Motor Sports, High Performance Vehicles, Cars
Being at the metal supplier’s counter and trying to choose between 6082 and 7075 is like trying to choose between two different engines in motorsport. Both will do what you need them to do, but one will be completely incompatible with the end goal you are trying to achieve. The two grades are not priced…read more
You made and fitted wishbones from 7075 aluminium tube, with welded joints. After three race weekends, you find yourself pulling a wishbone that has a crack on it. The crack is right at the weld, understandably. It’s a situation that is guaranteed to occur in a workshop during club racing. Most don’t understand the metallurgy…read more
If you ask most people building a race car what makes a good wishbone, they’ll talk about using the right materials: 7075 aluminium, chromoly tubes, carbon fibre. But the material is the last thing you should worry about. Get the geometry and cross-section wrong, and it doesn’t matter whether you’ve built it from a titanium…read more
When you watch an F1 fly down the Hangar Straight at Silverstone, you’re watching an F1 engineer’s appreciation of art. The exhaust, gear casings, and even the gear box, are all examples of great material selection for a given design and purpose. Modern day formula one engineering would have baffled F1 engineers during the sport’s…read more
Walk into any F1 team’s workshop and you’ll see carbon fiber (like in the monocoque, bodywork, and wings). But look a little closer, and you’ll see aluminum parts stacked atop workbenches. With teams spending £300 million a season, you would think they would use a more exotic material. In fact, they choose aluminum because it…read more