link pin coming lose

I've taken all the slack out of the link pin and torqued the pinch bolt to the correct tension. But after about 3000kms, there is lots of freeplay. The pinch bolt is still tight too. It only occurs to this particular link pin (right-hand top). All the other ones I replaced are fine.

Any ideas as to why the link pin is slipping?

To test, jack up the front & put it on stands.
Put a jack under the lwr trailing arm & take the strain otherwise the downward pressure of the torsion bar will take up the slack & hide the wear.
Put one hand on the top of the tyre & one on the bottom & rock it in & out- best to have an assistant do this while you look & where the slop is.

just a suggestion are you turning the link pin the correct way to tighten it up and then tightening the lock bolt ???

maybe yr turning it the wrong way ??? can you see the link move towards the king pin housing ??

geodon wrote:To test, jack up the front & put it on stands.
Put a jack under the lwr trailing arm & take the strain otherwise the downward pressure of the torsion bar will take up the slack & hide the wear.
Put one hand on the top of the tyre & one on the bottom & rock it in & out- best to have an assistant do this while you look & where the slop is.

good idea, but no need. You can quite easily see the slop.. it's VERY noticable.. I'm hoping it hasn't stuffed the new LP and bush in fact.

Yeh Dave, i turn the LP clickwise to take up the slack... made sure the (new) shims weren't taking up any excess lateral space...

Could having grease between the trailing arm pinch holding thing and the LP cause it to slip? although, if you think about it, the lower LP is held firm, therefore, it would act as a fulcrum or rotational reference point for the freeplay... so in fact, the steering knuckle would exert force against the trailing arm instead of away from it and pulling the LP loose..

conundrum.. unless my theory is totally wrong..

help?

make sure the indent is lined up with the gap in the trailing arm? Where the link pin goes in if using that washer & o-ring (8 shims)
Not sure how you would get 3 right and not this one but its a guess!
good luck!
Andrew

I got that indent on the washer correct... but I found out something else, my LP's were probably so shagged before, it's loosened the actual bushing in the stub axel. The bushing itself rotates a little... so either the bushing has been machined wrong, or my stub axel needs replacing altogether.. eerk. I'll have to pull it all apart and swap the bushes around to see what's the case...

dam

Nasty! It would have just slipped in if thats the case! Gotta be pressed apart and change the torsion link... (where the bush goes top and bottom)
hate that! Are you running drop spindles?

Arh that reminds me

Chris do you still have the origional trailing arms in yr car as the early trailing arms didnt have washer with indent and O ring also the arms did not have the groove machined in them to allow the washer to fit in

They just used the shims straight on the trailing arms

but as you say the bush is also moving

Check out if all yr trailing arms are the same early style without the indent you may not need the washer n O ring which were introduced around 60 or so to improve the efficiency of the grease to the arm n pin

Yeh, the bush only needed light tapping with a small hammer to get it in and out. I'm not sure which part is the torsion link by your description...
I'm not running drop spindles..


I still got the OG arms Dave. Yeh, i noticed they were different. The trailing arms I currently have on my car are from a 60's donor. They're all the same style.

I think it's just a case of old stub axels... might need to replace them later on down the track (which sucks coz i've spent all this TEM working on the componants I'm currently running on now!

Would the best thing to do is just keep on checking and adjusting the LP's every 1000miles or so? Troublesome I know, but better than having to take apart all that stuff again (at this stage).

Hey Tofu,

If the hub is on the way out you can use quicksteel or JB weld metal epoxy to glue the bushes in. Some will claim "butcher" however if it means you can continue to use this part...... You can also get the hub sleeved but not worth the expense.

You know that if you replace them you HAVE to buy the lowered ones 😵‍💫

Luck mate.

kkk

I have a pair of front stubs i did the kingpins on before I left. I am happy to sell one side. I havent put link pin bushes in them, yours should be fine still. Of all the kingpin rebuilds i've done ive thrown away plenty of torsion links for the same reason...
cant attach pic but heres one...
http://www.wolfsburgwest.com/cart/DetailsList.cfm?ID=111405352

[ Edited on 26-9-2006 by xornge666x ]

Are those are US prices on that website? I hope so coz that's a cheap price on that LP kit! U2U me with the cost of one stub axel please - ie: torsion link and the steering knuckle (or whatever the other part that connects to the torsion link...)

Cheers

Bring it over mate and i'll take a look.
I know your running a late 60's beam but carn't remember what arms your running? Sound like the bushes are stuffed anyway.all that hard cornering:P

haha

sounds good, perhaps we'll get the whitewalling done then too?

Its OK to buy the K & L pin kits but they have to be reamed to fit after there installed and unless you have done this job before its a real pain and having the correct size reamers is a problem

You would be better off doing an exchange set of K & Links already set up by someone make sure the stub axles are straight before you get them reconditioned in otherwords the stub axle has to be at 90degrees to the face plate on the stub hope that makes sense also give th grease nipple hole a good poke out with a bit of wire to remove the old hard grease build up

yeh, that makes sense about the axel being straight. I'll see what happens in the short term, I got a couple of other things to trial before I go about replacing parts.. Thanks for your help though mate

how much do ya think change over would be?