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COMING SOON Honda VTX 1300 & 1800 Cruiser Accepting orders for March delivery
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Honda VTX 1300 & 1800 Cruiser Champion Honda VTX proprietary differential is a custom-built, left-hand component of the rear end...as opposed to the way at least a few of our competitors handle the VTX drive-train, by simply turning their "regular" differential upside down. The key advantages to Champion's approach are: 1) Champion's proprietary pinion gear drives the ring on the pressure face (rather than on the coasting face as in an upside down differential) of the ring gear teeth, as dictated by conventional differential gear design; 2) Champion's proprietary arrangement keeps the two pinion shaft bearings partially submerged in lubricating oil as dictated by conventional differential design, when the oil level is properly maintained. This may not always be the case in an upside down differential; The third Champion advantage requires a bit of a tutorial on differential lubrication strategy: A. In differential design, there is an oil "supply channel" cast into the upper portion of the casing which accepts oil "slung" up and forward by the ring gear and drains it into the cavity between the two pinion shaft bearings. This provides approximately equal amounts of oil to the two pinion shaft bearings; B. Oil which lubricates the rear bearing returns directly to the differential "sump"; C. Oil which lubricates the forward bearing passes through the bearing into the cavity between that bearing and the pinion seal and is returned to the differential sump through a smaller (than the supply channel) "return channel" which is cast into the lower portion of the casing; D. In an upside down differential, in which the "sump" is above the pinion/ring gear interface, the ring gear will sling oil up and forward into the return channel. IF that pumping action is sufficient to move oil "backwards" through the return channel it will discharge the oil into the cavity between the forward pinion shaft bearing and the pinion seal. Since there is no return path from this cavity to the sump, this could over-pressurize the pinion seal. This arrangement could also leave the rear pinion shaft bearing without an adequate supply of oil. E. In short, the third significant advantage of Champion's custom-built left-hand drive VTX differential is that it preserves the the proven gear lubrication strategy in conventional differential design and avoids the potential lubrication challenges associated with the upside down rear end approach taken by some other VTX trike manufacturers. |
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