This is made from .090" thick 4130 sheet and 1.5 by 3/4 by 3/4 inch
 long 4130 rectangular tubing tig welded together. The sheet is water
 jet or laser cut for accuracy and ease of welding in the short
 sections of rectangular
 tubing.

 Flex plate is 3.4 pounds with ring gear.

 Sheet metal driven is 2.4 pounds.

 Molded low durometer silicone rubber blocks fill the spaces between
 tubing sections.

 The Ford flange with the drive spline weighs about
 3 pounds. Some of that can be machined away as unneeded.

 The advantage of this approach is everything can be changed
 or adjusted if necessary.

 It can be sold as a kit of parts for those that can weld.

 It might be possible to use it as a mold for liquid silicone
 rubber.

 Paul Lamar


  Hi  Paul,   What is going to hold the bits together? The rubber? will
want to push the two plates apart when torque is applied, and the
splined plate can only be riveted to the outside plate, One would need
to allow a fair bit of relative movement between the plates.
               John Burey

 A spacer. The force is then transfered forward to the sun gear and then to the output shaft which has a large ball bearing that takes all the thrust.  Also a snap ring could be installed on the one inch splined shaft instead of the spacer. The reaction force on the flex plate itself would be taken by the thrust
bearing in the front of the engine.

The horizontal expansion force can be reduced by clever concave shaping of the rubber moldings. That gives them room to expand with out growing horizontally.

Paul Lamar