Whaddaya Think? 360 hubs retrofit?

Could 360 hubs be retrofitted to the 355 so:

1) the rear shock could be mounted off the lower knuckle
2) A new space frame could be made in aluminum to
a) save weight
b) now allow an engine out of the top service
3) enabling better aftermarket brake options (including hats and 6 pot calipers)
4) engineering for a proper and functional emergency brake
5) cheaper and possibly more robust bearing replacement options
6) custom control arms could be fabbed to be more robust and include better bearing choices

besides that this would be an incredible undertaking for a single car, is there any reason not to consider this option (purist are welcome to hang themselves in advance.. just kidding.)

 

Not really sure what you are talking about here. Wheel bearings? Space frame?

 

as per the attached photo (hopefully.)
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Would be interesting

If I was to build a aluminum subframe I may just use titanium instead and go with a matching front suspension.

Something to add to my projects list

 

Why titanium? -besides being awesome Heat is not an issue, neither is exceptional strength. Aluminum is lighter than titanium when comparing like dimensional parts. The tooling and time required to machine titanium are greatly increased over those suitable for aluminum.

As for the 360 upright swap, why not just produce the parts like control arms and brake kits for the F355 setup? I wouldn't be interested in having to remove all suspension components along with halfshafts etc when I only need to remove the wheels/inner fenders and 20 bolts (the rest needs to come off either way) to get the engine out. Not to mention possibly fowling up the suspension geometry Ferrari engineered, it just seems like the trade off isn't there.

I'm a machinist/fabricator so I love designing and building custom and one-off parts but this just doesn't make sense IMHO.


Rob

 

To what end? I don't think the stock stuff is bad except maybe the brakes, and there are three or four aftermarket options to replace them along with the F40 or F50 upgrades some have done if you want to use Ferrari parts.

 

Pretty, pretty stuff. Worth at least some measurements! 'Course, if you do the rear, then you gotta do the front too.

 

Love the idea of a alum space frame to save weight and to do engine out service, seen it done, but not sure if it was alum. Here is the pic
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In the picture you can see the opportunities for creating space. The 355 mounts the rear shock to the upper control arm. Go back to the picture of the 360 set up and see the shock mounted to the lower control arm. The stock control arm mounting points can be retained, and thus the suspension geometry can be maintained with the new subframe.

Another helpful idea would be to tie the new top shock mounts to the fronts through a roll cage.

Even more potential exists in the open space architecture to replace the gas tank with a option that might allow for an in situ belt swap. The advantage here is less cycling thru breaking the electrical connections. Far less labor. And maybe further opportunity to bring down engine compartment temperatures.

 

is that with the new shock towers, the bends on the headers can be so much easier on heat radiation, so the melted header problem can go away too!

 

The 348 style parking brake is far superior to the 360 separate caliper. That is why they abandoned the 360 style parking brake and went back to the small drum and brake shoe set-up like on the 348 and all the V12s for the 458 and all the later cars.

According to Brian Crall in Forza, as the rotors wear on the 360, the contact surface on the parking brake pads on the separate caliper, which see very little wear, contact a smaller and smaller rotor area, rendering them more and more ineffective as time passes. The normal brake pads' wear matches that of the rotor, so no problem there.