Erik-
I just replaced the rear spring on my 76, I'm a surgeon and I'd like to
think I have some dexterity, but this is *not* technically challenging,
it's just grunt level work- very well described in Bentley manual, I
haven't looked at the section in the Haynes manual
it's quite easy to remove the old spring, just jack and support the car,
remove wheels, detach the shocks and the spring bushing bolts and then
remove the 4 studs that hold the spring to the top of the differential
housing via the access port in the cockpit floor behind the trim "squab" in
front of the fuel tank (behind seats)- this can be done without removing
seats, the spring just slides out one side at this point
the next step was a *little* tougher, there are some parts that need to be
salvaged from the old spring, a plate between the bottom two leaves, a bolt
with the sleeve through which the bolt passes, and the top "cover" (a
horizontal plate with two vertical transveresly oriented attached plates)-
I needed a vice and a big screwdriver as a pry bar (sorry, this is an LBC
list, should it be prise bar?) to get the spring compressed and the sleeve
manipulated so I could get the bolt holes in the vertical transverse
elements of the "cover" to line up with the sleeve
the hardest part for me was after I put the spring in position, it took
about 2 of the total 3.5 hours of this project to get the studs to rethread
into the 4 holes in the top of the differential, I had my wife help with
this part without success until I used a screwdriver to lift the spring
away from the diff housing a bit so that the locating pin in the center of
the bottom of the spring assembly wasn't engaged with the locating recess
in the top of the diff housing and this allowed a little lateral movement-
once I had the studs in place, it was easy- you need an extra nut to pin
against the one that is there now so that the stud is turned well into the
diff housing and the length isn't taken up by the current nut just moving
way down on the stud- these nuts should be snugged at first, but then
torqued to the proper spec (it's in the Bentley) with the car back down off
the jack- just reattach the spring end bush bolts, shocks, put the wheels
back on before you drop it from the jack and you're set
I bought the spring on sale from Moss, I think about $130 and it came with
the bushings installed, i.e., you need nothing but tools (including that
vice) and some sense to do this
you might need to do trunnion bushing/rebuild, but I think the parts for
that are cheap
I hadn't thought much about rear alignment before this and I know nothing
practical about it, lack of knowledge has never stopped me from giving an
opinion before, but since the camber orientation of the rear would appear
to be fixed by two points, which are determined by the spring length and
the half shaft length, unless you can adjust the length of the half shaft I
would think the toe in is the only thing adjustable by changing the shims
on the trailing arm attachment, I suspect your camber problem would be
solved by replacing the spring anyway, mine was
haven't done anything with my front suspension since it seems OK so far,
but the sway bar should be a cinch, ball joint may be tougher, there has
been a recent thread on ball joints and I'm sure Andy Mace or someone else
on this list can give you some advice, I'd like to see what they say
where are you, perhaps someone with some experince could give a hand?
good luck
Joe
Joseph R Schneider, MD, PhD
Associate Professor of Surgery, Northwestern University Medical School
100 Burch, Evanston Hospital, 2650 Ridge Ave, Evanston, IL 60201
voice: (847) 570-2565 fax: (847) 570-2899 e-mail: joe-schneider@nwu.edu
world wide web page: http://pubweb.acns.nwu.edu/~jschneid/JRS.HTML
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