A bit more movement.....
Progress has been awfully slow. I have been plagued by a job that I knew was going to be problematic before I even attempted it. I had to replace the lower arm frame bushings on the truck as the drivers side one was showing very bad signs of wear.
I decided to drill the rubber and then burn the innards out.....
Tada!!!
Then I was upset to find out that the new bushes I fetched from Birmingham came with outer sleeves that I think are resistance fit.
I then had some limited success with a large cold chisel that wasn't really the right tool for the job but made some weak spots that peeled over with a little help from the hacksaw cuts.
Embarrassingly, I had an issue with a hair brained scheme I had involving a chisel that I cut to size to try and drift the sleeve out with :doh
The chisel eventually snapped off in the chassis :doh
I've found that the best technique for me that I'll always use now is to try and cut grooves as long as possible in the front end of the sleeves every 5-6mm and try to knock them over to clear some room for the DIY press to do the rest of the work.
I knocked this up.....
It's a 300mm length of M12 Threaded Rod, with 2 nuts at one end and a 27mm Halfords Advanced Deep Impact socket as the "press", this has an outer wall of 38mm, the next socket size up is then 41.80mm which is 0.08mm to big to send through. I then cut to size some old Klarius metal tube I have spare and some M12 washers and a plate to go over the receiver.
It's installed as so......
I gave it some cranking around with the breaker bar and eventually with an ALMIGHTY crack, it let go but the shockwave must have been enough to shear the threaded bar and everything flew off in the explosion.
I had to get another length of bar and went again and eventually the dreaded thing was out!!! :bow
Just the other side to do now tomorrow after work, I've already made a start and bent a lip over ready for pressing.
A truly horrible horrible horrible job, I'd rather buy a new truck than have to do that job again
