Are you guys familiar with Ford "Atlas" axles? Apparently they've served well on lots and lots of Escort and Capri rally cars, and in England there's good support. My impression is that they're compact, light and inexpensive. Are they narrow enough to bolt right into some of our installations? Can they be found in North America? All sorts of performance parts and upgrades are available: various limited slip diffs, full floating hubs, disc brakes, any gear ratio you could ask for..., etc.
I started reading with these two links:
http://www.fostek.co.uk/services.html
http://www.fostek.co.uk/catalogue.html
So what can you guys tell me about Atlas axles? Are they something we should all know about?
Looks like a modified English Ford Capri axle. The full floating kit is interesting but,some are replacing the stock Capri Atlas axle with Volvo(Dana 30 rears) which have only 7.125" ring gear. With a full floating axle a lot of stress is taken off the separate hub,plus the limited slip will help split the load on the axles. You can do those mods to any marginal rear axles. The Atlas is popular with the Escort racers so must be stronger than that axle. I have no direct experience with this axle,just research.
I wonder what the torque handling capability is of these axles?
Also, it looks like they will be very expensive if set up with all of the modifications.
Curtis, doesn't look like anything they imported over here. Interesting design, looks like an aluminum center casting. I can't see where it would offer any advantage over several of the import axles such as the early RX7 or even a Ford 8". A new Ford housing with a Currie aluminum carrier good for up to 600hp should be of a comparable weight to the Atlas unit and very competitive to the weight of the stock MG axle assembly. Both are expensive to set up from scratch as a full floating race axle, but the 8" with a narrowed stock housing can be relatively inexpensive even with the aluminum carrier.
(http://www.britishracecar.com/WalterDavies-Ford-EscortRS1600/WalterDavies-Ford-EscortRS1600-DC.jpg)
I think the Atlas center section was iron as standard equipment, but I've seen ads for new replacement cast aluminum center sections and also complete aluminum axle housings. I haven't really studied this yet... My thought is the Atlas axle might be a good alternative for V8 conversions being done in England where American axles (including 8" and 8.8 Ford) aren't so cheap and plentiful as here. After all this time, putting together an authoritative apples-to-apples comparison of axle weights (and other dimensions) remains a priority item for my to-do list.