Alfa Pages

[Ken McCarthy]

I am seeking some assistance in locating a LSD for my car. The ideal type seems to be a Thorsen type as manufactured by Quaife Engineering in Sevenoaks, Kent (England). I have emailed them, but so far, no reply. Maybe they can no longer produce an LSD for this Alfa.

I have an article about an Alfasud Ti in Denmark with a Sprintex supercharger and a Quaife LSD in a 16V gearbox, so it must have been available at some time in the past. Perhaps there might be a second hand one somewhere?

Any help or comment would be appreciated.

Regards
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Ken McCarthy - 16V Sprint

[tvatavuk]

Last time (years ago) we have talked about it, someone said that minimum order was 10 or 20 LSDs, because they custom made it for 33.
You could try finding used one, or if in luck maybe even unused one from some of guys that had oredered that big amount.
Few Alfistis have tried to group and make that large order, but failed once or two times.
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Tino Vatavuk
Little black dress which replaced Alfa Romeo 33 S 16v Permanent 4 GMo

[Ken McCarthy]

Thanks Tino

Maybe my post above will find one of those hiding in someone's garage.

Regards
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Ken McCarthy - 16V Sprint

[hugh jinjin]

Hi ken ,it depends what you want to use the car for . If it's a road car then the torsen type diff is very good (if you can find one!) but if you want to use it in competition then it has one serious drawback, namely that it requires both driving wheels to have traction in order to work ie if you lift one wheel off the ground or run wide onto the grass the diff works just like a standard open diff (massive wheelspin!).
The prefered type of diff for motorsport use is a plate type lsd which doesn't suffer from the above problem and has the added advantage of actually being available for sale here in the uk! If the diff is for a road car then you could have it built with slightly milder ramp angles for the clutches and it would be absolutely fine on the road and would make a huge difference to the car.
The diffs are available from most of the uk alfa race preparers.
Try Adie Hawkins at www.ahmotorsports.co.uk

[Ken McCarthy]

Thanks Hugh

I will follow that up.

Regards
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Ken McCarthy - 16V Sprint

[tvatavuk]

http://www.alfa-pages.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=2462&highlight=
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Tino Vatavuk
Little black dress which replaced Alfa Romeo 33 S 16v Permanent 4 GMo

[Guest]

I was the man in charge of ordering the Quaife Torsen diff.

The first time we ordered 10, and they were all booked for different people.

Then some years later we tried to gather 10 orders (that was minimum for the Quaife company), but at first we failed. Could not find more than 6-7 persons who wanted the diff.

Then again some years later (I think that we are now in year 2000), we succeeded in getting 10 orders. In fact it was 14, and at that time I said, that I was very sure, that it was the last opportunity to get the Torsen diff. It would never again be possible to get 10 orders for an expensive part for a car, which was out of production many years ago.


So the only LSD that you can get now, is the traditional plate type (which I have not tried). But I can say, that a teoretical disadvantage of the Torsen when not having both wheels on the ground, does not manifest itself in real life - at least not on the tracks that I drive (Nürburgring, Zandvoort, Spa, Assen and all the tracks in Sweden and Denmark).


Peter Dyrelund
Editor
Alfa Romeo Klub Danmark

[Ken McCarthy]

Peter

Thanks for your reply and the comments. Do you recall what the costs were?

Regards
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Ken McCarthy - 16V Sprint

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