Roger K

I've got a set of polybush replacements for the nylon from Paddock to see what they're like. As someone said earlier, decent quality with s/s tube and none of the tin washer/o-ring parts. I can see that these should work just as well as the over-complicated parts that no-one seems able to reproduce, so will give them at least a trial fitting to see how they look while I'm waiting for the trunnionless kit. Could someone confirm for me, or give their opinion, as to which parts are supposed to be the rotating bearing surfaces? Is the tube supposed to rotate on the bolt (unlikely, given there's a torque figure which seems designed to hold the tube tight in the wishbone)? Or is the nylon/poly supposed to rotate on the sleeve? Or rotate inside the trunnion? It seems an odd design to have a nylon bush rotate against metal as a bearing surface, although I suppose that's what a poly (not a rubber) ARB bush does...

Brabham used rose joints.

I'm talking about the rear - Jags use balljoints at the front. You're right about the front end and Lotus, of course. Not sure about the very early ones, but most Lotus racing cars I've seen had the thread machined off the upright and a rose joint fitted.... sound familiar? Albeit with a redesign of the lower wishbone, an option we don't really have cost-wise. So many of these modifications and performance parts come with label of 'racing spec', as if that's a good thing. Racing cars are stripped, checked and any worn or damaged parts replaced every few hundred miles they cover. 'Racing', or 'competition' parts, don't have to last long at all, so I've never understood why this is considered a selling point (except to racers!). The real world, with traffic jams, weather extremes, 12 months between services etc. is a far harsher environment than any race track, I reckon.

A nice double-needle-roller bearing in there would have been nice, like the Jag IRS uses on the lower outboard fulcrum pin. Probably wishful thinking for a cheap-as-chips small car, though... nice winter project for someone!

To be fair, Chris was suggesting weld for the same purpose I originally suggested, i.e. as an anti-rotation device, to stop the holes in the wishbone ovalling as the bolt starts to turn in them due to rusting to the internal sleeve. I haven't seen any evidence of weld on original wishbones either, but properly done and with the right materials it certainly would be very effective. As it stands, for some time now it is clear that my front lower wishbone pivot has been the bolt in the wishbone holes. The nylon trunnion assembly has been doing nothing. The wishbones are pretty much scrap as the holes are badly worn, and there is severe pitting further inboard as well so new ones are on the way.

It was the depth of the pressed flanges on the washers that was wrong. Simply placing the tin washers between the trunnion block and the vertical link, with no nylon or rubber rings, showed they were about 2-3mm too wide and even rough assembly like that was impossible. I had half of one of the old metal washers remaining, and it was much narrower than the new ones. I ground the flange back and managed to get everything to fit, but I don't think it's right. These parts are clearly not fit for purpose! Unfortunately, nobody seems to make a 'trunnionless' setup for the rear...

Hmm, looks like I might have a problem here. I simply assembled the rear trunnions assuming the parts were all good. That wasn't too clever, as I had to modify the tin washers and the rubber rings just to get them in there, and thinking back to it I'm pretty sure the metal sleeves were significantly shorter than the plastic top hats when assembled. There is also no gap between the plastic pieces once assembled into the trunnion, and the whole thing is tight, pretty stiff to move by hand. I have no old parts to play with as they were completely scrap. Both Rimmers and Canley are selling the same parts I bought so I'm not sure if anyone else has anything better - google or ebay brings up new parts in varying colours, but without buying there's no way of checking dimensions. I'm getting more drawn to the trunnionless setup. The plan is to do a decent mileage in this car in all conditions, so reliability and low wear are prime considerations. Anybody got real-world experience of the trunnionless kits?

Just seen the 'trunnionless' kit on Rimmers' site - not cheap, but does it do the job reliably and last well, I wonder? And it doesn't solve the rearr problem.

Can anyone give a good recommendation as to which trunnion kits to buy? I have the standard offerings from Rimmers and Canley, both being the same blue plastic ones. I had to trim the metal washers to make them thinner just to get them between the vertical link flanges, and thin the rubber square section rings. Are there better ones available?

That’s what I did them to... ...but no grease

Oh dear - I’ve assembled the rear suspension and noticed the vertical links are very stiff to move on the rear trunnion block. I don’t want those going oval on me. Maybe dismantling time again...

OK, that makes sense. Clearly mine weren’t working properly as the nylon was not moving on the sleeve. Maybe it’s worth making sure the sleeve is not too tight a fit in the nylon? Maybe a mod to engage the sleeve with the wishbone, when assembled, would do it?

I assume the correct operation is for the sleeve to rotate around the bolt. This may well be a false assumption, but if not I’d think it is doomed to failure - the part that holds the sleeve firm between the wishbone arms is the bolt itself. An anti-rotation device seems necessary to me, and easy to do. It is actually a similar problem to the apalling design of the door hinges for XK Jaguars, which is why so many old or poorly-restored ones have doors that flop all over the place. I spent several weeks last year uprating and fixing mine, horrible job.

Yes, that too.

It just seems strange that they should go to all the trouble of designing that fancy trunnion with nylon top hats etc, but the bolt quickly rusts in the sleeve and the nylon does nothing. The bolt turns in the wishbone and the holes wear oval, allowing movement between trunnion and wishbone.

I've just dismantled the front end, and amongst the memories flooding back to me are having to hacksaw through trunnion-to-wishbone bolts. Such a delight. Once apart, it became obvious that with the bolt rusting into the sleeve inside the nylon tophats, the sheet steel sides of the wishbone had now become the bearing surface and the holes had worn badly oval. When I was younger I never considered such things, but I'm wondering if it would be worth sticking a blob of weld on the wishbone next to the head of the bolt and grinding it flat, to locate the bolt so that it can no longer turn in the wishbone arms, thereby forcing the trunnion to act as the pivot like it's supposed to? I going to bet this has been a common mod for over thirty years and I'm re-inventing the wheel... Roger

Possibly not, but it's extremely annoying

My usual method for releasing balljoint tapers is to loosen the nut on the taper pin, then whack the side of the steering arm with a decent hammer. This usually shocks the pin out of the tapered hole. Loosen the nut past the nyloc section, otherwise it can be tricky to undo as the ball will rotate in the joint when you try to undo it. Sometimes holding another hammer on the other side of the steering arm can help, but not usually necessary. Failing that, the usual armament of ball joint removal tools.... if using the screw type, fit it so it's putting pressure on the pin, then whack the side of the steering arm with the hammer. That should do it.

Yes, it looks like the Britpart item is incorrectly numbered. Plus ça change....

All makes good sense. Doh - I'd forgotten that the wishbone brackets are removable - obvious for shimming purposes. It is rather astonishing that Triumph chose bolts whose shanks do not extend to the bearing surfaces, incredible. Thanks for pointing this out - for the only one I've removed so far, a) I didn't notice it was too short and b) it's not worn at all in the threaded portion. I'll be doing a full alignment on reassembly anyway. Photos are always a good idea....

I think I remember this happening thirty-five years ago... Having (almost) sorted the back end, I'm now dismantling the front suspension for attention. Apart from one fractured bolt in the upright (the only one that does nothing except retain the dustshield), it's come apart very nicely. With one exception... Triumph in their wisdom, obviously assembled the lower wishbone to the car before fitting the suspension turret. The front wishbone bolt cannot be removed with the turret in position, and removing requires removing the engine mount and possibly disturbing the KPI setting, albeit minutely. It reminds me of the Morris Minor brake master cylinder, first removal of which requires complete disassembly of the driver's side front suspension and torsion bar. I presume the answer is a cutting disc and a new bolt, inserted from the front?

Aaaaargh - the dreaded blue bag! Having just restored a '67 Series IIA Station Wagon, I have learnt to avoid blue bags if at all possible. Somehow Britpart got the licence to call their products 'OEM', but the quality can be atrocious. Bearmach are better, Allmakes better still. The beauty of old Landies is that there are a number of parts specialists for the older ones that have prodigious stock of NOS parts, still in their sixties wrappings. Possibly not for Freelanders, however.

That makes sense...

Good advice all. I have one TR6 stud coming - well, two actually - one front and one rear, so I can see how they are different and which suits best. Assuming they look all good, which I'm sure one of them will, I'll probably spend a couple of hours on the lathe turning them to the best length and putting a short blank reduced radius on the ends. I might even look at the tapered seat, if I feel like it, as it might be worth reproducing the seat on the originals for a nice fit.

That's rather what I was thinking, Nick. It doesn't look like any broken bolt I can remember. Thanks all, I'll report back once the TR6 parts arrive and I can experiment.