The MGA With An Attitude
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MGA Guru Is GOING MOBILE - (November 1 - November 15, 2024)
Friday - November 1, 2024:
Didn't get it done late yesterday, so today we get to swap out the front shock absorbers. Been there,done that, so by no it is just grunt work. Crack the lug nuts loose, jack the front end, set stands under frame aft of the front heels, and remove the wheels. Place floor jack under front suspension A-arm, directly under the coil spring, and lift a bit, just enough to get the shock absorber arm off of the rubber frame bumper. Remove the trunnion bolt to free the top swivel link from the shock arm. Remove four bolts to free the shock from the frame.
 Generous coating of dirty grease from leaking oil and road dirt. Some light overspray red paint left after repair from the deer hit damage in June. the rubber frame bumper all beat up, needing replacement, put a pair of those on the shopping list. Last changed 8-1/2-years 211,000-miles, maybe I shouldn't complain. These buffers get beat bad when there is no oil in the shock absorbers most of the time. Guess we were too busy repairing deer damage last June. It's a wonder I didn't notice then and put them on the shopping list. -- Before installing the shocks, this time I drilled tiny vent holes in the oil filler plugs. I'm hoping that may relieve the pressure from thermal expansion of hot oil, maybe prevent blowing oil out past the shaft seals. Time will tell. -- There's the new shock installed,standard fare, four bolts in the frame and one in the arm with new trunnion seals, also new seal supports and new thrust washers this time., and tighten everything up. Then going to the left side, this one is a little less greezy, seems to have been leaking a little less, maybe.
Jack under the coil spring, lift gently, five bolts out and in. New shock in place, again new trunnion seals, seal supports and thrust washers. Notice the badly perished trunnion seals. We know these are made with crap rubber with short life, so we always carry spares. We installed new coil springs three years ago (almost to the day), and surely replaced these seals then. They have obviously perished in a lot less than three years. In August last year we bought a set of front suspension seals 3D printed in Urethane. We know they are somewhere in the Magic Trailer,but couldn't find them today, so had to put it back together with new crappy rubber seals. Also notice the thrust washers inside the seal carriers are badly worn. I suppose those were prior cheap garbage parts, not properly hardened. This left significant fore/aft freeplay in the top trunnions. Our new replacement thrust washers are nice and thick and do appear to have been heat treated, so we hope to have have better service from these parts in the future. -- Time to clean up the old shocks for return shipping, then bag them, box them,,box the boxes, tape it up and apply the provided return shipping label. Just a few miles to the local UPS Store to drop it off.
On the way back we , and stopped by O'Reilly Auto Parts to pick up some dark red spray paint for the upcoming engine assembly. We are about to find out how well Krylon does on a warm engine. -- Today is "tomorrow", come and gone, no call from the machine shop. I called them at ten-to-five, no answer. No return call, so obviously the block boring job is not finished, and I don't know the rebore size, so kill a few more days on the week end before I can order new pistons. Bummer. While cleaning up and packing parts away, navigator finally found the Urethane front suspension seals. They were in a nondescript poly bag with no markings other than a shipping label, and found with Rear Suspension poly bushings. So grab a Magic Marker and write on the package, and put it in with Front Suspension parts where we can find it next time. Maybe it won't be too long,as we want to replace lower A-arm inboard bushings sometime soon.
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