Jeff questioned why I used ball bearings in this location.
Well I will tell you why.

Since the input shaft is rotating in one direction and the
output shaft is rotating in the other, the relative
speed is about 7500 RPM to 9000 RPM. Not an eazy situation
to handle. Fortunately there is little or no radial
load on these bearing because the gear separation loads
in a planetary cancel out. One of the big advantages
of a planetary gear set. I do however need some type
of bearing in this location wheather it takes thrust
loads or not.

These ball bearings primarily take the
gear helical thrust loads only. A ball bearing is the
only kind of antifriction bearing I could find rated
at those RPM. A plain bearing would work of course
if it were designed correctly and fed with high
pressure oil properly. I am not interested in going through
the required research and development and long term testing 
a plain thrust bearing operating at these speeds would require.

Jeff mentioned putting a thrust bearing back near
the flywheel. I don't see how this would work as the
the thrust load would be transferred to the e-shaft
and then to the stock Mazda thrust bearing in the
front cover.
 
Paul Lamar
 
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