I decided to assemble the front struts as I had all the parts. Now I have always wondered why the strut gaiters on my Stag were never closed at the top, or fitted to anything, I had looked in the manuals but could never see the part required, just an item marked "washer", well when I stripped the estate I found 2 of these at the top of the struts
I now understand that this is the "washer" with the remains of the gaiter, which the previous owner must have cut away when the gaiter failed, to save an mot fail on a split gaiter (I must get 2 of these for the Stag too) and this is how they fit
So on to strut assembly, here's a finished one, with an uncompressed spring by it, showing how much "preload" the springs have in this configuration
and both finished with roller top mounts and the aluminium spacer
Now onto the vertical links, these are very rusty and the dust shield paper thin
So I removed the dust shield and started to wire brush the links, which clearly reveal the assembly method, a machined billet of steel, with the hub bearing carrier welded in, and various mounting lugs welded on
I cannot get all the rust off these, particularly on the reverse (due to inaccessability) so I intend to send them for blasting, when they are back and painted, I will fit the bearings and hubs and assemble to the struts.
The dust shields are another matter so I decided to fabricate these from steel sheet, here's one in progress
Its got the lip formed, but I still need to cut the centre out, and trim the lip, however thats all I have time for today.
I have also obtained a few NOS parts from ebay in the past weeks, firstly a genuine AE Stag oil pump, now thats a rare beast today (and it shouldn't weep oil like my County one on the Stag from the oil pressure relief valve assembly) and a Stanpart black transmission cover carpet, still in the original wrapping, but it will need some modifications so it will fit round the transmission tunnel mods, but its another rare item.
583 hours now worked - 4 today.
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