More brake and suspension Photos

[Peter Jones]

I'm just about to put white back together again after cooking the brakes at Sandown, just thought I'd share a few photos.

New Ball joints.

The originals are riveted in and have to be drilled out. The holes in the new ball joint are an odd diameter so I tapped them for a M8 x 1.25 thread and set them up like this.




Here's the knuckles with new bearings installed. One of the hubs had to be replaced because the bearing shaft was galled. The other Hub had the holding screw snapped off so that had to be drilled and tapped.




Assorted brakes bits, MK3 rear callipers, The notorious GTI (Or is it Audi?) callipers both with new TRW pads which are supposed to be good for 650degrees.

GTI vented front discs. I'll clean that paint off the braking surface before I put them on.

New braided lines. I had the rears made in a single length to save a few dollars on fittings and to simplify things a bit. (There would have been two hoses and a solid section per side otherwise.)



I also went to the bolt bar to get some replacement bolts but I had to upgrade to socket heads because they only had 8.8 s in the hex heads and the originals were 10.9. The socket heads are 12.0 which can't be a bad thing. ( If you didn't understand that last bit the numbers refer to the tensile strength of the bolt the bigger the number the stronger it is along it's length.)



There's still a few more goodies on the way before I'm done. I'm looking forward to seeing how all this works out.

Next track date is in April. Hopefully I'll get the car sorted by then and take it out to Phillip Island for some instruction.

Pete

[GoLfMan]

that looks great Pete
should stop very nicely mate

[gldgti]

if it werent gay, i'd say i love you pete. nice work

why'd you go with socket head bolts for the balljoint-control arm connection? just curious.

how does the car stop with the big rear brakes? i've got the SEAT rear drum setup with gti rotors/calipers on the front and that seems to balance out well.... with my current setup. i couldnt imagine i'd need anymore stopping power on the back than the big drums... since they scrabble for traction already, even with my stiff shocks. one advantage i've noted with the big drums is the good bite they have with the handbrake.....

anyway, just curious.

[ontarv]

one question for you how much bigger
are the gti brakes compared to standard?
my wheels only just clear standard ones
but i wouldn't mind something better

[Jarred]

good to see you're still making progress on this one. will have to come for a ride once it's all sorted!

[Peter Jones]

why'd you go with socket head bolts for the balljoint-control arm connection? just curious.

Overkill The balljoints are riveted in originally so there's no way to know what torque or clamping pressure is required. The socket head screws have a high tensile strength, higher than the equivalent hex head that the bolt bloke stocked.

All the other brake and suspension bolts had a 10.9 rating, but the store didn't stock 10.9s in hex head, only 8.8s, so I went with the socket heads throughout which are rated at 12.0.

Stronger = better!

Weaker = Dangerous!

Pete

[gldgti]

ahh.... i use high tensile in everything i replace.... in the manual it states that upon renewal of the balljoint, the rivets should be replaced with 6mm ??? bolts.... hahaha lots of info there. but honestly, its overkill anyway, they are only ever loaded in shear, and 3x6mm steel bolts in pure shear.... well you know it aint gonna break first.

[Peter Jones]

one question for you how much bigger
are the gti brakes compared to standard?
my wheels only just clear standard ones
but i wouldn't mind something better

They're the same diameter 239mm just thicker - 22mm instead of 10-12mm. I have no problems with 14" MK2 Steel wheels. I have a stock 13 I could try over them to see if it clears ok if you need to know.

I think some of the MK1 GTI s actually had 13" wheels but I'm not sure which brakes went with that.

Pete

[Peter Jones]

ahh.... i use high tensile in everything i replace.... in the manual it states that upon renewal of the balljoint, the rivets should be replaced with 6mm ??? bolts.... hahaha lots of info there. but honestly, its overkill anyway, they are only ever loaded in shear, and 3x6mm steel bolts in pure shear.... well you know it aint gonna break first.

Yeah I was going to use 6mm but the holes in the arm and the joints measured at 7.2mm (??!!) WTF am I supposed to do with that?

Didn't want any risk of slop in there so I just spun an M8 tap through them and bolted them up with the M8 Unbrakos. I reckon I'll tear the arm out of the chassis before these ball joints come off

Pete

[Jarred]

I have gti brakes on mine and it cleared with the stock 13's. I think there may even be a pic of it in my thread. I'm runnig mk 3 steels now, and theres plenty of room. Highly recommended upgrade, esp if you are looking at replacing the origional brakes (due to wear age, ie regular maintainance.