Yes, they provide the tension when you rotate the cube. The speed cubes come with different springs that can make it looser or tighter - in the center is this

Yes, they provide the tension when you rotate the cube. The speed cubes come with different springs that can make it looser or tighter - in the center is this white ball that houses the springs where you screw in the center tiles. If it wasn't such a pain to open back up, I'd take some pics of that part of it. You can see the white ball on the official site here: https://rubiks.com/store/product/rubiks-speed-cube https://rubiks.com/store/product/rubiks-speed-cube (disclaimer - the original article is mine)