Xtrac Limited, also known as Xtrac Transmission Technology, is a British engineering company founded in 1984 by the former Hewland engineer Mike Endean to make 4WD systems and gearboxes for

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and later rally and racing cars. Endean, together with Chris Goddard, who had been working on the electronic components essential to the system, in 1983 developed the first Xtrac 4WD system, for Norwegian rallycross star Martin Schanche. Schanche had thought up the idea of a changeable hydraulic 4WD system (his 1984 ERC winning Ford Escort Mk3 Xtrac- Zakspeed had a stepless FWD:RWD ratio of 28:72 to 50:50) and financed its development. This 560bhp so-called ''Xtrac No. 1'' was bought by Endean, in the mid-1990s, who raced it himself for many a year in carsprints and hillclimbs. "Xtrac started making gearboxes in the mid to late 1980s for the then-new Group A rally cars from their original premises in

Wokingham Wokingham ( ) is a market town and civil parish in Berkshire, England. It is the main administrative centre of the wider Borough of Wokingham. At the 2021 census the parish had a population of 38,284 and the wider built-up area had a populati ...

and then continued to do so after moving in 1986 to a new 20,000 sq ft factory in Finchampstead". In 2000, Xtrac built a bespoke high tech factory in Thatcham,

Berkshire Berkshire ( ; abbreviated ), officially the Royal County of Berkshire, is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Oxfordshire to the north, Buckinghamshire to the north-east, Greater London ...

, England, and is currently supplying many top level sectors of motor sport, including F1, prototype and GT sportscars, IndyCar, Grand-AM, rally cars and touring cars. In 2010 the company supplied its complete 1044 gearbox, designed and developed in only six months to three F1 teams: Lotus,

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and HRT. This is mated to the Cosworth CA2010 engine. In addition to supplying many high-profile motorsport customers, Xtrac has expanded in other areas such as automotive, marine and aerospace. The Pagani Huayra was a vehicle which used the Xtrac 1007 AMT transmission. In 2019, it was announced that Xtrac would be the sole supplier of gearboxes for the US based

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Championship, this was due to start in

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, but with Covid-19 restrictions being in place this was delayed until

2022 The year began with another wave in the COVID-19 pandemic, with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant, Omicron spreading rapidly and becoming the dominant variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus worldwide. Tracking a decrease in cases and deaths, 2022 saw ...

. In 2020, it was announced that Xtrac would supply gearboxes as part of the hybrid power unit for the Le Mans Daytona h endurance hybrid sport cars with Bosch, supplying the motor generator unit, and Williams Advanced Engineering, supplying the batteries.

Footnotes

External links

Xtrac website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Xtrac Engineering companies of the United Kingdom Automotive motorsports and performance companies Auto parts suppliers of the United Kingdom Automotive transmission makers