First of many questions

[DavidM]

Just taken delivery of my new Hawk kit (Round arch G4 will be Beta initially but have the mountings and harness for later Alfa upgrade) and thought I'd start with a simple job the front suspension. First stupid question - I have AVO coil overs with spherical joints, what spacers do I need to fit at the top and bottom, should I fill up the gaps with the eyes centralised or should they be offset in any direction? David

[colin artus]

You need the top joints spaced towards the front so that when you adjust for caster the offset between top and bottom mounting ( you will be pulling the bottom arm forward) is minimised. The rod ends will cope with the offset much better than a bush but it is still good practice to keep this angle down. The bottom mounting will need to be centralised in the arm for clearance. Make the spacers out of aly bar and turn them to cones where they mate with the spherical part of the rod end.


Colin

[guy mayers]

Assembly can be "amusing" unless you have three pairs of hands and a double jointed neck so here is a tip. Get a piece of old bar the same diameter as the bush sizes, push it through the chassis and score it from within the wheel arch. Cut it down so that it will slide into the chassis gap from within the wheel arch, chamfer one end slightly. Assemble the upper wishbone, spacers and shock absorber on the bar, insert into the chassis and use the pivot bar to drive the guide out gently.

Disassembly canalso be "amusing"! Don't forget to grease the pivot bar even on a trial assembly, it could be left inadvertently for years! Once seized it's a bugger to remove! Best way to remove it is to use sacrificial nuts, keep tightening them until it gives or you run out of thread. If this happens, remove the nut and repack with washers before tighteneing again. Repeat until it's removed. NEVER hit it with a hammer or you'll spread the head and it'll never come out.

Guy

[DavidM]

Thanks folks,a load of suspension spacers of various sizes came with the kit so I can mod accordingly to achieve the right offset. I also note the tightness of all the chassis drillings, looks like the effect of the powder coating so I will need to relieve them before applying liberal amounts of copperslip on assembly.Cheers David