27 replies to this topic

[Cargo]

http://www.timesonli...icle5304422.ece

Mosley pointed out that a wheel nut purchased by one team cost £800 and was used only once. The unnamed team used 1,000 such nuts a season, all flown into Europe from a specialist manufacturer in California. “It is completely unnecessary and nobody gets any benefit from that at all,” Mosley said.

Quite.

Can anyone tell me what kind of material these precious items are made of? I presume they must be ultra-light so maybe ceramics or plastic or beryllium? I'm scratching my head to think of what kind of alloy could be that expensive......

[exFSAE]

Probably steel actually, would be my guess I have a Champ Car wheel nut at home that would be pretty similar. They are zipped on and off VERY quickly with a LOT of torque. Has to be extremely hard for the threads to hold up. Aluminum and Titanium are inherently pretty soft, much more so than alloy steels. Plastic wouldn't work at all. Ceramic would probably just shatter. I suppose its possible they're some MMC or soft material that has a really hard coating.

It's all in how its made. You've got the material price itself... which you might have to anneal... then CNC machine (up to $120 / hr).. then heat treat.. then maybe even finish machine.. then they're vapor deposition coated I think.

Unless they're made from forged stock in which case you have a massive up front tooling cost, then the forge process itself, heat treating, finish machining, vapor coating, etc.

Little silly to just use them once. But if you have the slightest chance of cross-threading the nut or having the threads gall, that costs you immensely in a race.

[alexbiker]

We have only Max Mosely's word for this, of course. Maybe they're $800 new and go back to be reconditioned for $50 after the race?

[Todd]

I don't know if there is any truth to this story, but as a Californian I just wanted to say thanks!

[McGuire]

If they are coming from California my guess is Metalore is the source. They aren't cheap but they are nothing like £800 each.

However, I am not going to say this sort of thing or something like it doesn't happen. When I hear typical F1 budget numbers I think kickbacks and purchasing scams.

[NRoshier]

misleading?...do they not use centre lock wheels...why would there be any need for one use nuts?

[McGuire]

The mechanic does not have to bend over and pick them up, I suppose.

[exFSAE]

The more you thread a nut on and off, with 250-500 ft-lb (!!) of torque, the more chance you have of the threads getting damaged or galling or cross-threading.

If your nut galls or cross-threads on your hub, you are royally ****ed and will probably finish dead last. Using new nuts every time gives you some insurance against that.

I wouldn't be surprised if they used a new entire wheel assembly every race or couple races. Even the relatively simple ChampCar wheel assemblies were $40,000 + each.

[Fat Boy]

Originally posted by McGuire
If they are coming from California my guess is Metalore is the source. They aren't cheap but they are nothing like £800 each.

However, I am not going to say this sort of thing or something like it doesn't happen. When I hear typical F1 budget numbers I think kickbacks and purchasing scams.

Bingo. I think they're about $75-100 for Indycar ones. It can't be an order of magnitude more expensive for an F-1 one, even if they're Ti, which I highly doubt.

[exFSAE]

Well in that case, that's absurd! Talk about money out the window..

[J. Edlund]

Originally posted by exFSAE
Well in that case, that's absurd! Talk about money out the window..

I guess one could say that it's 'nuts';)

[cheapracer]

Originally posted by Fat Boy


Bingo. I think they're about $75-100 for Indycar ones. It can't be an order of magnitude more expensive for an F-1 one, even if they're Ti, which I highly doubt.

I've mentioned it before about buying the same part in - circuit racing shop compared to rallying compared to off road compared to speedway etc........

[primer]

Originally posted by alexbiker
We have only Max Mosely's word for this, of course. Maybe they're $800 new and go back to be reconditioned for $50 after the race?

$800 for a set of four. 48-hour worldwide home delivery charges included.

[alexbiker]

So the truth begins - they may use a thousand nuts but that's only 250 sets at a cost of $2,000,000 and that's assuming they're thrown away afterwards - they might be sold to different series or reconditioned and sold.

Mosely is a politician of fairly high ability. He didn't do the sums - he let us do the sums and come out with an offensive figure, thereby making his excessive costs point without lying. Nothing he says can be taken at face value, ever.

For every single statement he makes, ask ourselves "why is he saying this pre-planned mini-speech? What is his motivation? What effect is aiming to achieve? To whom precisely is he speaking?"

In other words, I do what my sig says.

[McGuire]

I don't blame Mosley. Someone told him a good story and he bought it. With F1 team budgets in the hundreds of millions, I'm sure there are stories that are equally egregious and perfectly true. It's the perfect environment for $2400 toilet seats and other comedies.

[McGuire]

Originally posted by exFSAE
Even the relatively simple ChampCar wheel assemblies were $40,000 + each.

Champ Car/Indy Car wheels do not cost $40,000. They are standard one-piece centerlock forgings by BBS or Oz. Straight off the rack.

[AdamLarnachJr]

Well on the two LMP1 Creation's I've dealt with, which used Metalore wheel nuts, they cost about $1000USD (so I was told) each and we had about a dozen of them. We use typically 250-300psi on the bottles and these things are cranked on. Now on the new Lola we have, it seems that they took a fastener off a timber framing column cap and welded a tapered bit to it.

Don't get me started on the sockets, the Metalore pieces look like something the Predator would kill a human with, the "standard" hex socket we use on the Lola is much more finger friendly. Don't get me wrong though, the Metalore stuff is gorgeous and tough as nails.

[exFSAE]

Champ Car/Indy Car wheels do not cost $40,000. They are standard one-piece centerlock forgings by BBS or Oz. Straight off the rack.

"Wheel assembly" commonly refers to the entire rotating assembly. Includes upright, bearings, hub, etc. 35-40g's the last time I was in a ChampCar shop (a few years ago). And again, that's for a "simple" one, not an EDM titanium F1 deal.

[Fat Boy]

Originally posted by exFSAE


"Wheel assembly" commonly refers to the entire rotating assembly

Funny, I didn't know what the hell it meant, and apparently Mac didn't either. Maybe your term isn't quite as common as you think.

[cheapracer]

Originally posted by Fat Boy


Funny, I didn't know what the hell it meant, and apparently Mac didn't either. Maybe your term isn't quite as common as you think.

I'm getting tyred of these misunderstandings, I wheely am.

[McGuire]

Originally posted by exFSAE


"Wheel assembly" commonly refers to the entire rotating assembly. Includes upright, bearings, hub, etc. 35-40g's the last time I was in a ChampCar shop (a few years ago). And again, that's for a "simple" one, not an EDM titanium F1 deal.

I have never heard the term "wheel assembly" used that way. Still not $40,000 I don't think. For four corners that's 160k, half the price of a new roller.

[RDV]

Having been in F1, it doesn't surprise me....we sourced some parts from the same supplier twice, once from the team, once from an anonymous buyer, and lo and behold; the directly sourced part estimate was 50% more expensive because coming from a F1 team...

We don't use the Metalore ones, we make our own, but they still come out at $380(*) each, even if they last 3 races in general before being discarded...bear in mind we use lesser torque settings, but still the Paoli guns and Metalore titanium gun sockets.Great pieces of kit.

We also use Carbon fiber prop-shafts from CTG, not cheap at $4000 a piece, and lasts 6000km, but worth it for the performance gain.
We are by no means in the F1 performance range....but as Daniel Sexton Gurney said "The only way to beat cubic inches is by cubic money."

On the other hand bear in mind the true cost of running a F1 can be calculated by taking (years budget-capital investment costs)/(number of races*2)...which in the case of a $200M team works out at (200-say 20 investment(10% is a reasonable number))/(18*2)= bottom line $5M per race start per car....if you screw-up a pit stop you have thrown the race and $5M away....cheap at the price.

Same applies to the gears, you put in new gears for the race, every time. Trust me, it's cheaper in the long run.

(*)-It was cheaper before, but the yen exchange rate makes anything done here gold-plated.....

edit-and £800 is not so expensive now, with the £ almost at parity with the euro!

[exFSAE]

Call it whatever you want to call it. I call it the wheel assembly, basically anything outboard of the wheelside suspension points. Heard that in Champ Car, Nascar, hell FSAE even. But who cares.

Like I said. Been a couple years, was still on the Lola but I coulda sworn the bill was $35k+. I could be wrong. That does include all the Ti fasteners, silver-plated nuts, billet Ti brake caliper pistons, blah blah blah.

[nissan_gtp]

it's £100 for the part, and £700 licensing cost for the "FIA" logo ;)

[cheapracer]

Originally posted by cheapracer


I've mentioned it before about buying the same part in - circuit racing shop compared to rallying compared to off road compared to speedway etc........

Just as proof of point, have a look at some of these components and the prices ....

http://www.speedwaym...&first_answer=1

[Lukin]

I would have thought the wheelnut would be from the soft end of the material spectrum and the hub/spindle from the hard end. If you cross thread a nut, you want to be able to remove it and be able to use another nut and know the spindle will be in working order. If the spindle is (relatively) soft your kinda stuffed!

[ralt12]

For older cars that is true. The ones on this '88, and in '89 and '90, at least, are aluminum on Ti hubs.

[Tony Matthews]

For your interest, one item from my small collection of memorabilia, March Porsche 90P wheelnut, titanium and, I suspect, not cheap!