MNBob's 1979 TATA 5 Speed

[stros]

Regarding the wheel clearance - I believe you have the same SLC56 Wilwood kit I have.  My YearOne 17” Snowflakes just barely clear them.  I’ve had them installed for years and haven’t noticed any noises or issues though.  Wilwood recommends having a minimum of 2MM of clearance.

[MNBob]

Thanks, I had about 1/16" and I added 1/8" spacers, so between 4 and 5mm. My whole set up is pretty close to yours.

[MNBob]

Front Suspension Redo – Final Right Side

I haven't posted in a while because I got involved in another project. We had guests stay with us in July and they had trouble with the toilet in the lower level bathroom. It was relatively minor, just the trip lever, but I got fed up with this problem as it's been going on for years. This led to a mini bathroom reno, including new toilet, new faucet, new shut off valves, new supply lines, and a cosmetic redo of the toilet area.

Back to the car, the installed caliper was a little off center, so I ordered a shim kit and put it to dead center. See picture. I also bled the brakes and set the toe. The tie rod end with the stripped threads that I damaged during removal was replaced with a new one. Finally, I purchased and installed UMI tie rod adjusting sleeves. See pictures.


Centered Caliper


Old Tie Rod Adjuster


New Tie Rod Adjuster

[stros]

Looks great!

[N PRGRES]

Toilet leads to mini resto, isn't that how it always goes?!  Nice Job!

[FormTA]

Looks like it's getting there! You'll be back on the road soon!

[MNBob]

Front Suspension Redo – Start Left Side

I didn't take a lot of pictures of the left side disassembly process because it is all pretty routine. The one thing I did differently this time was to use a tie rod removal tool instead of a hammer, see picture. I did manage to screw it up, however, because I attached the safety chain with not enough slack. When I got the bottom of the spring free, the chain was tight and I couldn't remove the spring. I had to get out the spring compressor and re-tighten the spring.

Upper control arm removal is another story. Because of the steering rod interference, the only way to remove the upper control arm is to remove the bolts. However, these bolts have splines that hold them into their mounting. Most instructions for this procedure say to take a hammer and knock them out from the inside. There is absolutely no room to do this.

I've run into the situation before, and basically you can just spin them out and ruin the splines. Then you could get new bolts and hope they hold when you do an alignment. Not ideal. So I Googled this and found a thread on the Corvette forum where someone suggested using a C clamp over the front of the bolt to push it out.

I got out a C clamp and hooked it on the end of the bolt, but the screw part wanted to go on the head, which, of course will not work. I was able to mount the clamp at a diagonal, catching the corner of the shock mount area. See picture. I didn't think about it, but I could've probably put a socket over the head and mounted the C clamp straight.
Anyway, I tightened up the C clamp really tight, and the bolt still did not come out. Finally, I took out my impact wrench and gave it a little jolt in the loosen direction and then again in the tighten direction and it popped out.


Using Tie Rod Removal Tool


Using C Clamp


Upper Control Arm Out


Splined Bolt

[FormTA]

I believe that's how I got mine out, C clamp and a socket. Your moving along pretty well.

[N PRGRES]

I believe that's how I got mine out, C clamp and a socket. Your moving along pretty well.

Same here but I added lots of swear words also

[MNBob]

Front Suspension Redo – Left Side Progress

Lots of little details go into a project like this including cleaning, rust treating, wire wheeling, and painting. I am not going to bore you with all the details, but there is one thing I would like to mention. I soaked the control arm mount bolts, nuts, and alignment spacers in my homemade rust treatment solution. Last winter, I found a formula on YouTube and now make my own for about 1/5 of the cost.

Anyway, here is progress as of yesterday:

[N PRGRES]

Looks good!

[FormTA]

Man, besides pretty suspension, I see a detailed engine hiding in the background   

I too make my own penetrating oil. An elderly neighbor told me about the fluids to use as it works great. Basically all the fluids that easily seem to leak mixed together.

[MNBob]

Thanks. I repainted the entire engine block in the car. I was surprised how well that could be done as I got almost complete coverage.

The commercial rust soaks get to be expensive and I was able to mix my own for about 1/6 of the cost.

[MNBob]

Front Suspension Redo – Problems

There have been a few issues that have come up when trying to complete the right side. First, my 35 year-old Menards cheapie bench grinder went out. I could've probably fixed it, but it really wasn't worth it. So I purchased a new one. See picture.

The second issue was electrical. I always keep the car on the battery tender (except to start). I needed to start it one day to move the steering linkage, and it would not start. Hooking up the regular battery charger indicated a charge percent of zero! So much for the battery tender. I did get it started after the batteries were charged, but then the fan would not shut off so I may have damaged the fan controller. The five year-old AGM batteries are nearing replacement, but I had hoped to get by until next year.

The third issue was a brake fluid leak. When I bled the right caliper, I noticed brake fluid on the floor of the garage. I thought maybe I overfilled the master so I let it go. Then when I did the left side the same thing happened. Tracing it down, it was coming from the proportioning valve area. When I did a redo 10 years ago, I chose to locate the proportioning valve up under the fender. This is similar to what the factory did with the blower fan on the other side.

The only access was to remove the inner fender. Having done the right side for the blower motor, this actually went pretty quick, maybe an hour and a half. My first thought was about my brake line flaring ability, but it really turned out to be something else. The proportioning valve itself was leaking where a fitting attached to the body of the unit. I have now ordered a new one and am awaiting delivery.


New Bench Grinder


Shimmed Left Caliper


Left Inner Fender Out


Fixed Proportion Valve (see paint off on lower right bracket)

[N PRGRES]

Its always something!

[MNBob]

Front Suspension Redo – Proportioning Valve

It appears that the old proportioning valve had been leaking for some time. One of the downsides of the location I chose, was the leaking brake fluid ran onto the bottom lip of the front fender, right ahead of the door. Of course, the brake fluid did its thing and removed all the paint on the bottom lip.

I knew my search for the problem would lead to an O-ring, and it definitely was. See picture. Also, I discovered that the master cylinder had been weeping on the booster. See picture. I gave this a spray and it looked better than it did before. See picture.

Installing the new valve took a lot of time and fiddling around. Upon initial install, it leaked out of four of the five ports. I ended up using the flare gaskets on three and fiddled with the other one to get it to seal. See picture of the mounted brass proportioning valve.

As of this writing, everything is reinstalled from doing the proportioning valve.


Leaking O-ring


Staining on Booster


Booster Painted


Installed Prop Valve

[N PRGRES]

I want to say it took me awhile to get mine new one to stop leaking also

[MNBob]

Front Suspension Redo – Final Details
Installing the sway bar end links is more difficult with the new control arms. It must be done in the correct order and using a jack on the sway bar. The bottom of the link had two bushings, one on each side of the Heim joint. I again proved I can lose anything in the shop, because not only did I lose one but two of the bushings. I had to make a trip to the building supply to obtain the correct stock and cut new ones to length.

I was putting on the wheels one day and I thought it would be a good check to see how much thread engagement I had on the lug nuts (especially with the wheel spacers). I greased the studs with white grease, put the wheel on and took a measurement. The total engagement was a quarter inch, or about three threads. This is not enough, so I had to order longer studs. See pictures.

Installing the new studs was a challenge and my old Ryobi impact wrench was not up to the task. I have used the Ryobi for this in the past, but it did not work with these studs. I had to go to Harbor Freight and purchase a Hercules ultra torque impact wrench. This handled the job with ease.

Since I put on a new outer tie rod end, I set the toe again. Also, the front AGM battery is not holding a charge and I had to charge up the batteries prior to starting. There is also a problem with the fan system as the fan is running all the time and I had to pull the fuse.

With all of this, I took the car for the first drive with the new suspension! I could not go too far as there is no cooling fan. It really wasn't enough to give any impressions, but there were no obvious problems.


Wheel Stud Comparison


Installing Stud


Completed Hub

[N PRGRES]

Good deal!  Did you ever get the height corrected?

[rkellerjr]

Great news, its' alive!

[FormTA]

Good to hear it's back on the road! Used to do studs by hand....

[MNBob]

Did you ever get the height corrected?

Good question. When I installed the first spring, it was way too high. Then I cut one coil off each spring.

Now it is about 1" lower.  If you would have asked me before I started this project, I would have said I would like to go down about 3/4".

I have never seen the car like this and I have had it for 46 years! It really take some getting used to! In my limited driving, I have noticed no rubbing or other issues.

The thing that bothers me though is the driver side is 1/2" lower than the right. If anything, i would have preferred the opposite.  Global West sells 1/4" aluminum spacers that go in the spring pocket and raise the car by 1/2" so I may eventually do that on one side.

[MNBob]

Electric Fan On
During the work on the front suspension about a month ago, I went out to start the car. The battery was low and the starter just clicked. After that, the electric fan remained on even when the car was shut off.

The fan is generally run by an Auto Cool III PWM fan controller. However, when I wired this in, I wanted redundancy, so I used the Sniper temperature fan inputs for backup fan control. To do this required two high amp relays. Tracing out the fan problem, showed that one of these relays had stuck in the on position. Unhooking it from power reset it and solved the problem.

Old Battery
My AGM batteries are both five years old. Testing the batteries on the workbench showed that one of them would only hold a 60% charge. The Braille batteries are good and lightweight, but also pretty expensive. This time I went with a regular AGM. See pictures.


Fan Controller and Relays


Relays to Fan Ground Switching


Old Battery


New Battery Installed

[MNBob]

Stance 1
After finishing the bulk of the work on the front end project, I let the car sit for about a week to evaluate what I had done. After that time, I decided I couldn't live with the current stance. The front end was just too low, and the back right too high. The car was also lower on the left, which really bothered me.

After thinking about spring spacers, I decided to just order another pair of front springs. I found a returned pair that I was able to get a good discount on. So I sent out to tackle the number one problem of the front left being too low. Instead of cutting a full coil, on the new one I cut just a half a coil.

This is the fourth coil spring install I have done now with this new set up. I only took a few pictures, see below. The new coil spring raised the front end of car about a half inch, although the right side was still just a tad higher.


Spring Cut and Ready


Spring Going In (note left sway bar in and spindle in)


In Pocket!

[MNBob]

Stance 2

After raising the front left, I moved on to tackling the right rear, which was too high. I installed a half inch lowering block on the right leaf spring. To do this, I had to cut off the head or pin of the centering bolt because it would not fit in the lowering block. See picture.

This adjustment did about nothing as confirmed by measurements. It was a do over, and I had to take out the half inch block and put in a 1 inch block. See picture.

The car now sat about level. Each side was within 1/8 inch of the other with the lower measurement now being the right side! Perfect. I took a couple pictures of the stance see below.


Shortening Centering Pin


1" Block Installed


Left View


Right VIEW

[N PRGRES]

Thats about how my car sits.  Not sure if one side is different than the other as I never measured, now I have to lol