Wish Bone Alignment

[Guest phil howard]

Has anyone else had trouble aligning there wisbones?

It seem that the drivers side front wishbone (back one) is not straight, therefore the wishbone would be under tension if I force it enough to get the bolts to align. I am reluctant to do this being a critical steering braking and suspension component.

 

The mis alignment is approx 10-12mm as per the attached photographs.

 

GBS have suggested that it is the welding that has pulled the chassis insert out of alignment (in a jig?) and has suggested that use a rat tail file to the adjust the chassis mounting.

 

Any thoughts?

[Guest mcramsay]

i had the same with my zero, when i was fitting the suspension. the wishbones had warped a bit, but to be honest i didnt see it as anything to worry about as the bushes are going to take up any of the missalignment, might make them wear down a bit quicker though! but yea, just leaver the bugger up and get a bolt through!

[miikae]

Seeing as the wishbone bushes pivot on the same axis i would try fitting a piece of round bar through the brackets to align them up first, so that no excesive stress is applied to the wishbone bushes once fitted.

 

Mike

[Guest Ian & Carole]

Hi Phil

 

If it was my car I would enlarge the holes to get the wishbone to hang right and with no pressure or twist on the rubbers.

 

When I converted our car I bought a 1mtr. length of theaded bar from B&Q and used it to align all the bracketry before I welded them in place.

 

 

Not the best pic but you can just see the bar through the bracket and the 'bone.

 

If you elongate your holes to remove any "twist" you have then weld some 3mm plate on the out side of each bracket, if that makes sence.

 

Better you spend an extra day now, and sort it, then regret it later.

 

Just my 2peneth though.

[fry61]

A small amount of filing to the leading "wing" of the rear wishbone chassis mount will give a big movement to the front mount -- assuming 10mm bolts for these mounts a 10mm legth of "silver steel" (from engineering supplies) will give best results for aligning all 4 holes as it will be dead right size-wise & straight (but is only 13" long in common stocks) threaded rod is undersize & may not be that straight (try rolling it on the kitchen work-top to check) any metal replaced by welding needs to be on the inside of the wing so the bush inner tube has a full surface bearing but if you only remove a very small amount of metal to obtain allignment this may not be necessary.

[Guest scrabster]

hi,i wouldnt file the chassis brackets,my front ones were out a bit as well so i held them in a vice and tweeked em a bit.there is a lot more welding on the wishbones than the chassis brackets which is more likely to warp them.one of my top rear shocker chassis mount hole was way out,i had to file that out which elongated the hole then welded a thick washer on in the right place,not easy as it was the forward facing one.nice chrome looking wishbones,be careful when you try to bend them.hth.

jess.

[fry61]

Please check allignment of wish-bone mounts with straight rod/threaded bar first; bending wish-bones is very hard (fortunately) & 2 wrongs won't make the turning centres right ; it must all pivot around a common centre.

[Guest ScotMac]

In the l/w dvd's, there is a chapter where tricky Dick shows how to use a nice big bar to slightly tweak the front bones to fit. Assuming chassis mounts are aligned, then i would look for a big bar.

[megadodo]

On my 2B the predrilled holes in the were slightly out of alignment so a small amount of drilling and filing improved the problem and I just "tweaked" the wishbones into place. I checked them for freedom of movement and they were very easy to move up and down. I just made sure the "track" of the swing up and down were parallel and in the same plane . Once I was happy I then drilled the "bolt on" brackets to suit. The straight long threaded bar is a very good idea as it will show whether the chassis holes or wishbone hole (or both) are out, I just used "mark one" eyeball and a piece of white paper!