(I wrote)
>++> Spitfire Weekend. Then Sunday evening after a 60(ish) mile drive around I
>++> pulled the car onto the drive at home only to have the front verticle link
>++> (LH side)shear. This is the third one that I have had go in 20 months and
>++> 37000 miles, the first went on New Years Eve 1993, the second in March '94
>and
>++> then yesterdays. I regularly oil the bloody things all to no avail, ANY
>ideas
(you wrote)
> I have never had this happen on any of the spits I've owned or
>worked on. This includes the spit/GT6 I built with boy racer tires which has
>had a pretty hard life (and I don't oil mine regularly either). So, lets try
>and
>look at some other factors which might be causing these to fail. If I had
>to guess, I'd say that front suspension is not within spec somehow and it
>is causing an excessive load on the vertical link. I wouldn't overlook
>improper assembly by the DPO. It is possible to switch the mounting
>brackets on the lower A-arm which would cause it swing in completely the
>wrong way (effectively eliminating all rearward compliance in the front
>suspension) Are the lower trunnons free to move? Otherwise, is there
>any evidence that the front end has been hit? Those front uprights can
>rust pretty severely back by the frame attachments too.
The suspension does pull slightly to the left, but it's only a bit which I put
down to road camber. What do you mean by rearward compliance?
When you ask if the trunnions are free to move, in which plane do you mean?
They turn left and right fine, but when I torque the trunnion bolt up, they are
quite tight(45 Lb's Ft (or should that be Ft Lb's)according to the haynes
manual). I don't think the car has been in a shunt before, if it has it has
been repaired bloody well. Funnily enough, the chassis is rust-free(more than
can be said for the body), pretty unusual on a UK car.
> BTW have you ever examined the broken vertical links? What
>kind of a break are you getting? Is it a propagating crack, or a clean
>break? How about the lower trunnions? Any evidence that they have
>severely bent?
The crack looks something like this(Crap Ascii drawing coming up)
Top down view of Threaded part that broke
off.
* * *
* # * Rough in the centre line, but smooth either
* # * side of this.
* # *
* # *
* * *
Rich.
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