Cryogenic Treatment for Teams Around Silverstone and Motorsport Valley

The stretch of Northamptonshire, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire around Silverstone holds more motorsport engineering per square mile than anywhere else in the world. This post is for the teams, engine builders and preparation shops in that area who have heard of cryogenic treatment, perhaps seen a rival using it and want to know what it does, what to treat and how to schedule it around a season.

Why the big teams keep quiet about it

Deep cryogenic treatment has been used at the top of motorsport for decades, but you will rarely see a team talk about it. The gains are competitive, so they stay in house. The same is true in aerospace, military and mining. What has been published is the academic work, and we keep a library of it on our Research page covering tool steels, aluminium alloys, brake rotors, piston rings and more.

For a club or national level team, the advantage is simpler. Parts last longer, run cooler and fail less, which means fewer rebuilds, fewer retirements and a smaller spares budget.

What to treat first

Brake discs. Every time. A treated disc resists cracking and warping through repeated heat cycles and typically lasts two, three or four times as long. It also runs cooler, which is kinder to pads, fluid and calipers. For a team doing a full season of sprints or a long endurance round, that alone usually pays for itself.

After discs, the drivetrain. Crankshafts, camshafts, connecting rods, pistons, cylinder liners, bearings, valve assemblies, flywheels, gear sets and differential internals all respond well. Treated parts have less internal stress, expand more evenly at operating temperature and wear more slowly.

Fitting it into a build and a calendar

Treat after final machining and before assembly or surface finishing. That is when the metal carries the most stress and when the treatment does the most good. Do not send parts torqued together, because dissimilar metals move at different rates during the cycle.

We run a full process about every four weeks and the cycle takes three days. For a team that means planning treatment into the winter rebuild and again at the mid season break. If you have a fixed race date, tell us when you book and we will do what we can to hold a slot. The next run date is always on our website.

Getting parts from Silverstone to us

Yaxley in Peterborough is roughly an hour and a quarter from Silverstone up the A43 and A1(M), so some teams simply drive parts over, particularly heavy items like blocks and heads. Most use a FedEx next day service, which is trackable and cost effective. Roll each component in cardboard so nothing can knock together, put a note with your name and contents inside the box and lightly oil any bare ferrous surfaces.

Treating the car you already have versus buying upgrades

A lot of money in club motorsport goes on replacing standard parts with uprated ones. Treating the standard part is often the better first move. A treated OEM disc outlasts an untreated performance disc in many applications and costs a fraction of it. The same logic applies to gear sets and differential internals, where the uprated part may be a long lead time import and the treated original is sitting in your workshop.

Where you do buy uprated parts, treat those too. The benefit stacks. Good steel, properly heat treated and then cryogenically treated, is as durable as that component is going to get.

What it costs

We price by weight, per kilogram, with a lower rate for larger batches. A full set of discs or a set of rods and pistons is a modest line in any race budget. Complete engines and gearboxes are quoted individually. Send us a parts list with rough weights and we will come back with a figure the same day.

Frequently asked questions

Do you treat parts for one off or club racers as well as teams?

Yes. Many of our motorsport customers are individuals with one car. Because we price by weight, a single set of discs is perfectly viable.

Will treated parts pass scrutineering?

Cryogenic treatment adds nothing to the part and changes nothing you can see or measure externally. It is a process, not a modification, and is used throughout professional motorsport.

How long does the whole thing take from the Silverstone area?

Allow a day each way for shipping plus the three day cycle, timed to our next run date. Most teams have parts back within ten days of a run.

Can you treat a complete assembled gearbox?

We would rather treat the internals separately, before assembly. Dissimilar metals torqued together move at different rates during the cycle.

Cryogenix Ltd runs deep cryogenic treatment from Yaxley in Peterborough and takes parts from across the UK by post or in person. If you are preparing a car anywhere around Silverstone, we are an hour up the road. Call 01296 433457 or email info@cryogenix-uk.com and we will tell you what it would cost and when the next run is.