oh! ok!!

Just thinking about with my wife's subaru, I don't remember any dowels in it's flywheel

Don't mistake designing to a cost with engineering it properly

Using dowels on a one off job like this one will cost the same as using bolts. This is not the case in a production line.

A mate of mine who is a software geek always used to question why we would change the cast iron manifold for some nice tubular extractors. His argument was always " but the factory used the cast iron one, so it must be good ". I am sure that your Mini does not still have it's cast iron manifold designed to the cost price that the BMC accountants set in 1957.

cheers
michael

_________________
the world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page
66 Mini Minor sponsored by http://www.lifeonthehedge.com.au/ The Dog Harness Specialists
It was a pleasure ausmini. I'll miss all you misfits and reprobates

very true - I'm with you

If, in this case, there is no room to add dowels to the flange on the crank, or adding dowels would remove enough material to weaken the flange, what would be the sensible approach?

I have seen a kind of dowel sleeve used where the location is done by a sleeve and the bolt passes through to clamp. I still don't like it though.

Best idea IMHO is to dowel four locations and clamp four locations with bolts. Four dowels will easily transmit the drive load and four bolts will easily provide sufficient clamping. Just because there are eight holes does not mean that they should all be filled in with the same thing.

If you have a look at a racing wheel and hub arrangement, usually you will see dowels and bolts/studs+nuts. In this arrangement you transmit the drive with the dowels and clamp with the studs+nuts. Ever wonder how the drive can be transmitted to the wheels on an F1 car that only has one big nut? It sure as hell is not by friction!

cheers
michael

_________________
the world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page
66 Mini Minor sponsored by http://www.lifeonthehedge.com.au/ The Dog Harness Specialists
It was a pleasure ausmini. I'll miss all you misfits and reprobates