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1. I found this patch of rust near the lower left corner of the right side door opening. What should I do? My car still hast original paint so I would like to prevent the rust from expanding without repainting the whole side. Is there any sort of treatment or chemicals that I can put to patch it and cover it with some paint but without using welding?
2. I see a lot of people posting pictures of door hinges when advertising 911s for sale. I guess they want to point out that the hinge area is ok. is that a known weakness? Shall I do some preventive work there?
3. I see this rear suspension arm (by the torsion bar) is not quite centered. is there some sort of rubber bushing inside that might be worn? I hear no unusual suspension noise and I feel no play. I'm thinking to lower the car a bit and I think I could do this repair at the same time if needed.
The top pic shows some potentially serious rust issues and the paint needs to be stripped in that area to properly diagnose the extent of the problem.
Your spring plate bushings have sagged and thats normal, given the age of these cars. The same thing is happening up front in your control arms and I'd recommend replacing all of them with ER's rubber bushings. We usually do the swaybar bushings at the same time.
RE: 3. That is a common issue with the spring plate bushing. Over time the weight of the car deforms the rubber around the spring plate. A trick Steve Weiner once told me is to swap the spring plates left to right and right to left effectively moving the deformed, egg shaped rubber that is thin on the top and thick on the bottom 180 degrees so that it is installed thick on top and thin on the bottom. Make sense? It's the poor man's solution.
Better to just replace the bushing with new rubber from Elephant, but that takes money and a bit more effort. If you are going to pay someone else to do the work you may as well go all in and replace. If you are a DIY kinda guy who can do his own alignment afterwards like me then.....do it.
I flipped mine a few years ago when I got fresh zinc and they already show signs of sagging.
RE: 1. I'd find a shop that can cut that out and patch it. It's in the jam and a good shop will be able to cut, patch, paint match well enough that you and the public's prying eyes won't ever notice it. The same shop can spray anti-corrosion protection inside that cavity to retard the spread.
Next, follow Steve's advice and use the ER rubber bushings. Forget all to the trick stuff and just put it back together the way it was designed. You don't want to know how much money I spent on trick parts before I learned all of this.
Next, follow Steve's advice and use the ER rubber bushings. Forget all to the trick stuff and just put it back together the way it was designed. You don't want to know how much money I spent on trick parts before I learned all of this.
Yep....My car has all "stock" Elephant bushings. Do not buy any other brand of rubber bushings because everything else is junk. ...JUNK It may look right and cost a couple dollars less, but it ain't Chuck's Elephant bushings....There is a very boring YT video demonstrating the difference.
Depends on the year, condition, etc of the rest of the car. Assuming that the economics make sense, I'd also have the paint taken down to metal all around that rust area to find out how big of an area that is rusted out. Then go from there.
I would not swap the spring plates. You can end up with a really squirrly rear suspension that steers by itself. +1 on Chuck's (Elephant Racing) rubber suspension bushings. Not sure about the poly-bronze. I'd stick with rubber. After I replaced my suspension bushings, I was very surprised at how much better the handling was, and how straight the car tracked at speed.
As far as the door hinge, try to clean the hinge area out with some electronic parts cleaner, using the straw into the oiling hole. Wait a few days, and then spray oil in there. Keep the door stay clean and lubricated. You might consider the door stay reinforcement kit on the Pelican Parts website.
1. is this ugly bushing something I would be dealing with at the time of lowering the rear ride height? otherwise I would like to defer this job until it starts making some noise OR I have more spare time
2. Is this bushing holding the sway bar? I was expecting to see some needle bearings of some sort, given the amount of angular suspension travel...
1. is this ugly bushing something I would be dealing with at the time of lowering the rear ride height? otherwise I would like to defer this job until it starts making some noise OR I have more spare time
2. Is this bushing holding the sway bar? I was expecting to see some needle bearings of some sort, given the amount of angular suspension travel...
It's one of two pivot points on each side of the rear of the car, so yes, you will change the angle a bit, but you don't have to adjust it or mess with it in any way to lower the car.....unless you have to "re-index" the torsion bars. Most guys aren't happy with lowering it with the fine adjustment screw and have to drop one inner or one outer spline to get the ride height they are looking for. You just have to play with it. What you need to worry about is the torsion bar inside of it riding on or hitting the surrounding tube and wearing a groove and weak point into the bar. You can deform the rubber so badly that the torsion bars is metal on metal with the torsion tube....and that ain't good.
Talk to chuck at elephant racing about your specific suspension needs. I discussed my needs with Chuck and he recommended poly bronze bushings over rubber bushings for aggressive street. I am VERY happy with the ride. I was also advised that if you go with rubber bushings you have to corner balance twice -once at installation and then after break in. This is not the case with poly bronze. Food for thought..
The problem with Chuck's bronze bushings is that you have to grease them. When you grease them you inevitably inject dirt into the bushing. The manufactures gave up on zero fittings decades ago.
That Pelican part you linked to is something different. It is the bushing used where the aluminum trailing arm (the component carrying the wheel hub) fastens to the body. Probably a good idea to replace it, but on a lot of cars you can't change these without an engine drop because the gearbox is in the way. See this photo on the Elephant website that illustrates this part: http://www.elephantracing.com/suspen...m-services.htm
1. I found this patch of rust near the lower left corner of the right side door opening. What should I do? My car still hast original paint so I would like to prevent the rust from expanding without repainting the whole side. Is there any sort of treatment or chemicals that I can put to patch it and cover it with some paint but without using welding?
Cheers!
The rust in this spot is unfortunate, really bad. If we use the "iceberg" analogy, you can only see 10% of the rust. The fact that it has broken thru and not just a bubble is not a good indicator. You will have to cut out all of the metal that has been affected and replace it.
This thread gives you an idea of what you might be up against:
The rust in this spot is unfortunate, really bad. If we use the "iceberg" analogy, you can only see 10% of the rust. The fact that it has broken thru and not just a bubble is not a good indicator. You will have to cut out all of the metal that has been affected and replace it.
This thread gives you an idea of what you might be up against:
I hope it's better than this, but be prepared for the worst when it comes to rust...
sad and scary story that thread...
I live in a dry climate... I hope I can postpone this about 1 year until I have time to do it properly. I do not want to open too many projects at the same time. Is there any chemical I can spray inside of it to help it stop advancing in the meantime?
01-29-2017 | 02:37 AM
carrera rust and suspension question
