Tony,
I have Tracy's 2.85:1 redrive and it has a fully functional, light
weight, proven, cost free mount. The original RWS mount that comes with
the
drive. I am not trying to knock what you are trying to acheive here but I
for one would have trouble justifying $1000 to replace the original. Yes
it
looks cool but then again I don't have a problem with the looks of
Tracy's
design, I want to fly it, not look at it. If someone else wants to look
at
it then they will have to find which one of a thousand lakes I intend to
explore once I'm in the air. If Paul Rhino'd a bell housing that could
be
fed into a CNC milling machine which would then turn out a real light
aluminum housing I might consider that, sure it would be a big chunk of
aluminum to start with, but a thousand dollars ? The huge pile of schwarf
going to the recycler would make it almost free :) I don't think this
could
be more than a few pounds lighter than the original and truth be told I
would be better off losing that weight from one of my man boobs anyway.
Perhaps though there are more people on here with the extra ca-ching than
I
realise. Best of luck to you.
John
Are you saying you don't think the carbon fiber version would be much
lighter than the Tracy 2.85:1 or that a milled aluminum housing would
not be much lighter?
How much could you remove from the existing aluminum housing?
Could you mill out holes and cover them with plastic or composite?
Could you mill out some kind of fractal honeycomb pattern?
-Jeff
BTW Tracy's current system with 1/2 inch thick adapter plate, four
inch long 10 mm bolts and aluminum spacers weighs around
8 pounds.
I like your idea John. NC mills are getting more numerous
and faster so the cost is coming down. I would start
with a slab about 16 inches high and 30 inches long and
three inches thick. Wall thicknesses would be an 1/8th of an
inch or less.
Paul Lamar ...No rotor no motor.
Jeff,
Oh no it would be lighter, it's a question of how many dollars per ounce to
spend.
Paul, if it could be milled down to 1/8" what would be the approximate
weight, cost ?
John
I don't know yet. I have do another one specifically for
NC milling as that requires no draft. I'll also need to get
it in Solid Works and use the shell command on it.
Then either solid Works or Rhino can calc the volume.
Aluminum weighs .1 pound per cubic inch.
If it were as simple as this with a .150" wall
and a .225" thick flange it would weigh about 5 pounds.
I am leaning towards sand cast magnesium.
As I recall sand cast mag is .6 times the density
of Al.
Paul Lamar ...No rotor no motor.
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