Originally Posted by 
Dougal
				 
			The output flanges appear to be the same.  My conversion has removed the output flange and gone from the gearbox spline to the transfer input spline.
I don't believe your shafts will stand up if not hardened.  I forget the exact hardness mine was done to, but I was looking for a material with at least 1000 MPa yeild, the concern being stress concentration causing fatigue at the start of the splines.
The final material I received had a yeild when hardened of almost 2000MPa.  Overkill, but it boasted minimal distortion in heat-treatment and the cost difference was minimal.
I received quotes from $NZ350-750 to make my shaft, in the end the workshop that started didn't finish it, I had to do the final machining and heat-treatment.  Total cost around $NZ600.
I'll see if I can dig up my original calculations, but the FEA study I ran at the time shows 650 MPa bulk stress with 1450MPa max stress concentration at the start of the splines.  The computer simulations tend to exaggerate stress concentration as computer modelled geometry tends to have sharper transitions than actual manufacturered parts.
This is with 2000Nm applied to the shaft.  2000Nm was the shaft torque required to light up wheels on tarmac.  It represents 345Nm applied by the engine in first gear or 666 Nm applied in second gear.