick bearings or uprights on my car, just factory Van Diemen stuff, seems to spin pretty well. Maybe not quite as easily as your new ones but pretty close.
Yea, well it was bad on my car. I am looking forward to seeing what difference it makes. thanks for the comment!
Such small Discs (Rotors) fitted..(?)
They are somewhat small in diameter. Remember this race car uses 13” wheels so braking components will have space limitations. With the brakes on this race car I do see over 3g’s in braking all the time. It gets on with it that is for sure. Thanks for the comment, keep ‘em coming..
I like GM's idea to use tapered seals to pulls the caliper pistons back to reduce friction.
Unfortunately, the execution of that concept was flawed. Ahhh GM...
All calipers including aircraft use the tapered seals idea.
Yes, I like that idea as well if it only worked. Thanks for the comment
@NixonMotorsports do you know who, or what industry came up with the concept?
Cause It was on my '98 Tahoe (GMT400 trucks) to improve fuel economy.
The aircraft from ww2 had tapered seals in their calipers.
@@jamiepursall I did not know that, very cool thanks for sharing
I will be surprised if you see any difference in top speed with these mods.
It may not help at all for top speed we will see, at a minimum it should help a bit with acceleration. My car is hp limited so anything I can do at upper speeds is the focus. Thanks for the comment.
Why do I feel like you're talking about my life???
Haha, rolling resistance = life.. got it, so true. Thanks