Front Suspension Strut (3)

What a rainy day! Nothing for it apart from to potter about in the garage playing with suspension parts.

What's left of the strut components. The bump stop (far left in the tray) has disintegrated

Actually, this post is about the other suspension strut, so I am afraid will be a bit boring as it is exactly the same as the previous suspension strut. Main points:

• Disassemble the strut
• Wire-brush the components
• Etch prime them
• Paint some silver and some satin black
• Dunk the nuts, bolts etc in de-rusting dip
• Order a shed load of spares costing circa £200 and await their arrival
• Have a bath in Swafega.

Disc shield painted in satin black

Caliper and hub painted in high temp paint

Top strut mounting in etch primer, ready for silver paint

Upper spring pan

Top mounting locating cup

MMMMmmmm.

Front Suspension Strut (2)

I am quite getting into this being oily lark. After what seems like years (coz it is!) doing bodywork, it is nice to be working on mechanical things again.

Last time we met I had just put together the new strut, but couldn't finish the brakes as I needed new pistons. Well, they duly arrived and I had a box full of bits to play with.

The pistons were more fiddly than I thought they would be, but in the end they went in ok with a bit of extra brake fluid to help them over the seals in the calipers. It was lovely to see the new brake pads, shims, split pins and retainer-thingies all in place and bolted to the strut.

So, today was all about stripping down the other suspension strut, ready to do the same job all over again. I don't have the parts yet to complete the rebuild, but I did enjoy taking everything apart.

The two ball joints took a lot of heat and hitting with a splitter to seperate them from the mechanics of the sub-frame, but in the end they relented and came free. That left me with the strut, which was very tired.

I had already removed the spring, and incidentally was amazed at how the bump stop under the gaiter had absolutely disintegrated. Hub and disc, and then the disc shield were all removed to make it lighter, and then I got on with the horrible job of removing the top collar/nut which holds the damper in place. This took an awful lot of heat but eventually it came free.

I must admit that I like stripping things down, and one of the things I have learned is never, ever throw anything away until it has been replaced by its new counterpart and confirmed satisfactory. And so it was today that my box full of new bits became the box of grime, and started to fill.

Having removed and split the calipers, the pistons just wouldn't budge. Hitting them with a hammer did make them move, which gave me hope of a successful outcome plus had the added benefit of squirting residual brake fluid three feet into the air each time. A combination of compressed air, mole grips (they will not be re-used - the pistons, I mean. Mole grips will have a place in my heart forever) and rather a lot of foul language saw them eventually come out.

So, the calipers went into the box of grime ready for next weekend and I got on with the job of cleaning and painting the bare strut. As before, I used a wire cup brush in the angle grinder and it came up well. A coat of etch primer, followed by satin black from a can saw it looking lovely.

I should say that I regret painting the other (completed) strut in Hammerite. Is it just me or has Hammerite gone off the boil recently? It is incredibly gloopy yet has the covering capacity of tracing paper. Plus, of course, the strut should have been satin black all along. What was I thinking? Oh well, this TR7 will have one gloss and one satin suspension strut. I hope that baffles her new owner long after I am gone. On that note and just for fun, I might leave a note in the strut where the damper goes: "John woz 'ere."

Front Suspension Strut

Isn't it amazing the difference a day can make? Yesterday I started to reassemble the strut assembly and to begin with everything went well, mainly because I started with the brakes.

Having stripped and painted everything last weekend, it was time for reassembly. It took me a while to work out that the caliper piston seals and dust seals didn't clip into the existing rim in the casting, rather, and that the rim itself was removable. I wondered what the extra bits in the repair kit were.

Once the seals were done, I greased the bearings before driving the smaller one in with a 30mm socket. However, I didn't have a socket large enough for the bigger bearing, so here's a top tip:

*** TOP TIP ***

Use a scrap Triumph TR7 caliper piston to drive home the larger bearing. It is EXACTLY the right size.

 *** END OF TOP TIP ***

So there you are. Now I just need to get some new pistons, fit them to the calipers and put them back together before fitting to the rebuilt strut.

Ah, the strut. Sounds like a 70s dance, doesn't it? Well, yesterday I was honestly ready to dance the funky thing into a skip, such was my frustration. I had reassembled everything but nothing would go right.

First of all the big nut/collar thing on the damper insert just wouldn't tighten fully. In, out, shake it all about and it still wouldn't go. Lots of thread cleaning and re-screwing eventually saw it rotate home, and I even managed the quite ignominious feat of quite literally punching myself in the face when my fist fell off the wrench I was pulling hard towards me. To add insult to my injury, the whole lot kept falling off the bench and thudding to the ground, damaging the lovely paintwork I had applied. That put me in quite a bad mood, I can tell you.

Finally I got everything reassembled using spring compressors and looked lovely, but no matter how hard I tried, I could not get the gaiter to attach to the spring pan. There just wasn't enough "give" in the rubber and the compressed spring made access difficult. "It's impossible" I declared, and turned with a swish of my imaginary cape leaving the garage in a huff.

This morning I was back in the garage at nine and everything felt better. The strut was still there (I was glad it hadn't got up to any more mischief in the night) and I had another go.

Yes it was fiddly, and I could have done with a couple of extra arms, but the gaiter finally hit home after about ten minutes. Not wanting it to escape, I quickly cable-tied both ends.

That done, I was on a roll and quickly offered up the new hub and disc, which went on a treat. What a difference a day can make.

Next stop will be putting the calipers back together, and then starting on the remainder of the old suspension.

Paint Prep and Front Suspension Strut

Gosh, it has been a while, hasn't it? Sorry for my absence of late but I have been working on the TR7, honestly. To be honest, a lot of my time has been on fettling the body and frankly I got bored with the endless hours of rubbing down and re-filling grey primer.

The roof in particular needed work, as it was dented. This took a surprising amount of time to do but as it will be so visible, it is worth doing correctly.

I'm afraid the remainder of these photos don't convey too much, as once you've seen one, you've seen 'em all. But the following will give you the general idea of where I am up to.

Did I mention that I had gotten bored with grey? Well, after tripping over a big pile of rusty suspension parts, I decided to start work on cleaning it up.

I decided to start with one of the suspension struts, and was surprised how involved the whole thing was (I had expected a quick rub down with wet & dry, and hey presto!). Splitting the ball joints was tough, as was undoing many of the seized bolts (which came apart with a combination of heat, hammers and WD40).

Having compressed the springs, I was able to remove them and have a go at the top nut, which, as always, bore no resemblance to what was in the Haynes Book of Jokes. It talked about a split pin, but I couldn't find it. In the end I used a various mole grips and other things to undo it.

Next was the large collar-type nut thing which needed to be undone in order to withdraw the damper insert. Imagine my delight when I read that - you guessed it - a special tool was needed. Heat, a vice, a stilson and hammer & chisel saw it come out fairly quickly.

Once that was done, I was able to dismantle the hub, disc, disc shield, calipers etc and give everything a good lean. A wire brush in the angle grinder was effective for removing loose rust (and there was a lot of that), after which things were painted.

More next time!