there has been a huge controversy about using a carbon fiber driveshaft let alone a 1 piece carbon fiber driveshaft. well i am well aware of the risk's, dangers, issues, ETC so if your comments are poor please keep it to your self. if it is not for you that is fine. post away. for the guys interested here you go. sit down this is not a simple task.

here it is as it showed up




removing it from the box was a PITA. they really packed it to protect it and that was nice. so the fight is worth it. once removed this driveshaft is gorgeous. on to the install.

i had a AWD Motorsports 2 piece driveshaft. i always wondered about these 1 piece carbon shafts and did as much reading as i could. some say if made properly it will work great and some say they are junk. well i have yet to see a evo break one. i know a few who ran one and never had an issue. so i decided to pick one up. i spoke to Mark at PST for a good 2 hours. the guy is supper nice and helpful. he told me why he feels his carbon one piece is superior to anyone elses. so with an agreement we made with each other i opted to buy one. now i knew both carrier mounts needed to be removed. i already had the middle one taken off so removing one more was no big deal for me. what i did was i cut 80% of the front one off. leaving 1 stud. what i removed is still in one piece so if this project fails i can easily weld the removed bracket back in place.

what i was not interested in was modifying the tunnel. i was told by PST this did not need to be done and several other people said they did not have to mod the tunnel at all. so i am not sure what happened here with my car but it is what it is. i decided to cut up the tunnel . if you look at your tunnel there is a huge bracket that is spot welded right to the actual tunnel of the car. here is the driveshaft WITHOUT cutting anything from the tunnel. it is a few inches off from lining up to the rear diff.



then i trimmed this little piece off the tunnel bracket and got this result




as you can see this is much much closer. but not good enough. so i ended up cutting the **** out of the tunnel. highly upset about it but if i want to give this a try its what i got to. i trimmed and trimmed and then still had to give the actual tunnel a slight crown. i can get my finger tips between the driveshaft and the tunnel so clearances are about 1/2 inch in some spots. a little closer then i would have wanted but i am not ruining the car more then i feel i already have. so here are the completed pics of the install. also to keep in mine the angine/trans/TC lean back ''toward the firewall'' which actually pulls the driveshaft away from the top of the tunnel. so this should be fine............... i hope.

also the driveshaft is coming back out and the tunnel is being sanded and painted. maybe that will make me feel better about this.






here is the best i can get to show the clearance.



and from the rear



RECOMMENDATIONS
DO NOT use OEM engine mounts with this shaft. solid mounts are NOT needed but you do need something much stiffer then stock. i run avid trans and cam side mount, TS rear dog bone, and a custom MPFab solid front cross member. as for the rear i have aluminum mounts with bushings.

i may remove the entire tunnel bracket. doing this will eliminate all mounting points for the shifter base bracket, E-brake handle and some other stuff. what i will do is weld on nuts to the tunnel to replace what i removed. that should be easy to do but very time consuming. we will see. first i want to get the car moving.

weight. this shaft weighed 16.8lbs. that is a 10.5lb savings over the AWD 2 piece. the brackets and trimming i did removed another 4lbs. i bet the rest of that bracket is another 6lbs or so.

so here go's nothing. this car will be driven this year. on the street, at the track and back on the streets. with over 650TRQ i feel this is going to really test the carbon driveshaft. stay tuned as i will keep this updated once the car is finished and the snow melts away. wish me luck.

 

Well good luck. One piece isn't for me especially with the amount that had to be trimmed from the tunnel, but with that said I am always down for letting someone else test new parts haha. Interested to see how the carbon shaft holds up to daily use, especially in the cold, I understand that on paper they are stronger, lighter and absorb torsion better than steel, but often times paper and real world results end up different. Keep us updated this may be the driving force on my decision between aluminum and carbon fiber (gonna get one of them just for the serviceable u-joint option).

 

As I said other cars did not need tunnel trimming. So don't judge that off my car. Why mine is different I do not know. We sure will see what happens though.

 

Looks good. Is there any particular reason why you went with the 1 piece? Any benefits over the 2 piece that you've read or heard of?

 

As always, nice review EvoDan! I need to check your shaft out soon!

 

DSS 2 piece carbon is heavier then the AWD aluminum 2 piece. The 1 piece is one of the lightest shafts you can get. I went with it because I feel it will work. Mark at PST was a stand up guy. Great to talk to and made me feel comfortable with my purchase. It is extreme and for sure not for everyone. I like to be the guy who trys new things and when others say it wont work that is not good enough for me. I like to go agents the grain I guess.

 

Keep us updated please!

 

what kind of clutch do you run? I was always curious what effect on decel noise it has. if it mutes noise or not. amazing weight savings for sure.

 

I run a QM twin clutch. Its actually pretty quiet on decel. I do not have any decel noise coming from the rear. I have a few vids on YouTube you can watch and on decel the car is pretty quiet.

 

are you saying the carbon shaft is more quiet than two peice? or it was pretty quiet with the 2 peice and yoou dont yet know how quiet the carbon shaft is?

 

I have not driven it yet with this 1 piece shaft. There is still snow on the ground. Plus the engine is out for rebuild.

The awd 2 piece had no vibration issues or decel noise.

 

Not to thread jack. But I also have a 1 piece driveshaft. I have been told that the 2 PC DSS CF shaft is the 2 rear sections of driveshaft, so it is still actually 3 PC. Is this correct ?

I have a torqline 1pc driveshaft. However it is the 2 rear sections into one piece.


It's my understanding that your driveshaft is the ENTIRE driveshaft from transfercase and back.

I can't post a pic because the IB app sucks

 

Ok apparently it attached 3 pics lol nvm. Kept getting an error

 

i am not sure what your asking me. your drive shaft is a 2 piece. your shaft go's from the TC to a carrier and then from the carrier to the rear diff. if that is the case that is a 2 piece driveshaft. my drive shaft is 1. 1 long carbon shaft from the TC to the rear.

 

Looking at the DSS one now it looks like it's from the driveshaft to a carrier to a long 1 piece rear section skipping the 2nd carrier. Which would be 2 pieces of CF. I was told by my vendor it was a 2 piece and still used the oem front from the TC which is why I bought mine.

Could have saved more weight it looks like -__-


Oh well