New- GMR AFX Upright Packages

[The GMR]

GMR AFX-Front C6 Hub







GMR AFX-Brake Man Pro-Tour







GMR AFX-Z06 Monobloc







GMR AFX-Wilwood BNSL

Info and Investment structure coming soon.


Jason

[Bad94]

Ready to read more info.

[The GMR]

Ready to read more info.

I will not have more info until next week up on the site, but if you have any questions please ask away!
Jason

[The GMR]

double post.

[Bad94]

Are the steering mounting holes moved at all?
Will they work with the Ride Tech tru turn?
How much taller then stock?
Any drop?
Do they move the wheel mounting in or out?

[MarkM66]

Are you making these for CPP?

[DarkoNova]

Do you mean they're for A/F/X bodies? Because those definitely aren't AFX spindles...

[TitoJones]

Holy AFX spindle ripoff batman. I expect nothing less than that from a company like CPP. Nice looking brake packages and hub though. Is that hub rebuildable? Roller or taper bearings?

Tyler

[killer69]

Do you mean they're for A/F/X bodies? Because those definitely aren't AFX spindles...

Thank you.

[Jay@GMR]

Are the steering mounting holes moved at all?
Will they work with the Ride Tech tru turn?
How much taller then stock?
Any drop?
Do they move the wheel mounting in or out?

Hi Bad94, we will have the specifics up soon. Please stay tuned.

Are you making these for CPP?

No, although we are working with CPP on a few different packages that will be seen at SEMA. We know people have mixed reviews on CPP, but we (GMR) fully support this product.

Do you mean they're for A/F/X bodies? Because those definitely aren't AFX spindles...

Yes, for A/F/X bodies.

Holy AFX spindle ripoff batman. I expect nothing less than that from a company like CPP. Nice looking brake packages and hub though. Is that hub rebuildable? Roller or taper bearings?

Tyler

Mr. Tyler, You are the undisputed originator of this blended "GM design" but with such a good concept comes its competition...... CPP has done a great job in our opinion with form/function/cost. We really like the fact that it is of steel...... makes for little to no deflection. I believe a pair of uprights and C5 hubs will retail at around $400..... not to shabby for the guys on a budget who want serious parts. The Uprights themselves will be under $300! I believe we will be seeing many sets sold?

Thanks for the kind words , yes our hubs are rebuildable and available in tapered rollers. We do however offer a ceramic ball option.

[TitoJones]

Mr. Tyler, You are the undisputed originator of this blended "GM design" but with such a good concept comes its competition...... CPP has done a great job in our opinion with form/function/cost. We really like the fact that it is of steel...... makes for little to no deflection. I believe a pair of uprights and C5 hubs will retail at around $400..... not to shabby for the guys on a budget who want serious parts. The Uprights themselves will be under $300! I believe we will be seeing many sets sold?

That's not competition my dear friend. What you are witnessing is the destruction of innovation. Do you think CPP would have figured out how to even come close to that product if we hadn't spent $500K in R&D, engineering, testing, and manufacturing to make them back in 2005? You know what they have invested in that product? Probably $10K. They didn't have to scratch design the pick up points, they didn't have to make pre-production prototypes, do physical geometry testing, physical destructive testing, source foundries in the USA so we can keep some of our infrastructure in this country and keep American workers employed, figure out how to make them stronger than GM's C5 pressure casting, and lighter than a machined block of billet 6061T6. They took our specs, removed the 7/8" drop, and made them in china out of steel.
Fantastic innovation. Oh, and because they don't have all that nonsense cash tied up in paying engineers, making tooling that is of aerospace standards, thousands of hours in Solidworks, they don't need to re-coup anything and can sell it for pennies on the dollar.



Just remember that one day people will rip off and steal your hard work, make it inferior and sell it as the next best thing for pennies. Where is my motivation to bring other awesome ideas I have for the motorsports niche we all love? It's gone, along with my ownership of ATS and my interest in supporting a client base that continues to f*ck themselves over by buying products like this, from sh*t companies like CPP. If all the DSE's, ATS's, and RideTechs disappear, who will companies steal from and where will the new products come from? There will be nothing left but a stagnent market of old technology parts all made in China.

Kudos on your new partnership.

Tyler

[The GMR]

That's not competition my dear friend. What you are witnessing is the destruction of innovation. Do you think CPP would have figured out how to even come close to that product if we hadn't spent $500K in R&D, engineering, testing, and manufacturing to make them back in 2005? You know what they have invested in that product? Probably $10K. They didn't have to scratch design the pick up points, they didn't have to make pre-production prototypes, do physical geometry testing, physical destructive testing, source foundries in the USA so we can keep some of our infrastructure in this country and keep American workers employed, figure out how to make them stronger than GM's C5 pressure casting, and lighter than a machined block of billet 6061T6. They took our specs, removed the 7/8" drop, and made them in china out of steel.
Fantastic innovation. Oh, and because they don't have all that nonsense cash tied up in paying engineers, making tooling that is of aerospace standards, thousands of hours in Solidworks, they don't need to re-coup anything and can sell it for pennies on the dollar.

Just remember that one day people will rip off and steal your hard work, make it inferior and sell it as the next best thing for pennies. Where is my motivation to bring other awesome ideas I have for the motorsports niche we all love? It's gone, along with my ownership of ATS and my interest in supporting a client base that continues to f*ck themselves over by buying products like this, from sh*t companies like CPP. If all the DSE's, ATS's, and RideTechs disappear, who will companies steal from and where will the new products come from? There will be nothing left but a stagnent market of old technology parts all made in China.

Kudos on your new partnership.

Tyler

I can sense your frustration, along with reading previous posts about similar situations in the past.
The facts are simple, we were contacted by Cpp to compile a package for this new product. We are working on a GMR hub, C5 caliper, and standard "off the shelf" 2 piece wilwood rotor for more of the "masses" per say. This does not mean we have any negative things to say about ATS or Speedtech etc.. In fact quite the opposite.

All the above brake packages / GMR setup can and are offered for the uprights you designed. Here is just one example, gen 1 with ATS uprights on GWS arms.








From what the owner has told me, you were the one he bought the suspension setup from years ago. He is still the exact same setup (other then GMR hubs) that you suggested and has ZERO complaints about the handling of the car. I have been in the car and was impressed with how well she feels.

thanks
Jason

[TitoJones]

I'm not slamming your brake packages or hub; those are of fantastic design and quality. Just try to imagine CPP asking for one of your floater rear end setups or new front hubs only to see them offered for 20% of your asking price and made offshore. When that happens (and trust me, it will happen to you one day) just remember how you called it competition and not ripping off of your hard work, engineering, and development investment. Make no mistake about it, these companies will do anything to make the same product for cheaper somewhere else if they can cash in on a products popularity. There is no original thought out of these brands and they see something innovative and well designed and figure out how to knock it off in china. Their entire business model is based around this concept.

The days are coming where the innovators leave the arena and the thieves are all that's left.

Tyler

[SSninja]

Just to play Devil's Advocate here, but what would your stance be if these spindles were produced by American company that sourced all of their products and labor in North America?

Given that, I'm sure the spindles would be at least double the price of these spindles of unknown origin, but they'd still be less expensive than the AFX arms.

If the "Buy American" argument is off the table (And it's a good one, don't get me wrong), I'm curious as to your thoughts on the matter: Would you still consider a company selling a similar if not 99% identical product a thief? Keep in mind, with a higher price-point for this hypothetical competitor, the AFX spindle would still be considered the "premium" product.


Thinking about control arms, there's only so many ways to design one that will work, and once that is fixed you're then down to materials and service. Much like any other business in the world, the innovators need to keep innovating and proving that they have superior products and service if they want to stay on top and not become a one trick pony.

I understand the extremely expensive cost it takes to be an innovator, but it's not as if you are the only person/company that has had to endure this hardship.

With all of this R&D cost, was the spindle patented? If not, I would suggest doing so next time, perhaps so that you can also recoup costs by leasing the design to other US-based automotive performance companies.

Using your ridetech example, there were (And still are) other alternatives for airbags on the market that are less expensive. That said, they are one of the leaders for many reasons, two of which are quality of service and knowledge, along with the drive to always innovate and increase their portfolio, hence their entrance into sway bars, control arms, coilovers, etc.

Will others come out with very similar products down the line? Of course, but ridetech is still the premier choice given the service and products offered.

[The GMR]

Do you mean they're for A/F/X bodies? Because those definitely aren't AFX spindles...

Sorry about that, I did not mean to create any confusion between the brands / products. I also do not see why the term spindle is being used for these, technically they are uprights hence why I was calling them AFX Uprights. They fit the A / F / X body cars and its an bolt on upright, so I named it accordingly. The use of the term "AFX" was not intentional by my part to create any animosity between the brands. I want to create the same packages for Speedtech uprights as well, I already know what we need to do to modify our current hubs so that they can be installed with ease because the lower bolt is actually stud on the ATS design. So, the reality is that all the brake packages you see above can be put together for all ATS uprights as well. We already have that proven, so again Im not bias. We simply built packages around an upright.

[Jay@GMR]

That's not competition my dear friend. What you are witnessing is the destruction of innovation. Do you think CPP would have figured out how to even come close to that product if we hadn't spent $500K in R&D, engineering, testing, and manufacturing to make them back in 2005? You know what they have invested in that product? Probably $10K. They didn't have to scratch design the pick up points, they didn't have to make pre-production prototypes, do physical geometry testing, physical destructive testing, source foundries in the USA so we can keep some of our infrastructure in this country and keep American workers employed, figure out how to make them stronger than GM's C5 pressure casting, and lighter than a machined block of billet 6061T6. They took our specs, removed the 7/8" drop, and made them in china out of steel.
Fantastic innovation. Oh, and because they don't have all that nonsense cash tied up in paying engineers, making tooling that is of aerospace standards, thousands of hours in Solidworks, they don't need to re-coup anything and can sell it for pennies on the dollar.

Just remember that one day people will rip off and steal your hard work, make it inferior and sell it as the next best thing for pennies. Where is my motivation to bring other awesome ideas I have for the motorsports niche we all love? It's gone, along with my ownership of ATS and my interest in supporting a client base that continues to f*ck themselves over by buying products like this, from sh*t companies like CPP. If all the DSE's, ATS's, and RideTechs disappear, who will companies steal from and where will the new products come from? There will be nothing left but a stagnent market of old technology parts all made in China.

Kudos on your new partnership.



Tyler

We certainly appreciate your point of view Tyler, but this situation is not unique, is not the first, and definitely will not be the last.

As an American Co., GMR does and is coming up with new and innovative designs/products on a regular basis, I somewhat understand your frustration when a similar design surfaces..... but welcome to the real world.

Did the GM engineers/designers rant and rave when they saw your usage of the A,F,X, and C5 existing designsbeing duplicated? You clearly used these existing ideas. Again, I commend the idea to blend the two worlds…..but this was hardly a product from scratch.

All good products are challenged sooner or later, but only some are successful and can be duplicated offshore...... usually the simpler ones. Here at The GMR we are ALWAYS a few steps ahead with new and better designs for when a situation similar to this may arise. Always keep one up your sleeve my friend!

We feel you can choose to sit back and play the victim, price match, find less expensive ways to manufacture or as we do…. simply improve the design and set the bar higher.

As Jason mentioned we are simply offering a very solid option to the Speedtech AFX Upright. You can claim inferior all you want but it is a nice piece. Not to mention it is also offered by CPP for the Gen 2 Camaro, of which is not offered by others but certainly is in need. If others want to stay in the forefront you must “stay in the forefront”.

Let it be known, we are not in the business to sell Uprights, and If one prefers to spend the extra $ for the Speedtech AFX kit, we are all for it and will gladly mate it to our hubs as shown above. We think your design is genius and our hubs look great on it!

Oh, and if you should get motivated and have another good idea, we could probably save you bigtime on the R&D ..... 500K ..... WOW! We could probably do it for 20% of that

[TitoJones]

We certainly appreciate your point of view Tyler, but this situation is not unique, is not the first, and definitely will not be the last.

As an American Co., GMR does and is coming up with new and innovative designs/products on a regular basis, I somewhat understand your frustration when a similar design surfaces..... but welcome to the real world.

Yeah thanks there killer. I've been subject to design rip offs for 13+ years now; certainly don't need a welcome to the neighborhood that I helped to build.

Did the GM engineers/designers rant and rave when they saw your usage of the A,F,X, and C5 existing designsbeing duplicated? You clearly used these existing ideas. Again, I commend the idea to blend the two worlds…..but this was hardly a product from scratch.

You have ZERO idea of what you are talking about at this point. At first glance it's easy to look at a high quality part like the AFX tall spindle and say, that looks like a modified C5 Corvette part. We built it to be of OEM and higher standards. You want to know what we didn't scratch build on the AFX spindle? The C5 hub and the distance between the brake bracket holes. To use the brake systems from that vehicle necessitated those design criteria. But where do you think the idea for the height of the spindle came from? The relocated steering arm location? The rotation of the brake caliper bracket in relation to the steering arm? The option to make hardened ball joint inserts so as to not cycle fatigue the forging when installing and removing the assembly? The beefing up of the caliper bracket and strategic fillets to integrate a safety factor of 12? None of that was a 'blend' of a C5 upright and a factory Camaro spindle. We used a hub and brake bracket off a high performance OEM vehicle to help make the item more serviceable and to have readily available off the shelf brake systems from the top names in the industry; Baer, Alcon, Brembo, AP Racing, Wilwood and others. In addition, the C5 is a pressure casting of A356 aluminum, and the AFX spindle is a forging of 6061T6 aluminum. To say we practically adapted an off the shelf C5 spindle to a Camaro is an insult to my engineer. He spent over a year refining that design, doing physical testing on the geometry, and destructive testing of the unit after production. Not to beat a dead horse, but go ask air ride how the use of the overseas FatMan tall spindle worked out when they forgot to have them heat treated and it failed. Or ask L&H how that upper ball joint insert managed to pull through the machined spindle? Ever see that on an AFX spindle?
Nope. The reason? Engineering and innovation with high quality American suppliers.
And really, do you think GM even supports a car they manufactured 40 years ago? They provided feedback on our spindle during the engineering process. They were so impressed with it that they used it on their show cars, along with our oil pans, LSX engine mounts, T56 install kits and other items we were the leading developer of.

All good products are challenged sooner or later, but only some are successful and can be duplicated offshore...... usually the simpler ones. Here at The GMR we are ALWAYS a few steps ahead with new and better designs for when a situation similar to this may arise. Always keep one up your sleeve my friend!

We feel you can choose to sit back and play the victim, price match, find less expensive ways to manufacture or as we do…. simply improve the design and set the bar higher.

Oh please tell me how CPP improved the design of the AFX spindle and didn't simply rip it off? They made it out of steel? Hardly an improvement in unsprung weight. Is it stronger? With overseas processes on manufacturing that is up for debate. I'm all for someone seeing a void and making an innovative product, but where I draw the line is when companies like CPP see the action they are missing out on due to lack of ideas and innovation, and cashing in on someone else's hard work and design. I'm certain I could get the CPP engineer in a room and ask him questions about his design that he doesn't know the answer to as to why it was done. It was done to theirs because we did it to ours, and it flat out works great, so they added that to their own knock off.

As Jason mentioned we are simply offering a very solid option to the Speedtech AFX Upright. You can claim inferior all you want but it is a nice piece. Not to mention it is also offered by CPP for the Gen 2 Camaro, of which is not offered by others but certainly is in need. If others want to stay in the forefront you must “stay in the forefront”.

Yeah, you designed a C5 brake kit. Congrats. GM did it back in 1997. You must feel like such an innovator and industry leader. We also offered a fitment of the AFX spindle through SC&C back in 2008 for 2nd gen F body and even G body back in 2007. But because CPP released it last month, it must be 'innovative'. I'm really trying to shy away from criticizing you, but as someone who is participating and encouraging intellectual theft, I'm having a hard time letting it slide. You guys make nice products. Your hub is a great design. But CPP is not known for quality service, well fitting parts, or anything linked to high performance. And of course it looks like a quality piece, it was BASED OFF ONE.

Let it be known, we are not in the business to sell Uprights, and If one prefers to spend the extra $ for the Speedtech AFX kit, we are all for it and will gladly mate it to our hubs as shown above. We think your design is genius and our hubs look great on it!

Oh, and if you should get motivated and have another good idea, we could probably save you bigtime on the R&D ..... 500K ..... WOW! We could probably do it for 20% of that

When I owned ATS I didn't ever have a single person call me or email and say they were disappointed in the quality of my products.
I've got a 300 page book filled with innovative ideas, products, and the like. But I'll steer far clear of injecting them into a market of consumers that kills off innovation by voting with their wallet on the knock off brand. I appreciate the offer, but my money was well spent on the people who helped me achieve the great designs I brought to market. There is always ways to make things cheaper and faster but I'll stick to the people who were as loyal to me as I was to them. I'm happier out of this industry and I'm glad to be just another guy with a long term project car. It also allows me the freedom to say what I feel and not participate in the politics game.

I'm done with this discussion. Good luck in the brake and hub market. No hard feelings on your product development, but f*ck CPP.

Tyler

[The GMR]

Can we please move forward. Tyler, your argument is with CPP not GMR, we are making packages that retrofit ANY C5/6 upright assembly. We do not manufacture these uprights so clearly its not an argument for us.

Like stated above, we have respect for you and recommend products that you have designed in the past even if you are not directly financially gaining from it. You are very smart, and there is no question that you did not provide the industry with new product, but as you post more it seems as though your very Jaded with the industry. Please do not hold this against GMR or Jay / Myself because we are offering hub/brake packages for upright manufactures.


Thanks
JAson

[Twentyover]

Just to play Devil's Advocate here, but what would your stance be if these spindles were produced by American company that sourced all of their products and labor in North America?

Given that, I'm sure the spindles would be at least double the price of these spindles of unknown origin, but they'd still be less expensive than the AFX arms.

If the "Buy American" argument is off the table (And it's a good one, don't get me wrong), I'm curious as to your thoughts on the matter: Would you still consider a company selling a similar if not 99% identical product a thief? Keep in mind, with a higher price-point for this hypothetical competitor, the AFX spindle would still be considered the "premium" product.


Thinking about control arms, there's only so many ways to design one that will work, and once that is fixed you're then down to materials and service. Much like any other business in the world, the innovators need to keep innovating and proving that they have superior products and service if they want to stay on top and not become a one trick pony.

I understand the extremely expensive cost it takes to be an innovator, but it's not as if you are the only person/company that has had to endure this hardship.

With all of this R&D cost, was the spindle patented? If not, I would suggest doing so next time, perhaps so that you can also recoup costs by leasing the design to other US-based automotive performance companies.

Using your ridetech example, there were (And still are) other alternatives for airbags on the market that are less expensive. That said, they are one of the leaders for many reasons, two of which are quality of service and knowledge, along with the drive to always innovate and increase their portfolio, hence their entrance into sway bars, control arms, coilovers, etc.

Will others come out with very similar products down the line? Of course, but ridetech is still the premier choice given the service and products offered.

OK, no emotion, no name calling,just a discussion of what constitutes original design vs. a knockoff

China vs US off the table, the question become how does a design originate? Going back to an old litigated case of Microsoft vs Apple (windows vs Mac), courts have determined that the look and feel of the end product does not dictate infringement,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_C...ft_Corporation

So legally, the fact that another product matches look and feel is not de facto (no, i'm not a lawyer, I'm a design engineer) evidence of 'copying'. I think this also leads to the conclusion a patent would not be defensible based strictly on shared design elements of the end product.

This leaves us with the question of how did a design get developed? If a design is developed by measuring points of an existing product on a CMM and filling in the spots between with metal, then I believe the charge of design thievery and indignation on the part of the innovator are justified. If the new player did significant analysis work on selecting locations, dimensions, materials, and features. and they coincided with the first product to market, then the accusation and indignation is misplaced.

Selection of design dimensions for standard parts is not itself copying- selection of off-the-shelf parts to be used in a product is standard practice in industry, and many manufacturers provide mathematical models for their products to system manufacturers so they can be designed in to the assembly.

In the case of spindle designs, I would expect that the second product to market would be able to show camber curves, FEA, Rationale for dimension/feature selection, durability, TTF, and/or other design data as evidence they developed the design independent of the first product to market.

Note there is no discussion of cost or availability of the original design in this equation. They have nothing to do with what constitutes knocking off a design.

I'm not Tyler, who you directed the question at, but I do have my name on a couple patent disclosure documents. I cannot speak for him- I'm saying these are the features that would dive my opinions.

Vis-a-vie US vs Chinese manufacturing- IMO the only reason this was discussed is because of China's history of providing good sample parts,then letting quality slip after production launch. If one wants to use Chinese parts in mission critical parts, you've got to have a QA staff living with them, or make the consequences so huge they take quality assurance on seriously. Imagine the consequences of Apple pulling production of their i-machines from FoxConn- and even then Apple does audit them.

[Twentyover]

double post