# ??'s About threaded axles..



## rdm95 (May 8, 2008)

Couple Quick questions..
What are the most commonly used lengths of both front and rear axles? Ive only had just a very few of them in all the years ive been dabbling in slot cars so im not an expert on them by any means. I seem to have 2 different length front axles (.950" & 1.125") and just 1 fairly standard length rear axle (1.020"). Are there others that are used for different applications (or should there be) or are these lengths universal enough to cover everyones use of them? Im looking into getting some made and I thought it'd be best to find out first. My hope is there is enough demand for them so that I can get a high enough quantity made to cust down the cost per axle..the machine time is around $100/hour so the more I make, the cheaper they each become..

Thanks!


----------



## Bill Hall (Jan 6, 2007)

*versatile and adaptable*

Wheel width and chassis application controlled the length for front and rear. I've seen BOTH wide and narrow axles for front or rear. I'm sure there are others. Just consider the required application relative to what models were being made. I know ya just asked about axles, but I'm gonna blather on. 

Not to get overly nostalgic, but it was the beauty of it. A cursory glance at Flea-bay will reflect what the market considers their worth to be. A standard hub thread allowed a very desirable interchangeability to whatever diameter and axle width. Naturally these antiques also used a jam nut, No press, no fuss; just some slender needle nose or the silly little wrench that I could never find, but now have 27 of. I ended up with a dozen or so vintage sets still in service. Some with their original bonded silicones. Spin 'em on and spin 'em off. 

In retrospect, the truth was that they were soft and therefore it was easy to gerf the hub threads. The axles could've been a grade er two harder; as they liked to get ruined at the threaded ends. 

Note that the narrower axle width was for T-jet front, and or applications where one would run the skinny AJ's front rim. The vast majority just butchered the bodies and ran fat-n-wide as was the style of the times. Now we're a bit more descerning. Much depends on the desired look. Fat wheels tucked or not tucked. Medium wheels tucked into narrower bodies. Formula one style with fat rears and medium fronts on wide axles. 

Keep in mind that any axle wheel combinations would probably fare better in the market; if when assembled they passed a tech block. Please feel welcome to drop into chat. I work nights now and only get in on fri or sat, BUT there's plenty of guys there to bounce things around.


----------



## rdm95 (May 8, 2008)

Well now I really dont know what to do..lol I'd like to change my own wheels to threaded style rather than a press fit which is why I want to get pricing for having the axles made. I figured if I were to get them done, I'd get a whole bunch done bcz I know theyre not particularily abundant and rather pricey when you do see them. My hope is there is atleast some market for them bcz I know its going to be a substantial investment, considering what it is..please dont tell my wife!  The Jam nuts I can get fairly cheap (I sell those on FeeBay) I guess maybe ill see what the quote comes back at, and decide how many different lengths to have done. Do you think those I listed before sound like they might be acceptable for a fair share of applications?


----------



## partspig (Mar 12, 2003)

I am sure that if you produce a quality product that they will sell! I may be interested in picking up some to sell at shows that I go to. Especially, if they will work on t-jet and AFX chassis. Have a good day! pig


----------



## Joe65SkylarkGS (Feb 15, 2010)

What Pig said.

I say do narrow and wide, sell them in pairs. 2 narrow or 2 wide so we can mix n match em all.

I would buy em.


----------



## rdm95 (May 8, 2008)

Sounds great guys! Ill have them quote those 3 lengths and see what itll be. Im really hoping to get these done..i m pretty sure it wouldnt be a one time order. Im guessing people will want them as long as theyre made well and work for a wide range of applications. You all know I wont sell junk!


----------



## alpink (Aug 22, 2010)

I am impressed with the two complete sets pressed on axles that I purchased through eBay. I think you will pick up a lot of business with threaded axles..
make some available to folks on this site via the Swap N Sell forum too.


----------



## partspig (Mar 12, 2003)

One thing to not forget though, on the threaded axles is the spline for the crown gear. Didn't see it talked about much in earlier posts. It is an important part of a threaded axle! JMOFHO!!!  pig


----------



## rdm95 (May 8, 2008)

alpink said:


> I am impressed with the two complete sets pressed on axles that I purchased through eBay. I think you will pick up a lot of business with threaded axles..
> make some available to folks on this site via the Swap N Sell forum too.



Thanks! Glad you are so happy with them.. I kept thinking to myself as I was doing yours, "Man, if he doesnt like them, I'm gonna be the biggest loser ever!" Haha


----------



## rdm95 (May 8, 2008)

partspig said:


> One thing to not forget though, on the threaded axles is the spline for the crown gear. Didn't see it talked about much in earlier posts. It is an important part of a threaded axle! JMOFHO!!!  pig



Yep, I didnt forget that. I was going to have it knurled to raise the material about .005" over the axle diameter.


----------



## rdm95 (May 8, 2008)

Oh and I had to pull my auctions bcz i pretty much ran out of axles.. Im waiting on a huge auction I just won few days ago on eBay.. Big bag with Hundreds of axles! I needed that so bad..i even begged the seller to do a buy it now but he wouldnt. I had my max bid so high on that, there was no way I would have been outbid, no matter what it cost me! lol  After I get them, I was planning on posting some sets in Swap & Sell


----------



## eastside johnny (May 13, 2008)

We all liked them for the same reasons & I still have (but don't use) many. My question is "What about wheels?" If you produce a large quantity of axles, they will be great if we have wheels to use with them.......are wheels sets available at reasonable/fair prices?
Just wondering....


----------



## rdm95 (May 8, 2008)

eastside johnny said:


> We all liked them for the same reasons & I still have (but don't use) many. My question is "What about wheels?" If you produce a large quantity of axles, they will be great if we have wheels to use with them.......are wheels sets available at reasonable/fair prices?
> Just wondering....


Ive been making my own wheels for years bro.. Primarily for Tyco, with a one (or 2) off for a different brand every now & then. Mine have always been pressed on besides the few sets ive hand tapped lately. I am in the process of switching over to a threaded wheel and hopefully can make that happen very soon.. The only thing that is going to hinder the process is $$. Its not going to be cheap to have them made. The machine time alone is over $100/hour..add in material, tooling, etc and it quickly turns into a substantial investment for silly little axles (nobody better tell my old lady! lol) I wouldnt be out to make my retirement money off them.. I'd much rather sell them all and break even so I can get more made. . "So I can work harder.. so I can make more money.. so I can buy more coke.. so I can work harder.." haha ya know what I mean


----------



## Marty (Oct 20, 1999)

Instead of making htree different lengths, why not make the longest one with enough thread to be able to cut down to any desired length?

MOO

Marty
Marysville, OH


----------



## rdm95 (May 8, 2008)

Marty said:


> Instead of making htree different lengths, why not make the longest one with enough thread to be able to cut down to any desired length?
> 
> MOO
> 
> ...


God I hate smart people..lol j/k  Thats probably the best thing to do actually! Thanks! The spline wont be an issue in the front, will it?


----------



## alpink (Aug 22, 2010)

a long axle threaded to be enabled to use with the narrowest of chassis would have threads riding in the hole for a wider chassis?
I seriously do not know.
need to hear from folks that have concrete evidence of the width of the rear of chassis of different makes in order to make a serious consideration.
has anyone run a threaded surface inside of an axle hole and if so what was the result?
I am in favor of the threaded axles and there is another innovator working on a threaded axle design that would not require a lock nut.
and would a reverse thread on one end intended to help one wheel from continuously wanting to come loose be applicable. think older Chrysler products with reverse threads on one side of the car for the wheels.
perspiring minds want to know.


----------



## Hornet (Dec 1, 2005)

Aluminium hubs and steel axles,why not just use Red Locktite to hold the hubs on Shawn.
I take it if your having them knurled they aren't a real high quality hardened steel axle,or are you having them hardened after knurling?
Rick


----------



## rdm95 (May 8, 2008)

Not sure what I will go with for the material yet and if it will need to be heat treated after machining. My hope is to use something hard enough so it wont bend or flex easily, but not so hard that its a nightmare to machine. Being a Machinist, I can tell you that the more trouble a material is to machine, the more money its going to cost to machine it. Not to mention the potential of scrap parts from tooling wear or breakage. A part like this needs to be ran on a Swiss machine..its costly to setup, but once its running, it should run unattended. These machines generally will not be used for anything short of mass quantities of parts. Im guessing since my boss knows the people im having quote these, they'll do them, but it'll have to be a minimum order of 1,000 pieces. This is why I said before, the more I make, the cheaper they will be. Set-up time alone is going to cost around $600..add material and run time of $100 and it will quickly be quite a costly venture that my wife doesnt need to know about, understood?! lol

Al.. Left hand thread on one end may be possible with the proper tooling I would imagine. it would have to be done with a left handed carbide insert in a toolholder, not a die head.. Material this small is not going to be easy to thread that way if they even could. The left hand lock nuts however, may not be a possibility at all. Its too small to use anything other than a tap & I personally have never seen an 0-80 left handed tap anywhere. Standard right-hand taps are hard enough to find bcz its just not a commonly used thread. Ill look into it, but im gonna guess theyre non-existent. Could explain why its never been done before..im sure those who made the axles in the past would have tried to solve that problem at some point.


----------



## alpink (Aug 22, 2010)

dude, just throwing stuff out there. never was serious about the reverse thread.
mostly interested in finding out if making a one size fits all really will?
all of it is food for thought.
I have to be careful though. the lenny(dan) guy got terrible upset with me even when I was suggesting he was on a good and righteous path.


----------



## rdm95 (May 8, 2008)

alpink said:


> dude, just throwing stuff out there. never was serious about the reverse thread.
> mostly interested in finding out if making a one size fits all really will?
> all of it is food for thought.
> I have to be careful though. the lenny(dan) guy got terrible upset with me even when I was suggesting he was on a good and righteous path.


No no..i wasnt trying to be rude. Just nibbling on yr food (for thought) & kinda thinking outloud. Sorry


----------



## Bill Hall (Jan 6, 2007)

Yeah Al's totally right, ya cant have the extended thread lengths (to allow narrow chassis usage) gnawing in the journals of the wide chassis.

I like Hornets Loctite idea. Red er blue. Even liquid teflon (pipe dope) would work. Today's everyday things that werent all too common in the golden age, now eliminate the need for jamb nuts. Requiring less thread machining.

As you have the vintage Tyco thing all fingered out. You can develop the more modern 440 fitments. I'd also consider lengths that would work for AFX pancake, and T-jet as they are a popular choice and share a common diameter.

A HT polling might help to get a feel for the demand. IMHO, we have a good cross section of the various factions which make up the slot hobby. 

******

Al, I will not allow you to publically take the hit for Dan's frustration. THAT TRAIN WRECK IS ON ME. Please check your PM.


----------



## Grandcheapskate (Jan 5, 2006)

I know nothing about theaded axles and wheels having never used them, but a question occurs to me. If you have threaded axles, don't you need wheels with the same thread size? One without the other is useless, right?

Is it hard to thread axles by hand? Can you simply take a black rod and thread it with a tap and die set? And wouldn't it be great if the crown gear was threaded as well?

Joe


----------



## alpink (Aug 22, 2010)

*no worries*



rdm95 said:


> No no..i wasnt trying to be rude. Just nibbling on yr food (for thought) & kinda thinking outloud. Sorry


hey no problem here. I know you weren't being rude or anything. it seems you are intelligent enough to know how to communicate well and look out for other feelings. regardless of a slight letdown, which we are overlooking, I think you are gonna be a well respected member here. unlike myself. LOL!


----------



## partspig (Mar 12, 2003)

Those sizes you mentioned in the first post will work well. I make my own axles for my own cars. For t-jets using stock wheels I would cut them at .900, and 1.140 for AFX and other cars. At 1.140 they were a little long, so I would trim them down to fit. So your lengths are in the ballpark. Let me know what you come up with! Have a good day! pig


----------

