[Dick Linn]

It's all engineered, folks. Glass-filled sprockets of the correct diameter can work just as well as steel if you figure it out. Just don't count on a 10-tooth plastic sprocket if you have high torque and poor alignment and don't drive conservatively. It all depends...

On the other side of the equation, picture this. Last year, we had 60-tooth #35 chain sprockets that needed serious lightening to make weigh. I didn't like it, but I had to spend about 2 hours with a 4 1/2" angle grinder and a very thin cut-off wheel to gouge about 1 1/2 pounds of out of the solid steel "pancakes" because we had no access to a mill. Not fun and definitely bordering on the dangerous in trms of possible mishaps. The good part was that these were off-the-shelf go-kart parts that were really cheap. And the drive-train was completely reliable. No breakage, no spares, no hassle. And no chain tensioning during the regional or the final at Epcot.