Re: Inboard brakes

[JHertzman@domain.elided]

In AD7-505 Ron Horowitz mentions, along with the risk of brake shaft snaps
under hard braking and of excess heat build up on inboard brakes, "the
Reventlow Scarab with the center rear brake, my favorite (though totally
impractical) setup!"

I know one hears of half-shafts breaking on competition cars, but I wonder how
many break on transaxle Alfas, and whether this loss of braking due to half
shaft breakage has been a problem with Alfasuds?

On the heat build-up and on center rear brakes, I note in passing that most of
the great race cars of the Gordon Bennett era had (in effect) a DeDion rear
axle, transaxle, and center brake, and some of them also had water-cooling for
the brake. The rear axle was typically a dead axle, with a chain sprocket
attached to each wheel, driven by chains from another sprocket on a jackshaft
from the gearbox. The brake was typically on the input side of the
transmission, and water was sprayed on it as needed to keep the temperature
down. On some cars, to decrease the frequency of thrown tire-treads, there
were arrangements to spray water on the rear tires also. 

Front brakes came much later, and were considered both unnecessary and
dangerous; either spring wind-up or axle twist could result in negative
caster, which is counterproductive from a directional standpoint. The great
Ugo Sivocci died in the first Alfa race car to be equipped with front brakes,
and on Alfa's next four-wheel-braking car Jano added radius rods to maintain
caster.

Cordially, 

John H.
Raleigh, N.C.

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End of alfa-digest V7 #506
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