I haven't done a wire wheel conversion but I have a steel wheel car and a
wire wheel car. I did a tech article a few years ago for the now defunct
Midget & Sprite Magazine on the dimensions of the rear ends, axles, and
hand brake parts for both set-ups. I also have a few sets of conversion parts.
The wire wheel axle length is 22 1/8" while the steel wheel axle is 22
5/8", a half inch longer, measured from the inside of the flange to the end
of the spline. The whole rear assy is 40 3/4" for the wires and 41 3/4" for
the steel, 1" shorter, measured from the inside of the backing plate to the
inside of the opposite backing plate. The preferred wire wheel axles are
marked BTA939. They are the factory option and are more durable than the
others which have no marks.
I measured the wear marks on a set of steel wheel axles I happened to have
out of a car. It appears that the steel wheel axles engage the diff for 1".
If you put 1/2" shorter wire wheel axles into a wider steel wheel assy, I
would guess they would engage 1/2" on each side. Is that enough? I don't
know. But substituting shorter axles is a lot easier than replacing the
entire steel wheel rear assy with a wire wheel one. I'm sure that's what
most guys do.
Hope this helps.
Bob Spruck
MG Maven
Sharpsburg, GA
At 12:30 AM 11/23/2006 -0500, BCAH@aol.com wrote:
>Hello all,---I'm going for more power(1275) in my BI this winter and was
>wondering about the rear axles. It is my understanding that there were
only a
>very few true wire wheel 1/4 elliptic car from the factory. A fellow I
>contacted in England said the ones he saw early on were just adaptors bolted
>on to
>the pressed wheel shaft.As I understand it, most conversions are just guys
>sliding wire wheels axles into solid wheel axles. The problem with this is
>that
>theses wire wheel shafts are a bit shorter so they do not fully engage the
>differential. My question is just how much shorter? How thick is the gear
in
>the differential where the shaft has to go through, and how much does the
>shaft fall short? It was suggested that the shaft be pressed apart from the
>splined knock-off hub making the total length longer and that there was
>still
>plenty of "meat' in the splined knock-off hub. One book I read said that
>theses were originally put together with a 20 ton press! Up rated shafts are
>available for the solid wheel axles. Has anyone had any experience with a
>strong
>1275 and these shorter axles? Thanks in advance,-----Bob C
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