Lightened Flywheel... anyone uprated theres?

Meridian, you say only race cars need them. Well if race cars use them that is obviously because there is an advantage to having one fitted. That being the car accelerate quicker in the lower gears. As mentioned by Andy they work well in high revving NA engines.

Simply saying only race cars need them is ridiculous. No one needs a car that goes above 70mph but how many of those are on our roads?
 
Sorry, but thats sort of wrong too. Just because a race car has it doesnt make it a good thing (insane spring rates, for a start) but lightened flywheels, for certain cars, are great, if you want to make it more responsive :D
 
I had a lightened flywheel in my e36 325i and the the benefits were increased acceleration, but the down side was it lost speed on slight motorway inclines due to reduced mass, and was more awkward in stop start traffic. But for what it cost me, E30 325i flywheel modified it was cheaper than a new DMF, so the pros outweighed the cons. I also noticed a slight bit more vibration through the car with it in.
 
I wouldn't get one on my mazda but im tempted to get one on the beetle, after all better acceleration can only be a good thing on that.
 
Matt82 said:
Sorry, but thats sort of wrong too. Just because a race car has it doesnt make it a good thing (insane spring rates, for a start) but lightened flywheels, for certain cars, are great, if you want to make it more responsive :D
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Apologies, I meant that there has to be a performance advantage which is why they are used and why modders choose to fit them to their own vehicles. I appreciate that there are a few cons to fitting one, higher rpm required for pull off inducing more clutch wear, faster throttle response which could induce lift off oversteer in cars prone to it etc and cases like the turbo cars setup mentioned earlier in the thread.
 
If you commute or do a lot of daily driving I wouldn't go with one. It started to annoy me after a while and the benefits weren't good enough.
 
Gixer said:
Apologies, I meant that there has to be a performance advantage which is why they are used and why modders choose to fit them to their own vehicles. I appreciate that there are a few cons to fitting one, higher rpm required for pull off inducing more clutch wear, faster throttle response which could induce lift off oversteer in cars prone to it etc and cases like the turbo cars setup mentioned earlier in the thread.
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I also fitted a flowed throttle body to my car, i beleive that caused me more problems in terms of being able to drive it smoothly. So the right hand pedal was a bit on/off, the left pedal had a lightened flywheel to contend with and the middle pedal didnt really work when cold.

GF absolutely hated using that car around town :D
 
Decided against one in mine.

There are steel and aluminum options (steel is heavier so a bit easier to live with but they are both lighter than the stock DMF).

Advantages were quicker revving so the car feels more urgent on pick up but does make it less drivable in traffic and day to day for the reasons mentioned already in the thread. They are also louder/rattly which I didn't want.
 
Mmmm, this is the kind of feedback I need you see. I do a lot of town driving as well as motorway etc etc, and was thinking of things to make the RX8 quicker. I'm waiting on the porting results from GroupB motorsport... and also keeping on eye on thje supercharger... however at the moment, kind of at a dead end now and thought this could be a nice change when I change the clutch.

Seems a lot of fors and against's... suppose I should possibly drive one with one in. Also, I do intend to possibly go FI so... this may not suite the supercharger. Well, I'm not rushing into it, as it's not urgent so... I'll just go with the flow for now and find out more information.
 
If you are looking to change the clutch anyway and definitely intend going the supercharger route, then I'd stick with the stock flywheel and maybe get an uprated clutch depending on what the power hike is.

Bear in mind this is likely to be stiffer/heavier but not as annoying as a light flywheel imo - depending on the clutch.

Alternatively, stick with the stock clutch and just replace it more regularly.
 
It also knocked a few tenths off my 0-60 pb

Not sure how a charger would suit it as the parasitic effect might make the idle even more fragile
 
Thing is, these RX8's are mental. 228bhp mine's meant to have... first rolling road session 176bhp rofl :-) Remap and K&N put it to 196bhp. Then since then, full exhaust system/decat and remap again to use the better breathing... new coils, new sparks, new ignition leads... all fluids upto track spec including all gear box oil, diff oil etc... compression tested on both rotors all showing between 7.6-8.0 so it's running perfectly. 212bhp now lol. So with all those mods and an A1 mint engine, it's still 16bhp down on factory lol. God knows what the 4 port jobbies are doing... 192bhp... I wonder where there's much difference between them when dynoed.

Basically they were saying ALL RX8's are well down and mine is one of the fitter ones... they've never ever seen a stock RX8 with over 200bhp... so Mazda I think were telling porky pies. Which then makes you think the book 0-60 time of 6.4s was based on a lot less than 228bhp?

Also, on Superchargers... they have two guys who have them and both are around 250-260bhp... all this talk of 300bhp+? Mmmmm, take with a pinch of salt.

What I'd be hoping is, with a port job and a super charger you'd then be looking at the sharp end of 280-300bhp... however, that'll be a £10k payout... and then straight away you think... hold on, could go out and put that towards my TVR or M5 lol... in which case why bother lol.

One of them... will see what happens when I replace clutch later in the year, I probably just won't be able to resist as I'm a tart when it comes to cars lol.

The bigger decision comes later in the year when I decide whether to blow some serious wedge on Roxy or not?!?!:eek:
 
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pugheaven said:
Mmmm, this is the kind of feedback I need you see. I do a lot of town driving as well as motorway etc etc, and was thinking of things to make the RX8 quicker. I'm waiting on the porting results from GroupB motorsport... and also keeping on eye on thje supercharger... however at the moment, kind of at a dead end now and thought this could be a nice change when I change the clutch.

Seems a lot of fors and against's... suppose I should possibly drive one with one in. Also, I do intend to possibly go FI so... this may not suite the supercharger. Well, I'm not rushing into it, as it's not urgent so... I'll just go with the flow for now and find out more information.
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What flywheel has Mark at GroupB motorsport got in his RX8 as i know he's used that on track etc? He'd be the person i'd take advice from personally as he's seen and driven enough RX's to know if its worth it.
 
sovietspybob said:
What flywheel has Mark at GroupB motorsport got in his RX8 as i know he's used that on track etc? He'd be the person i'd take advice from personally as he's seen and driven enough RX's to know if its worth it.
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Funnily taking Roxy back down to them this week to double check the new coilovers to ensure everything is still ok since putting them on. Was going to quiz him on Thursday :D
 
I've had three engines with lightened flywheels and driven one with an insanely light race flywheel with paddle clutch.

Mine: Ford Crossflows come with massive flywheels as standard and take ages to rev up. One of 1700's had the lighter 1300 flywheel which was ok, but still took a while to flip the revs up and just off idle it used to burp a bit because of the cam grind. The other 1700 has a light steel one that lets the revs fly quickly, but not excessively light that it makes pulling away difficult. The third one was on a vintage sidevalve engine with a whole host of mods and it made it a lot more responsive.

The overly light one was on a heavily tuned 4.2 Rover V8 in my dad's hotrod. Way cammed up and quite a heavy car with a featherweight flywheel and a paddle clutch - it was always too much for me to get used to and it was much more drivable after fitting a heavier one.

So light is good but don't go too light ;)
 
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