Aftermarket Driveshaft Options....
10-13-2014, 01:17 AM
#81
TECH Fanatic
Dude, they should have seriously refunded a good portion of your money cuz of this whole deal. Back n forth and back n forth, I would have returned that damn thing. Hopefully your experience is the exception rather than the rule. The first thing I check is the packing lists, or some other itemized form of what I've got. That way I know what I'm missing. How in the world are you supposed to know what they include without an in depth list. Hell Jaysen put a list in the paperwork for his master cylinder upgrade. He remembered and he has a full time job aaaaaand he sends those out in his spare time. Hope you get it all worked out
10-13-2014, 07:04 AM
#82
Dude, they should have seriously refunded a good portion of your money cuz of this whole deal. Back n forth and back n forth, I would have returned that damn thing. Hopefully your experience is the exception rather than the rule. The first thing I check is the packing lists, or some other itemized form of what I've got. That way I know what I'm missing. How in the world are you supposed to know what they include without an in depth list. Hell Jaysen put a list in the paperwork for his master cylinder upgrade. He remembered and he has a full time job aaaaaand he sends those out in his spare time. Hope you get it all worked out
spend the other 700+ on other upgrades.
10-13-2014, 09:33 AM
#84
TECH Resident
mine isn't even installed yet so i've debated whether or not it's worth going with your poly one and selling the aluminum driveshaft "slightly used"...
10-13-2014, 09:36 AM
#85
Having a driveshaft rebuilt with a rubber surround didn't appeal to me either but the poly carriers you have now offer the upgrade I would need before investing money in the OE shaft.
Voodoo, at what power level do you think your shaft would start giving up? 600whp maybe?
10-13-2014, 09:58 AM
#87
TECH Resident
10-13-2014, 05:11 PM
#88
my poly carrier will hold more power than the stock driveshaft will hold. Also we are currently obtaining core driveshafts.. Already got one in last week and trying to find more.
Havent there been plenty of V's with stock driveshafts that have tons of power?
Havent there been plenty of V's with stock driveshafts that have tons of power?
11-05-2014, 08:23 AM
#90
Blowing the diff doesn't really say much for the driveshaft because we all know the diff will go very easily.
Poly mounts all the way around + Carbon Fiber driveshaft = a car that "tingles".
While the car is smooth in one respect, I don't get what I would consider to be driveline vibrations caused by an imbalance or a shaft that is too long, what I do get is the cars inability to filter harmonics.
The UMIs will be the first thing to go or be modified, followed by replacing the trans mount with a factory unit and then, as much as I hate it, the 54 shifter. The shifter has turned into a tuning fork after the install of the driveshaft as I'll assume that the flex disc was the last piece of rubber dampening the not perfectly balanced rotating assembly. I've installed delrin washers and dampers at every bolt and a nice thick piece of it between the Hurst stick and the shifter but it's just a little much. I will probably modify my stock shifter and be happy enough.
Unfortunately our motor mount options are chewing gum and concrete with nothing in between. The poly cradle mounts will stay as they made a very noticeable improvement in how the car rides and handles. The CS diff bushing will stay for now because eventually the diff will be tossed in favor of an 8.8. But the rest will be going under the knife.
Poly mounts all the way around + Carbon Fiber driveshaft = a car that "tingles".
While the car is smooth in one respect, I don't get what I would consider to be driveline vibrations caused by an imbalance or a shaft that is too long, what I do get is the cars inability to filter harmonics.
The UMIs will be the first thing to go or be modified, followed by replacing the trans mount with a factory unit and then, as much as I hate it, the 54 shifter. The shifter has turned into a tuning fork after the install of the driveshaft as I'll assume that the flex disc was the last piece of rubber dampening the not perfectly balanced rotating assembly. I've installed delrin washers and dampers at every bolt and a nice thick piece of it between the Hurst stick and the shifter but it's just a little much. I will probably modify my stock shifter and be happy enough.
Unfortunately our motor mount options are chewing gum and concrete with nothing in between. The poly cradle mounts will stay as they made a very noticeable improvement in how the car rides and handles. The CS diff bushing will stay for now because eventually the diff will be tossed in favor of an 8.8. But the rest will be going under the knife.
11-05-2014, 10:09 AM
#92
Unfortunately I don't have the time or shop space to chip away at it. If I'm going to spend 2 hours under the car I may as well spend all day.
Btw....Frank and I have discussed this and he offered to build whatever kind of driveshaft I thought would tame these harmonics. Seems to have a genuine interest in making it right. Much appreciated!
11-25-2014, 09:50 AM
#93
Blowing the diff doesn't really say much for the driveshaft because we all know the diff will go very easily.
Poly mounts all the way around + Carbon Fiber driveshaft = a car that "tingles".
While the car is smooth in one respect, I don't get what I would consider to be driveline vibrations caused by an imbalance or a shaft that is too long, what I do get is the cars inability to filter harmonics.
The UMIs will be the first thing to go or be modified, followed by replacing the trans mount with a factory unit and then, as much as I hate it, the 54 shifter. The shifter has turned into a tuning fork after the install of the driveshaft as I'll assume that the flex disc was the last piece of rubber dampening the not perfectly balanced rotating assembly. I've installed delrin washers and dampers at every bolt and a nice thick piece of it between the Hurst stick and the shifter but it's just a little much. I will probably modify my stock shifter and be happy enough.
Unfortunately our motor mount options are chewing gum and concrete with nothing in between. The poly cradle mounts will stay as they made a very noticeable improvement in how the car rides and handles. The CS diff bushing will stay for now because eventually the diff will be tossed in favor of an 8.8. But the rest will be going under the knife.
Poly mounts all the way around + Carbon Fiber driveshaft = a car that "tingles".
While the car is smooth in one respect, I don't get what I would consider to be driveline vibrations caused by an imbalance or a shaft that is too long, what I do get is the cars inability to filter harmonics.
The UMIs will be the first thing to go or be modified, followed by replacing the trans mount with a factory unit and then, as much as I hate it, the 54 shifter. The shifter has turned into a tuning fork after the install of the driveshaft as I'll assume that the flex disc was the last piece of rubber dampening the not perfectly balanced rotating assembly. I've installed delrin washers and dampers at every bolt and a nice thick piece of it between the Hurst stick and the shifter but it's just a little much. I will probably modify my stock shifter and be happy enough.
Unfortunately our motor mount options are chewing gum and concrete with nothing in between. The poly cradle mounts will stay as they made a very noticeable improvement in how the car rides and handles. The CS diff bushing will stay for now because eventually the diff will be tossed in favor of an 8.8. But the rest will be going under the knife.
Contacted Frank at DSS to see where this goes next.
11-25-2014, 12:05 PM
#94
Fixed the "tingle" with a factory transmission mount and the car is night and day better than it was. However, now that the harmonics are gone, you can feel what is left by the driveshaft itself which are minor vibes at interstate speed. For $1400, I need it to be better than this considering there are much cheaper options available now that weren't available to me when I ordered this.
Contacted Frank at DSS to see where this goes next.
Contacted Frank at DSS to see where this goes next.
11-25-2014, 12:08 PM
#95
Fixed the "tingle" with a factory transmission mount and the car is night and day better than it was. However, now that the harmonics are gone, you can feel what is left by the driveshaft itself which are minor vibes at interstate speed. For $1400, I need it to be better than this considering there are much cheaper options available now that weren't available to me when I ordered this.
Contacted Frank at DSS to see where this goes next.
Contacted Frank at DSS to see where this goes next.
01-12-2015, 09:15 AM
#96
So at the end of the day, the CF shaft didn't work out. While it vibbed just a little the first day I had it, it got progressively worse every day thereafter. In the end, it got very "clunky" and vibrated pretty hard so I replaced it with a voodoo shaft.
Frank at DSS has been nothing but great to work with. While mistakes were made, poop happens. The entire staff at DSS did everything they could to accommodate me and while they offered to build me a 2 piece carbon which I would love to see, I don't have time to be a test bed. Therefore, Frank issued a complete refund including the shipping!!!
IMHO, based on the plunge measurements that were taken with the shaft both in and out of the car, the driveshaft is to short and the CVs are over extended which has lead to their early almost complete failure. This seems to mimic 07ctsv's experience with the shaft but his CV actually failed whereas mine were just getting sloppy. Frank said he would keep me posted and I look forward to doing other forms of business with these guys in the future.
Is it possible that the only way to offer a product like this is to simply build it and let the general public be your test bed? Maybe...could they have written this loss off as an R&D cost? I would think so...
Either way, the voodoo shaft seems to be working very well and for most of us, it will probably be all we ever need in a driveshaft.
The key to making it work right will be to insure that the front part of the drivehaft is perfectly aligned vertically and horizontally with the output shaft of the transmission. While it is called a fex disc, keeping the shaft as straight as possible will keep the joint as relaxed as possible. I think I'm convinced at this point that a CV joint will accommodate a mis-alignment where a u-joint will not and sense the rear part of the V1 driveshaft has CVs at either end, we shouldn't have to worry so much about aligning the rear part of the V1 driveshaft as it should correct itself by virtue of having CVs.
The transmission output flange is a little hard to measure off of but you can use a cheapo digital angle gauge to get a vertical angle measurement. Just shim the driveshaft carrier bearing so that the angle measurement off the drivehaft equals the one you took off the output shaft and you should be golden vertically.
Horizontal alignment is a bit trickier because my elcheapo digital angle gauge doesn't do relative horizontal angles. Mine needs a little help in this department so I plan on making a simple fixture to bolt to the output flange that will basically act as nothing more than a nice big flat surface to measure off of and for taking simple string alignment reference points and go from there. It will basically be a big block of plastic drilled so that you can bolt it to the output flange. The goal will be to see if the trans is straight with the diff.
I'll do it with a string. The output flange is wider than the input flange. The output flange is say 5.5" wide while the input flange say 4.75 wide. Drill a hole through the block 2 3/8 off center, run a string through the hole, pull it to the outside edge of the diff input shaft and then use a carpenters square on the face of the block to see if the string is 90 degrees off the face of the it. If it isn't, adjust until it is and then you know the drivetrain is horizontally aligned with the diff. the only problem I see with this could be interference with the driveshaft bearing mounts in the dirveshaft tunnel interfering with the strings site line from trans to diff.
I'll keep you posted.
Frank at DSS has been nothing but great to work with. While mistakes were made, poop happens. The entire staff at DSS did everything they could to accommodate me and while they offered to build me a 2 piece carbon which I would love to see, I don't have time to be a test bed. Therefore, Frank issued a complete refund including the shipping!!!
IMHO, based on the plunge measurements that were taken with the shaft both in and out of the car, the driveshaft is to short and the CVs are over extended which has lead to their early almost complete failure. This seems to mimic 07ctsv's experience with the shaft but his CV actually failed whereas mine were just getting sloppy. Frank said he would keep me posted and I look forward to doing other forms of business with these guys in the future.
Is it possible that the only way to offer a product like this is to simply build it and let the general public be your test bed? Maybe...could they have written this loss off as an R&D cost? I would think so...
Either way, the voodoo shaft seems to be working very well and for most of us, it will probably be all we ever need in a driveshaft.
The key to making it work right will be to insure that the front part of the drivehaft is perfectly aligned vertically and horizontally with the output shaft of the transmission. While it is called a fex disc, keeping the shaft as straight as possible will keep the joint as relaxed as possible. I think I'm convinced at this point that a CV joint will accommodate a mis-alignment where a u-joint will not and sense the rear part of the V1 driveshaft has CVs at either end, we shouldn't have to worry so much about aligning the rear part of the V1 driveshaft as it should correct itself by virtue of having CVs.
The transmission output flange is a little hard to measure off of but you can use a cheapo digital angle gauge to get a vertical angle measurement. Just shim the driveshaft carrier bearing so that the angle measurement off the drivehaft equals the one you took off the output shaft and you should be golden vertically.
Horizontal alignment is a bit trickier because my elcheapo digital angle gauge doesn't do relative horizontal angles. Mine needs a little help in this department so I plan on making a simple fixture to bolt to the output flange that will basically act as nothing more than a nice big flat surface to measure off of and for taking simple string alignment reference points and go from there. It will basically be a big block of plastic drilled so that you can bolt it to the output flange. The goal will be to see if the trans is straight with the diff.
I'll do it with a string. The output flange is wider than the input flange. The output flange is say 5.5" wide while the input flange say 4.75 wide. Drill a hole through the block 2 3/8 off center, run a string through the hole, pull it to the outside edge of the diff input shaft and then use a carpenters square on the face of the block to see if the string is 90 degrees off the face of the it. If it isn't, adjust until it is and then you know the drivetrain is horizontally aligned with the diff. the only problem I see with this could be interference with the driveshaft bearing mounts in the dirveshaft tunnel interfering with the strings site line from trans to diff.
I'll keep you posted.
Last edited by ls1247; 01-12-2015 at 10:19 AM.
07-19-2015, 06:33 PM
#97
Finally stopped driving the car long enough to address what little issue I had left with vibrations.
IN the past months, some have said their UMI motor mounts could be contributing to this because they are so stiff. I tend to agree with that so I ordered up a set of the latest "soft" mounts form CS and installed those, along with a new camaro flex disc, this weekend.
CS offers a "bore scope" alignment tool so I rented it up to help with this install.
Before pulling the UMIs, I used the tool to check the alignment of the drivetrain and found that it favored the passenger side of the car by just over an inch at the differential. After installing the CS mounts, I checked it again and it was alignment perfection. I installed the mounts and let it all fall where it wanted to go and without "pry bar action", the engine and trans aligned perfectly with the diff.
I also used the method described on the Revshift site for aligning the carrier bearing and I had to elongate the carrier bearing mounting holes in order to push the carrier over far enough to line up properly. I'm using 4 standard 3/8 fender washers under each carrier bearing bolt to get the height right.
The camaro flex disc is slightly different than the V1 disc but it seems to be working fine thus far as the car is smoooooooth.....
http://www.cadillacforums.com/forums...tall-help.html
IN the past months, some have said their UMI motor mounts could be contributing to this because they are so stiff. I tend to agree with that so I ordered up a set of the latest "soft" mounts form CS and installed those, along with a new camaro flex disc, this weekend.
CS offers a "bore scope" alignment tool so I rented it up to help with this install.
Before pulling the UMIs, I used the tool to check the alignment of the drivetrain and found that it favored the passenger side of the car by just over an inch at the differential. After installing the CS mounts, I checked it again and it was alignment perfection. I installed the mounts and let it all fall where it wanted to go and without "pry bar action", the engine and trans aligned perfectly with the diff.
I also used the method described on the Revshift site for aligning the carrier bearing and I had to elongate the carrier bearing mounting holes in order to push the carrier over far enough to line up properly. I'm using 4 standard 3/8 fender washers under each carrier bearing bolt to get the height right.
The camaro flex disc is slightly different than the V1 disc but it seems to be working fine thus far as the car is smoooooooth.....
http://www.cadillacforums.com/forums...tall-help.html
Last edited by ls1247; 07-19-2015 at 06:41 PM.
07-20-2015, 06:27 PM
#99
I also beefed up the factory transmission mount a little to try and get some more life out of it because I wasn't crazy about other mounts or inserts I've used. My factory mount wasn't completely sacked so I jacked the transmission up just a touch (1/4" maybe) to gain the room I needed and filled each void with one length of scrap power steering hose (stiffer than fuel line) and bedded it with window weld...it settled back down maybe an 1/8th.
I know it sounds ghetto but much like the flex disc, we don''t have many options. So far so I good and based on my past experience doing this kind of thing, I shouldn't have any problems with this setup and if I do, it can be removed.
The bore scope tool from CS is brilliance. Simply slide it over the indexing shaft on the transmission and have at it.
Last edited by ls1247; 07-20-2015 at 06:37 PM.