update time!
took my spare pair of radius arms to the local friendly garage ive found with the big hydraulic press, and asked them to press out the old bushes where the castor correction bushes would be going!
unfortunately even 15 tonnes of pressure couldnt push the 20 year old bushes out!
so they pushed out the rubbers for me, just leaving the outer metal piece left.
so i used a hacksaw to cut a slit in the metal bush ring.
and then used a chisel to knock the metal ring out.
did the same on the other arm, so all the old bushes were now completely removed.
this box arrived the other day, from Andrew. thanks mate.
went on the ironman 4x4 .com.au website and found the fitting instructions for the castor correction bushes.
put some plumb marks on the old arms before removing them, as per the instructions.
found the woodwork vice worked well for pressing the bushes in.
one done.
comparing what difference the bushes have made on the position of the arm.
other arm done!
anyone spot the glaringly obvious mistake here??
it was 10pm by this time and i was very tired. so i didnt spot the mistake. spent 20 mins hammering, levering and bashing the arm back in place, and then realised my mistake!
the arms were a bastard to get back on, as the new bushes are a tight fit into the brackets on the axle. so the crow bar, trolley jack and sledge hammer all played a part in getting the arms fitted.
when i eventually got the arms bolted to the axle, i found the axle was 2"s too far forward. so used a ratchet strap to pull the axle back to where i wanted it.
all done, or so i thought.
noticed the oil seal needs changing on the axle.
so by this time it was 11pm so time for a shower and bed.
jumped in and drove to work this morning. got to the end of the road pulled out on to a busy A road and realised id got no left lock on my steering!
had to reverse and take another shunt on the tiny bit of lock i had got, to be able to turn left at the junction.
got to work and a little investigation revealed that the clamps on the rear steering bar had been fouling the arms, so i had to undo them and turn them around so they wouldnt foul.
oh and it drove like a pig all the way to work. the death wobble was probably worse than ever!
while at work i remembered that last night, i forgot to bounce the suspension/axle up and down a few times before tightening all the bolts on the arms.
so i undid them all and drove it slowly over some bumpy terrain, before stopping on level ground and re-tightening all the bolts.
i definitely noticed an improvement on the drive home. the steering wheel self centres after turning, beautifully, and the death wobble is definitely improved but still present.
broke a wing mirror on sundays laning trip.
only one i could find in my shed was a chrome LJ78 one. will do until i get another black one.
decided to fit my other set of wheels, and while fitting them i had a look to see how well centred they were. i found that they were definitely not centring correctly.
used some feeler gauges to work out how much out it was, and adjusted the wheel to suit.
maybe this will have improved things slightly.
both front wheels are now almost perfectly centred on the hub.
difficult to see in the pics, but there is a very slight gap between the aftermarket wheel and hub.
will be interesting to see what the d wobble is like on these wheels/tyres.
i then gave the truck a wash.
