Unloaded Paxton!

[mfg]

A good way to increase the service life of a Paxton supercharger is to remove a few springs from the internal race load assy, thereby decreasing pressure on the five drive balls and their respective races.......True?

[r1lark]

I'll say upfront that I have not done much with the McC and Paxton blowers. But if I understand how the ball assembly works, decreasing the spring force would lead to premature failure of the assembly. I'll say FALSE.

[mfg]

3 hours ago, r1lark said:

I'll say upfront that I have not done much with the McC and Paxton blowers. But if I understand how the ball assembly works, decreasing the spring force would lead to premature failure of the assembly. I'll say FALSE.

False is CORRECT!...(Doing this would lead to slipping & burning up under boost pressure)

[brad]

The ORIGINAL and EARLY McCulloch superchargers had a bakelite clutch under the races. They were not pinned or fastened in any way, and would slip (on purpose) when boost exceeded the set solenoid regulator pressure. This slipped the outer races to the same RPM as the input shaft and ball driver, thereby stopping the balls and any slippage and resulting heat and galling. By the time they went to V8 models, and higher RPMs then they pinned the races as the clutches would burn at the higher RPM.

Edited April 14, 2018 by brad

[mfg]

10 hours ago, brad said:

The ORIGINAL and EARLY McCulloch superchargers had a bakelite clutch under the races. They were not pinned or fastened in any way, and would slip (on purpose) when boost exceeded the set solenoid regulator pressure. This slipped the outer races to the same RPM as the input shaft and ball driver, thereby stopping the balls and any slippage and resulting heat and galling. By the time they went to V8 models, and higher RPMs then they pinned the races as the clutches would burn at the higher RPM.

Sounds like the engineers were 'thinking ahead' at the time!