Work done on the front suspension

One of the winter 99/00 tasks was to take the front suspension apart, one of the reasons was an obvious indication of worn bushings and strange "clonking" noises while driving on bumpy roads.

It all came off very easy, the front crossmember is fitted to the frame with only four bolts. After removing the steering rack and the four bolts, the crossmember came down nice and easy. The complicated (and dangerous) part is to take the suspension apart, especially the springs. I used a long spring compressor to keep the wishbone and the damper together while removing the bolts that connects the kingpin assembly to the wishbone.

When I took everything apart I suddenly realized where the clonking noise I have heard all summer came from, not the rubber bushes as I thought  but from the dampers which bolts had shaken loose making the damper "clonking" against the crossmember. I am grateful that the damper didn't came loose while I was driving down the Italian Alps!

A lot of dirt!

After dismantling everything I decided to let a company grit blast the bigger parts (including the crossmember at the rear end of the gearbox) and to paint it all with a hard and nice paint.  Meanwhile I cleaned and painted the smaller parts. You can see the result below, quite a difference!

Front suspension ready to be mounted on he car.

Besides all the bushings I had the dampers replaced with renovated ones which should enhance handling quite a bit. The old ones where leaking which was one reason to all the dirt. I also changed the brake pipes and hoses to be on the safe side.

When a took the kingpin and hub assembly apart I accidentally mixed up the bearings so I didn't know which bearing came from which side. After about 1500 kilometers I realized that I didn't put it all together right, a grinding noise from the front told me that the bearings has to be replaced...