Was wondering if anyone could shed some light on my front suspension issue......

I am running a 74 Beetle with TB front end and Swing Axle rear.

I am rebuilding the car and have replaced all bushes, brakes, lines, etc, etc, etc.

I replaced the outter needle bearings on the front beam with Urethane, left the inners in place.

I am running 2deg neg camber on all 4 wheels, bit of toe in on the rear and a bit of toe out on the front and have slapped in 4 shims in the bottom of the beam to add a bit of caster.

I tried running (what I thought) was stock length oil shocks up front, they were to tall though - basically had very little compression and the ride was very rough, like the frontend was solid steel instead of rubber and urethane :-)!

I mean really, really rough - driving along at 80km/hr, hit a bump and the entire front end would leave the road - bone jarring :-)!

So, out they came and in went a set of EMPI shocks to suit lowered cars, I measured from the lower mounting point to the strut tower and it was 320mm - the EMPI shocks are 365mm to 250mm fully compression - easily within the shocks range.

HOWEVER - once again the ride was still rough as f#ck! Bascially as bad as the shocks I thought were bottoming out.

I pulled the shocks, losened off the front beam adjusters and ran the suspension through its full arc by jacking up the front - nothing was binding and all looked good.

I did note though that the control arms were north of the horizontal at rest..............

So I wound up my beam adjusters as far as they would go, which brought the control arms back to the horizontal and threw the shocks back in - NO GOOD - ride still really, really rough.

So I pulled the shocks out entirely...............

PROBLEM solved, car rode and handled beautifuly - bit of getting used to with the toe-out on the front, but can really hit those corners at speed.

So, anyone got any ideas as to why the ride improves when I take out the shocks?

Just as a side note - I got my hands on a set of Gas shocks - no idea of what they are from, but they more or less fit - these were an improvement over the OIL shocks, but still quite rough.

It is much, much better without front shocks!!!

i think your spot on there andrew.

btw its illegal to run with out shocks in this country no matter where you are.

It sounds to me like you've got some high speed binding issues with your front suspension, you'll never replicate this with a jack.
You need to check the bushes etc to find out what is causing this issue.

As a side note, when I had my std 76 bug, I drove it for sometime without realising the front shocks were completely stuffed. I mean I knew they were sad, but when I took them out there was absolutely no resistance, they were essentially just filling the gap and no they weren't safe, because when I had to emergency brake in traffic the front bottomed out which caused the tyres to unload and then lock up. I then had to get off the brakes and reapply to avoid rear ending the car in front.
Decent shocks is a lot easier on the heart, trust me.

Problem is the urethane.....the arms should turn without resistance in the beam. The binding urethane is resisting the suspension movement. Very poor product when fitted without reaming to size.
Then there's 'slapped in 4 shims in the bottom of the beam to add a bit of caster', and 'a bit of toe out on the front'.......check your specs mate, and get a propper alignment.

urethane hates torsional twisting, the beam MUST have roller bearings as per factory.

Urethane doesn't work the same as rubber...

I wouldn't touch them Myself...

they may as well be solid metal...

and no shocks or NO Working shocks is illegal and for good reason...
without good shocks Your braking distance can double...
a bit of a rough road surface and even worse...

LEE

PS: its good to take shocks off and test them now & then.
I unhooked the top of both of My rear shocks and found they were gas... I didn't realise or remember fitting gas shocks. did the same to the front and found one of those not working at all.. so New shocks on the front..
should make a difference along with correct toe in etc...
LEE

On all of my cars i run KYB gasajust shocks that are standard length, i also have lowered them all using dropped spindles, all my cars ride better than standard, if you lower the car with adjuster the lower you go the rougher it rides as you change the way the suspension is designed to work, when you hit a bump the wheel moves in a arc back and up, if you lower it the wheel moves up and foward, it completely changes the ride, dropped spindles keep the geometry standard but lowers it 2.5", get rid of the urathane bushes as they do not work in that aplication, you can buy replacement needle bearings from CB performance in the states, as for running the car without shocks all the above posts are correct, they are there for a reason.

vw060, do CB supply needle roller bearings for a ball joint front end? Can't see them but maybe looking in the wrong place
Cheers........Wayne

Look at VW Heritage in the UK for the needle bearings. Will save you heaps in shipping costs. I only buy from the states when Europe don't have what I want and has saved me hundreds of dollars.

As for your problem, the urethane bushes can work well if fitted correctly and lubed properly. The arms must be fitted entirely by themselves to make sure they rotate freely within the urethane before assembling them with the rest of the suspension. Don't forget that the needle bearings are a tolerance fit to the torsion arms and hence why the urethane needs to be reamed to mimic this tolerance or they won't rotate freely.

Castor shims are only necessary if you have a particularly nose down rake on your bug. If not then don't fit any but fitting 4 is way too much.

Lowering on adjusters is normally OK for a few inches but after that the ride generally gets worse and worse.

Gas shox can also make the ride a bit harsher on lowered vehicles but that is a personal choice on ride quality

It seems like it is just the urethane binding - the more I have driven the car without the shocks the bumpier it has gotten, so the putter urethanes are freeing up it seems.

I remember I got two sets - one that replaced both inner and putters and one just to replace the putter needle bearings - I did not replace the inners so I used the latter set - it seemed of poorer quality than the set that replaced both inners and outters!

Wish I had just stuck with the stock needle bearings!

As for the stern lectures :-)!

Not my first choice to run without shocks.

I can hit a right angle corner at 70-80km and this thing feels like it is on rails, I copied the suspension settings from some Greg Ward fellow just to see what it would be like - this car really does handle well.......just a bit bumpy up front :-)!

Reaming of the urethane bushes is mentioned. How is this done?
Also, how is correct lubrication achieved?
I have seen these bushes on Pierside Parts site and they are quite long.
I am concerned the grease nipple may be obstructed.
I believe ,also,that urethane needs Moly grease. Does this mean setting up a new grease gun with moly grease?

I have a job coming up soon where a trailing arm is really loose and I am being pressured into replacing all the bushes with Urethane.
I am reluctant to do so when I believe replacing one inner bush will do the trick.