Wishbone Splitting

With the frame still upside down and the new Chassis Engineering transmission/wishbone mounting plate installed it seemed like the right time to split the wishbone. I also thought I would need Steve's welding skills again.

The first thing I needed to do was remove the original perch pins holding the wishbone to the axle. I've been here before so I knew it wasn't going to be easy. I went a head and cut the ball in half so I could swing each leg separately. Finding one side would move about easily I started there. Not having a press I got out the drill bits, hammers and punches. After a lot of drilling, hammering and cutting into the original axle to get some oil in there it finally came free. One more to go and I knew it was going to be worse. It was getting late so I sprayed it down hoping to loosen it up for when I came back in a couple of days. When I returned Steve had already removed the old perch pin, Thanks Steve!

The instructions say to take a reference measurement from the ends of the original axle to the original ball mounting point, or something like that. To late for that one, the new axle is narrower anyway so the those measurements would be useless. Now cut the wishbone so that one inch of the threaded tube sticks out of the end of your wishbone. Good thing I dug through a bunch of magazines and found a couple articles on splitting wishbones.

I first cut each leg of the wishbone just past the point the original ball was welded on. Then I bolted the new ends to the mount and slide the two legs on over them. Then I slide the new axle in place and dropped in the new perch pins. I used a long piece of steel the same width as my spring to help align the front ends of the wishbone. Measuring diagonally I centered the axle. From here I was able to measure how much more to cut off, 2 inches. I cut them a quarter inch short of this measurement, I'd rather have them a bit to long than a bit to short!

I wanted to take a measurement with spring, axle and wishbone all mocked together. The axle was centered up again and more measurements taken. My original measurement would have been fine. Back apart it came and the final cut made. Now that the tubes are the right length a three inch long by quarter inch wide slot was cut in each tube along the seam. At the end of each slot a short perpendicular cut was made making a letter T. The tubes were then heated and formed to fit tightly around the threaded tube. Steve then welded the threaded tubes inside the wishbones and welding up the slots.

With the welding done it was time to realign the spring perch. The wishbone and axle are bolted back in place once again. When everything is measured and centered we held it in place and heated each spring perch and bent them 90 degrees to the axle. Alot of heat and muscle were needed for this step. Luckily we had a third person around that night to help keep thing from sliding around.

Just a couple more items to finish up on the frame before I take it home, like the crossmembers.