From the Rolls-Royce experimental archive: a quarter of a million communications from Rolls-Royce, 1906 to 1960's. Documents from the Sir Henry Royce Memorial Foundation (SHRMF).
Letter discussing the development and fabrication of aluminium alloy rims for racing cars.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 88\5\ scan0019 | |
| Date | 2nd October 1935 guessed | |
| Copy of letter "Our Italian Company have done a good deal of development on aluminium alloy rims and have been supplying such rims for racing cars for several years. "In the early stages the rims were rolled up from the aluminium strip by the same processes as the steel rim is fabricated, but later an extruded section was evolved which is stronger for the same weight and also more easily jointed. The material is, of course, not welded and the joint is effected by a cover plate of the same material rivetted on. The saving in weight is obviously dependent on the rim size, but at least 5 lbs. per rim would be saved on the size you are using. In case you might want to build the rims into wheels it would be advisable for you to indicate which type of wheel so that the rims could be depressed and pierced prior to the hardening treatment. We have drawings of some of the sections and we also have some short lengths of the extruded shapes, which it is hoped to send by a later post. "With regard to data, we have not carried out extensive tests ourselves on these rims, but they have undoubtedly given very satisfactory results indeed on the racing cars of Alfa-Romeo, Maserati and Mercedes. So far duralumin has been employed and water quenched after application, but in the writer's view one of the R.R.alloys should be rather more suitable since the only heat treatment necessary after the component was finished would be a low temperature precipitation treatment." | ||