Gear Diffs In 1/12 Scales
 

Why not join the club? Discuss.

The old Tamiya 1/12ths had them. They were an open design that offered no limited slip. At the time a ball diff was the trick option to have! To have a closed in diff with silicon oil would be an intricate design.

.... and pretty heavy. With the diff off to one side of the axle, this weight issue may cause set-up problems if you would like a sealed-diff design.

There was a 1/12 gear diff back in the 80's made by Delta (?). It was quite fragile but was really trick for its time.

Yes it was Delta. I used this a little bit but it was very fragile. Gears would break pretty easily. However it did work well when it worked. With today's better materials and increased traction on carpet surfaces with better tires, it would probably work better than back in the '80s. I don't necessarily think a gear diff would need to be sealed for it to work properly.

I agree with Rick, if a good designer combined modern materials with modern manufacturing techniques, a geared diff at minimum weight penalty would be possible. As long as there was something to keep the dust and dirt out, sealing is not neccessary. Correct material selection for the gears should enable the gears to run with a good teflon dry lube.

As a ball diff is so easy to keep maintained and set these days, I am not sure that a geared diff has a market in this class, and it would have disadvantages, like backlash, over a ball diff.

I ran them back in the day a few times. As I recall they added a lot of chatter to the car compared to a ball diff. Was fun to have those options, work or not. :)

you mean like this Tamiya 956 porsche I own...

http://www.nashrcracer.com/images/rIMAG0410.jpg

http://www.nashrcracer.com/images/rIMAG0409.jpg

This ought to be in some archive. I went and dug out a few Delta gear diffs, and snapped a few pics. including the instructions from 1983-1984. :)

http://www.stormerhobbies.com/pics/del2262.jpg

http://www.stormerhobbies.com/pics/del2262_2.jpg

http://www.stormerhobbies.com/pics/del2262_4.jpg

http://www.stormerhobbies.com/pics/del2262_3.jpg

The teeth on those where very brittle, once they where ruined we would lathe the teeth of the center section and then machine the proper size hole into a Kimbro gear, put the two togeather and glue them. This way we had a much more durable gear. The only bad part about running one of these was this was during the solid t-bar times, so there wasn't a whole lot of flex going on so a lot of times the car would unload the lite wheel in hard corners and then spool up and snap the car around.

This ought to be in some archive. I went and dug out a few Delta gear diffs, and snapped a few pics. including the instructions from 1983-1984.


I wonder what other vintage gems Bob has stashed away.
I am betting there is a bunch really cool stuff.:)

Nash I need those gears, The road wizard has not made a lap in years!:lol:

I ran that car back in the days and won 3 club championships with it against the wide 1:12 cars with the 27turns stock motors in them.
Now that was a blast:D:D

regards Roy

There might be a "few" things... ;)

gear diff in pan car = yikes