Hewland

Hewland is a British engineering company, founded in 1957 by Mike Hewland, which specialises in racing-car gearboxes. Hewland was the first company to manufacture a bespoke racing-car gearbox. The first product, the Hewland Mk1, was a minor modification of a Volkswagen box for Lola for their Formula Junior cars. Within a few years the company moved to manufacturing sideplates and gear clusters, only using the VW main case. These gearboxes became widely used in Formula Junior and Formula Three. The first gearbox designed by Hewland was the HD4 in 1963, where the HD stood for Hewland Design. By removing the synchronizers from the original VW Beetle transaxle module, room was created for a 5th forward speed. All gears are straight-cut, constant-mesh type with dog (motorcycle-type) engagement rather than sliding engagement. The driver quickly gets used to the crash type operation since rotating masses are small. In addition to the advantage of the 5th speed with close ratios, the gear ratios may quickly be changed in the field to match the needs of a particular track. Many models of racing cars built in Britain and the U.S. since 1962 have used this transmission.