Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums Modifications Duratec Performance performance tranny's?

Yes you are way off.Gear cutting uses expensive equipt and materials,as you know the 'Quaife' gearsets are over $4000.Suggest you check sites that do custom gearboxes and gear cutting.

Cool, at least we are moving into the right direction. So what are gears made out of? Some type of hardened Alloy?

As far as the cost of Quaifes gearsets... Look at what happened to the LSD for the MTX-75. Ours used to be the most expensive one to buy, but because Ford is now using it in the FR200 (?) the price is now the CHEAPEST.... Volume...granted, you arent going to see 6000 sets of Quaife gears sold a year, but is that what it takes to drop prices?

If i go to a local CNC shop, and tell him i need one piece fabbed up and that one piece costs me $500, if i go back and order 10 of the exact same thing at a later date, each one isnt going to cost me $500 individually. That just isnt the way it works, at least not the way it should work.

So what (in detail) is it that makes gears for the MTX-75 so expensive to make, compared to just about everything else out there for every other car that is machined?

Nikolas

Phone your Ford dealer and as the price for a full 'out the door' price for an MTX75 for a 2001 Focus,I have no idea where you get your 'costing' but an example of say 4 upgraded mtl diff gears from a gearcutting shop will set you back around $900.These parts are not mass produced and even mass production gear cutting is expensive.BTW all the gears in the trans are steel.Hook up with a mfg engineer on this site and visit a few shops & plants,it wont take long for you to see the costs....

Cool...Just called up the local Ford, per your suggestion Terry....

Cost for a 2001 Focus MTX-75 is $2168.xx out the door.....

I figured there would be some generous markup on them as there is on just about every other Ford Part out there, but I am wrong again. I could get this same thing for $2035 wholesale, whoopty do, a savings of $130 or so. So I see your point there.

But, I would rather have discussions like this, where we actually learn something. Than having replies posted that are one liners and in some kind of riddle. Post what you know and in a way that can actually be understood and that would be much appreciated.

I want to learn as much as I can, and if someone who is in your position, can point us in the right direction, and not confuse us more, or make us frustrated, that would be helpful.

So where do we go from here? Do we just have to live with the fact that making strong transaxles is going to be an expensive thing? Or can anyone come to the rescue?

Nikolas

With respect, I'm an engineer so my replies are usually 'one liners'...care to guess how many people it takes to design,develop and bring a vehicle to production ?..so I can't cover all the aspect unless I/we write a book on the specific subject...in answer to your question it would take a lot more Contours/Cougars & 'Foci' to be racing to bring down the cost of custom gears ...'custom' is small runs or 'one offs' which cost more time and money than most are prepared to spend, either to buy or offer for sale.Supply & demand is the name of the game,without a 'production' demand the cost will always be high......

Coming out of U. Rochester, and living 2 mintues from the plant on University Ave., I've had contact with some of the guys from Gleason (they make gear cutting machines).

The machines to cut precision gears are BIG!!!!! money, then there is the relativley large set up time to program in a whole new set of gears, and the cost of maintaining the cutters and all. Even though it may only take small dollars in materials, and relatively short times to cut a set - there is no way they could ever make money without charging mondo bucks for limited runs.

Rick Barnes at torsen (also in Rochester) could probably give you a good idea of how much these things run - maybe he has some contacts???

Terry make sure you let any customers know what there getting themselves into.

You know what happened to the last customer that spent alot of money on your business :rolleyes:

BTW why is your mailbox full all of a sudden?? :p

You make sure you learn more about your Contour,one return job out of over 100 customers in a year, not a bad track record I'd say...

Quick question, does the 2001 Focus MTX-75 have the quaffie Diff in it?

No,not as std....