The Cal-look Lounge

I am fabricating everything on this bus myself, if not already using other VW bus body pieces.  Anything that does not exist will get made on my English Wheel or other metal working tools.  This is the largest metal project I have taken on, since I will be making all my own suspension parts as well.  Nothing, other than replacement bearings and things I cannot make, I will fabricate for the bus. Wait until you see the final finished front end, dash, etc.  I am putting a bench seat in the front, and the full rear seat where the middle seat normally resides.  The balance of the area behind the middle seat will be storage area.

This post includes some shots of the new plates I made for narrowing the stock beam.  The plate pictured is actually the template for my pattern cutting machine. I have it hanging on a jig I made from an old bus chassis, so I can set up the plates in the correct location.  The beam will also have adjusters in it.  Still thinking about what spindles to run.  Not sure about welded, dropped spindles.  Thinking about going the route that the Type 2 Detectives developed.  Has anyone on this forum run their spindles with them mounted on top of the arms.  Just concerned about the press and the retaining ring holding up. Would like input from someone who has them on their type 2 bay window.

Rick Mortensen

Hi Rick

I'm running a set of 'turned' spindes on my Early baywondow. I haven't bought them at T2D but at Transorterhaus. Transporterhaus uses the same set-up as T2D but htey are cheaper.
I'm have been running my turned spindles for half a year and haven't had any trouble with them. The fitment was very straight forward.
My frontbeam also has adjusters welded in.
Here are some pictures of the parts.

(http://i566.photobucket.com/albums/ss101/DevinckeWim/DSC09935.jpg)

(http://i566.photobucket.com/albums/ss101/DevinckeWim/DSC09939.jpg)

The bus is riding pretty low right now. Just judge for yourself.

(http://i566.photobucket.com/albums/ss101/DevinckeWim/DSC00925.jpg)

(http://i566.photobucket.com/albums/ss101/DevinckeWim/DSC00916.jpg)

(http://i566.photobucket.com/albums/ss101/DevinckeWim/DSC00920.jpg)

Hope this is what your are looking for.

Wim

Wim,

I love the stance of your bus.  Did you send your spindles and trailing arms to them to have them done? If so, what did the process cost?

Rick M

Hi Rich

Usually they work on an exchange basis, but I didn't have to sent my OG spindles and arms.

Wim

Rick,

Split front panel is a joke, right?

Nope. Not a joke...but it is not the only mod taking place. :-)

RM

Hello Rick,
I'm also driving the dropped spindels from transporterhaus, nice stuff already have 15.000km on them with no problems at all.
(http://i927.photobucket.com/albums/ad112/mychatype3/ddd2011.jpg)
(http://i927.photobucket.com/albums/ad112/mychatype3/IMG_0143.jpg)
Greetz Mycha

I like the idea of running the forged factory spindles without welding them to get the drop.  Will have to look more into the ball joints available here in the US. I have full access to a machine shop to do the mods to the arms, etc.

RM

In my opinion, loading ball-joints like this is against all engineering principles. They may not fail today, or tomorrow, but they will fail prematurely, with what could be catastrophic results. Talking of surviving '15,000km', or 'a year and a half', is nothing in the life of a ball-joint.

Not only are you relying on the whole ball-joint itself not pulling out of the trailing arm, but you are also loading the taper of the ball-joint in such a way that it wants to loosen, relying solely on the fine thread of the nut to keep it together.

VW (and others) designed ball-joints to work one way for a reason. Correctly-made dropped spindles are a better bet, or simply forget this infatuation with 'slamming' everything and use beam adjusters, or raise the whole beam in the chassis if you want to get radical.

Just my opinion, of course, and no suggestion at all that these parts have not been subjected to rigorous pre-manufacture testing meeting the highest safety standards as adopted by major manufacturers around the world... :)

Keith,

My concerns exactly.  The whole idea goes against the grain in terms of loading stresses.  I am putting adjusters in my beam already and still considering the best options.  I ran welded spindles on my teal 67 bug and never had issues.   Most likely I will stick with the adjusters first and see how things sit.

Rick M

Those "slam" spindles scare the hell out of me. Like Keith says, they go against every engineering principle in the book. It's not a case of if they will fail, but when they will fail. Ticking timebomb...
I would love to see what our German friends on here think. Imagine what the TÜV guy would do if he ever came across those on a Bus? I reckon Mein Herr would 'flippen his wiggen' and slap a great 'Nein!' on the ticket...  

Great work by the way Rick!

Thanks for the nice comments All Torque.  I think I am sticking with the adjusters and simply narrowing my beam for now. With the popularity of the bay windows, you'd think someone would be up for making a one piece dropped spindle.

RM

Welded Drop Spindles are the way to go, least then everything is the right way up,

I Run a just over 4" narrowed beam to tuck the welded drop spindles and disc brake conversion inside the wheel arch lip.

P.s. Please say that front panel is a joke?????

Jesus,

Who's welded spindles are you running on your Bay Window?

Rick M

Nate at Wagenswest is the man.

Be very careful with welded spindles. Forged steel needs to be heat treated post welding. Check to see whether your desired brand is correctly treated. I doubt it very much. Welded forgings have all sorts of nasty stresses that can lead to cracks, snaps and total failures.

For the ultimate in scary suspension, can anyone remember those Red Nine Design coilovers that did away with the torsion leaves on a Bus and relied solely on the lower shock mount for the entire Bus weight? If you like to live life on the edge, this would be the way to go...  :o

I always get a kick out of red9, those guys are the best!
Check out the mounting of the lower ball joint on their double A arm suspension for bus.
(http://www.vwnorge.no/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=1110.0;attach=77107;image)
No interference fit... just two m8 bolts (in tension) keeping the bus off the ground.

I ran welded spindles on my 67 bug for years. In fact, they are still on the car and fine after 16 years of use.  Who has actually heard of someone with welded spindles failing?

Rick M

I found mine second hand as not many people produce them, I would much prefer to trust a welded set than a set of flipped the wrong way up ball joints. Call me crazy I know :D

OK, I will. Hello 'crazy I know', how are you? :D

Keith,

In your years of dealing with the hobby, have you heard of or witnessed any welded spindle failures?  the buses easily weigh an additional 1,000lbs over the weight of a bug.  I guess it could be a concern but then again why would Wagenswest or any of the others produce them if the liability was so high?

Rick M

There were some early failures in the UK after a British company made its own, but the design was an accident waiting to happen. Since then (back in the early 90s, or earlier) I've not heard of any failures. I'd feel far happier running them than upside-down ball-joints.

Thanks Keith.  I'm thinking along the same lines.  I know the welded ones work and have run them.  The ones I drove cross country on the Berg Cruise in 1997 were welded.  We drove over all types of roads, including the potholed Detroit roads near Auburn Hills, Michigan.  I've never had an incident with the welded ones.  Will end up running what I know instead of chancing the unfamiliar.  

What I cannot understand is how running ball joints against their designed stress areas was approved by anyone.  I am certain if there were a failure and an accident ensued, some smart attorney would find the root cause of the failure and someone would have to pray their liability insurance was in order.  Even so, the insurance companies could revoke someone's coverage if they found parts were being used against their designed or intended use and it could be a nightmare for the producers of the product.

Good discussion overall and really narrows the choice down.

Rick Mortensen

Rick, you raise a very interesting point on the issue of liability on flipped balljoints. You can bet your bottom dollar the guy who makes the majority of them in the UK would vanish overnight, were there ever to be a serious claim. It would be down to the retailers to take the flak. It's a shame that both the manufacturer and retailer have very little knowledge of engineering and appear to favour profits over public safety. At least in the US your manufacturers have the savvy to put in writing that some products are for 'show' only and not for road use. At least this gives the end user a clue as to the product's engineering integrity. 

Flipped balljoints are a relatively new phenominon in our scene and therefore they aren't too many vehicles on the road that have covered high mileage with them on. I fear that there might come a time where we witness a glut of failures. I hope this not to be the case, but wear and tear suggests that this will be inevitable. Sorry to be a party pooper on your excellent thread, but I feel strongly on this issue and believe people should know about the possible dangers.

I tend to be cautions about product liability issues since being in the construction business for 40+ years.  When we have site accidents, the first thing investigators look at is "was the project built with all the correct safety considerations in mind?"  If you failed to do your due diligence and have not considered all possible threats to the end user, you will end up in court and could lose your business over an oversight.

The US has become such a litigious society (Sue Happy) that people are always trying to retire off someone else's mistakes. So, if in business,  you learn to be proactive about looking at things that could potentially come back to haunt you.

Rick M

I agree they are a bad idea, but the actualy method they use to stop the balljoints coming out of the arms was quite smart.  Until you have to replace the balljoint anyway.   For those not familiar a groove is machined into the OD of the balljoint for a snap ring then a similar groove is machined into ID of the bore in the arm.  The balljoint is then pressed in using a type of piston ring compressor to compress the snap ring.  Then once grooves line up the snap ring pings out and the balljoint is locked into place.

However all of the testing that was reported was just about checking that the balljoint didn't pop out by attempting to press it out in the normal manner(apparently it took over 20tonnes).  Nothing about whether the ball could pop out, stretch or the threads fail