Big weekend at chuck's garage near Kutztown, PA. I had NO IDEA what I was
getting into when I asked if I could get some help rebuilding my front
suspension, whilst chuck painted Larry's Midget. chuck said, no problem, we
can do both. Well, 14 hours on Saturday and another 5 hours on Sunday, after
a 5 hour drive for parts, and it's fixed, mostly.
Mucho DPO work evident. Lots of previous BFH damage. The king pin dust
cover was missing completely from one side, the other one was bent so it
wouldn't come apart. The blue wrench got the old lower-inner bushings out.
Only about 1/16" of play on the lower king pin bushings!
Peter C. of World Wide Auto Parts sent me everything we needed, including two
rebuilt front shox, so we were set for parts. One of my A-arms was in bad
shape, and two more used ones from Kevin Valentine proved to be also bad, so
a call to Frank Clarici and a short 5 hour drive to pick it up on Sunday. We
took the king pin dust cover off one of Kevin's sets.
We worked in the dark putting the right side back together Saturday night,
after 14 hours of work. Sunday went much better, and the car is totally
different. No clunking sounds and it it goes straight when crossing railroad
tracks!
I can't say enough about the members of this list. chuck christ, Larry Macy
and Kevin Valentine gave two days and lots of sweat to help me for absolutely
nothing. Frank C. supplied parts for free, and I know he would have been
there if he could. Peter C. took my phone call and had everything we needed
in my hands in a few days. (Cores and a check will be going back to Peter
this week.)
Thanks again to all you guys for a tiring, but successful weekend. Larry's
car is in chuck's garage, in primer, waiting for new paint, probably today.
Then reassembly will be later this week.
Allen Hefner
SCCA Philly Region Rally Steward
'77 Midget
'92 Mitsubishi Expo LRV Sport
|