Steering and Suspension Rebuild
Richard's Corvair
The Restoration of my 1960 Corvair
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Month 8 part 1
The past couple of months have been spent sandblasting, painting and traveling to various parts of the US to get parts. Haven’t really been able to do much with the body as I need to finish the mechanical and get it in before final body work and painting. But several parts are beginning to come together, as you will see here.
It would not be right to put the car together without checking and rebuilding the steering box. It appears to be very well designed and amazingly had little wear, even though the grease was dry and there was water in it. The rust was superficial and limited to the ball bearing races.
I’ve put it back together with a polyurea grease with a high Timken test value so that it will last.
The front spindles did not look good, but I chose the best 2 that I had and cleaned them up with sandblasting and sanding. Now they are painted and ready for assembly.
Most of the brake shoes were almost new, but there was a lot of mud and rust. They have all been sandblasted and painted. Drums were turned and cylinders painted as well. Next to replace the hoses and hone the cylinders to rebuild them.
The tires that came on the car were 4 different sizes: 165/70R13, 155/TR13, 6.50-13, and 6.45-13. One rim was apparently replaced at some moment. I’m putting on 4 Pirelli P400 P195/70R14 (Later I changed these to Hankook whitewalls)
I may some day redo the original wheels, but for daily driving I wanted radial tires and some nicer looking ones. It took a while to get the 45 degree metal stems, but now they are mounted.
The rear suspension wasn’t as bad as the rest. Probably from leaking oil that kept some of it from rusting, but it still needed sand blasting and painting.
It was amazingly difficult to take out the old suspension bushings after 47 years, but they finally came out with a little over 2 tons of pressure in the hydraulic press and a few home made adapters to push them through.
The front suspension has progressed from the rusty twisted mess at the left to the painted parts on the right with the help of a some parts from the other front suspension brought from a Tulsa junk yard, shown as it arrived on its pallet.
The original suspension had cut tires for the spring cushions and the one from Tulsa had worn original cushions. I wrapped the upper and lower coils with industrial grade hose.
Here you can see the detail of one of the tie rod ends and the rubber used as a bushing on the strut.
I was unable to get strut arm bushings from any of the Corvair suppliers in the US, so these were hand made on a lathe from heavy duty tractor tires.
Here we are compressing one of the springs to assemble the suspension.
This month continues on the next page.
It would not be right to put the car together without checking and rebuilding the steering box. It appears to be very well designed and amazingly had little wear, even though the grease was dry and there was water in it. The rust was superficial and limited to the ball bearing races.
I’ve put it back together with a polyurea grease with a high Timken test value so that it will last.
The front spindles did not look good, but I chose the best 2 that I had and cleaned them up with sandblasting and sanding. Now they are painted and ready for assembly.
Most of the brake shoes were almost new, but there was a lot of mud and rust. They have all been sandblasted and painted. Drums were turned and cylinders painted as well. Next to replace the hoses and hone the cylinders to rebuild them.
The tires that came on the car were 4 different sizes: 165/70R13, 155/TR13, 6.50-13, and 6.45-13. One rim was apparently replaced at some moment. I’m putting on 4 Pirelli P400 P195/70R14 (Later I changed these to Hankook whitewalls)
I may some day redo the original wheels, but for daily driving I wanted radial tires and some nicer looking ones. It took a while to get the 45 degree metal stems, but now they are mounted.
The rear suspension wasn’t as bad as the rest. Probably from leaking oil that kept some of it from rusting, but it still needed sand blasting and painting.
It was amazingly difficult to take out the old suspension bushings after 47 years, but they finally came out with a little over 2 tons of pressure in the hydraulic press and a few home made adapters to push them through.
The front suspension has progressed from the rusty twisted mess at the left to the painted parts on the right with the help of a some parts from the other front suspension brought from a Tulsa junk yard, shown as it arrived on its pallet.
The original suspension had cut tires for the spring cushions and the one from Tulsa had worn original cushions. I wrapped the upper and lower coils with industrial grade hose.
Here you can see the detail of one of the tie rod ends and the rubber used as a bushing on the strut.
I was unable to get strut arm bushings from any of the Corvair suppliers in the US, so these were hand made on a lathe from heavy duty tractor tires.
Here we are compressing one of the springs to assemble the suspension.
This month continues on the next page.
