IE serrated rear toe plates

#1

Another DOH! moment? I’ve installed the serrated IE camber and toe plates. In trying to center the toe plate slot on the original tab hole I ended up slotting the mounting tabs all the way back to the edge and then just removing the upper portion of the slot as there was less than 1/16" of material left. In any event I’m now left with a “step” in the material where the bushing will ride as the arm moves up and down. At a minimum this ought to tear up the ends of the bushings and probably the arms as well. Anyone else run into this or devise some clever way of dealing with it?

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#2

It might be ok. The bushing is not supposed to turn. Its the shaft inside of the bushing that is supposed to turn. When you put the shaft thru the bushing, make sure it can indeed turn (this step was one of my various failures). If the shaft can’t turn, polish a smidgen of material off of the shaft. It doesn’t need to be loosey goosey because the forces on the pivot points are high, the shafts just need to be happy enough to rotate inside of the bushings such that the bushings themselves aren’t tempted to turn.

An additional possibility is to put some lube in between shaft and bushing. I think ChuckB has installed Zerk fittings for this. The problem with lube is that it attracts debris. The Zerk fitting idea would allow a person to inject clean grease and debris would be forced out but in the absence of the Zerk fitting debris would just get in there and grind away. There are dry lubes you could try, but I don’t know much about them. Maybe someone with some experience with those could chime in on their utility.

#3

If the bushing is to remain stationary, the bushing itself would have to turn inside the trailing arm. Which mine likely won’t. The trailing arm, bushing, and hollow steel tube at the center of the bushing will all likely rotate as a unit around the bolt. There’s gonna be some rubbin’.

#4

Can you cut back the ends of the bushings and put washers in???

I used the AKG weld-ins and wish I would have done some better figuring before welding the plates in… can only get -2 1/2 camber GRRR!
The toe adjustments are perfect though :slight_smile:

#5

Ahh, that’s a good point. I think it would be easier to get a subframe off of someone and start over than it would to try to overcome this. Find some ebay seller with lots of e30 parts and ask for a subframe.

Next time do some test fitting and marking such that you better understand just how much toe slot is necessary. Camber is hard to test fit but toe is easy.

#6

[quote=“NASA144” post=71512]
I used the AKG weld-ins and wish I would have done some better figuring before welding the plates in… can only get -2 1/2 camber GRRR!
The toe adjustments are perfect though :)[/quote]
-2.5 in the rear is fine, at least imo. Remember that your rear end gains neg camber in compression. So in hard compression in a turn the outside wheel is prob hitting -4deg.

#7

Have you already welded them on? If not just cut the rest of the original tab off and weld the new tab on along the bottom. This is what I did.

If this is not possible just find some plate (or washer) the same thickness as the original tab and make a spacer that will slide with the bushing adjustment and fill the void.

Upon further looking at the picture, you could just weld a narrow strip of plate to the top half of the new piece and solve your problem. With the long hole the bushing is only against the plate at top and bottom.

#8

Yeah, they’re already welded on. I was thinking along the same lines you suggest with a plate welded to the top of the slot or maybe a washer with the bottom sliced off that would match the surface heights. I kind of like the idea of cutting off the ends of the bushings and installing washers too but I don’t have any very precise cutting tools. Whatever the short term solution I basically have to pick one and go with it this weekend. Too little rebuild time left to start over.

#9

Putting the subframe back on the very first time is no picnic. Start by knocking the big subframe bolts up into the passenger compartment.

You have to decide the sequence of the diff install. You can put the diff on the subframe first, or you can install the subframe on the car first. Neither way is a picnic.

If you first put diff on to subframe, don’t waste time trying to jockey the driveshaft into the subframe hole. Drop the driveshaft center bearing and get the driveshaft completely clear. You don’t want to be screwing with the driveshaft, fuel cross-over tube and subframe mounts all simultaneously.

Devinney says that the subframe/diff can be put on w/o dropping the driveshaft, but I spent a bunch of time trying to do it that way and all I acheived was frustration. So just because he can do it, doesn’t mean that everyone can.

One cool idea I keep telling myself to do is to install studs into the top of the diff, and then cut holes in the bottom of the trunk such that you can get right to the nuts on top of those studs. Folks that change diff ratios a lot to it this way. Makes for rapid diff R/R. You can get 12 or 14mm studs from the local autoparts store as wheel studs.

Take a hard look at how much clearance around your rtab adjuster fasteners you’re going to have once the subframe is in place. It’s common to remove a little material from the subframe bushing so more clearance is created to move a wrench.

Finally, take a hard look at how best to orient each adjuster bolt, particularly the outboard bolts. By “orient” I mean having the bolts point inboard or outboard. IIRC with that kit you only have to get to one side of the adjuster, not both. In that case, put the adjuster on the inboard side so you’re not fighting a wrench around subframe bushing.

IIRC someone welded nuts to the IE kit adjusters to there would be more threads for the bolt to grab. That’s something else to think about.

#10

The good news is the car is completely dissembowled. No pesky driveline parts to worry about and the subframe mounting bolts are long since lost in the “spare” parts box. Another bit of good news is that your recollection is correct. The IE bits have threaded plates on one end, no wrench required. I don’t quite understand the need for extra threads as the threaded IE plates are about as thick as the original nuts were. But I guess we’ll see. I need to reattach the trailing arms temporarily to see if the subframe bushings will need notching. I’m still wrestling in my head with the diff first versus diff last thing. I have the upper body strength (and build) of an anemic chipmunk and the bolts were preety tight when I disassembled things. I’d like to get a good run at them where I can reach them. Nothing else about this has gone smoothly so I’m not anticipating much, but I am out of time and have to just suck it up and see how things work out. Would you recommend reattaching the trailing arms before or after mounting the subframe?

#11

In order to put the subframe in place with diff already attached I put a race jack under each end of the subframe and a tranny jack under the diff. That allowed me to position the subframe pretty precisely, so I could then bonk the subframe bolts down into place. In the absence of 3 jacks, I don’t know that a person could put the subframe in place with the diff already attached.

#12

With the diff, trailing arms and everything attached it will balance on one jack under the diff. That’s what I would recommend.

#13

That’s how I did it. It does help to put another jack right where the opening is for the driveshaft as well to get everything lined up.

#14

Excellent! Thanks gentlemen, I have several jacks at my disposal. I’ll see if I can use them and the rear suspension assembly to model plate tectonics with my skull.

#15

That’s how I did it. It does help to put another jack right where the opening is for the driveshaft as well to get everything lined up.[/quote]

Agree with these two. Driveshaft CSB can stay in place. One floor jack under diff, one under subframe driveshaft hole. I put the two halves of my creeper under each brake disc, so I can roll the assembly around. Try not to drop the whole thing on your legs or chest. I leave the 4 diff mounting bolts on but loose, otherwise the rear differential/body mount bolt won’t line up correctly.

#16

To make life easier, I have installed (with red Loctite) studs in the 4 diff mounting holes and use locknuts on top…makes installation a great deal easier.

#17

Was that just to make removal and installation of the diff by itself easier in the future?

#18

YES!!!

#19

Ended up dicing up a few fender washers and slipping them in above the slots to act as bushing surfaces. The bushing material (from Ireland Engineering) is relatively soft to make it possible for the trailing arm mounts to be a little off axis with respect to each other without binding. So I shaved a few mils off just installing the training arms. I let you know at the end of the season if it worked. Unless it doesn’t in which case I’ll know a lot sooner.
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