Manx Club

With the stock front torsion springs my suspension is topped out in the front. If I sit on the bumper I can get it to go down and inch or so. Obviously this is because the buggy is lighter than a bug. I heard that Bruce recommended removing springs from the front. This is for a king pin front end. There are full and half springs. How many and which ones?

My first recommendation before deleting any torsion bars would be to make sure the spring packs are thoroughly lubed. We had a ball joint front end that was as stiff as could be. After lubing it, it loosened up over a few months (it took time to get the lube between each of the bars. You could R & R each one to lube them by hand to make things go quicker). Once it was lubed, it moved much smoother and with much less force. Also, if you are using any gas charged shocks, that may be contributing to its stiffness. Bruce recommends only using inexpensive oil filled, non-gas charged shocks on the front.

No gas shocks. I don't know if removing a half spring from each tube would do it or a whole one. Or from just the upper or lower tube only. It's a little bit of work so I was looking to take advantage of any experience out there. Just a basic buggy in the front. With just the strength of my legs, I can lift the front end off the ground.

I have seen online, and thought about doing this to mine. Remove one set of springs, choose a whole width spring and cut 1 inch from middle so you have 3 pieces. put the 3 pieces back in the pack and reassemble. Your spring pack is still the full pack and can be locked in place. The cut spring is just a place holder,
not a spring.
I haven't done this yet, My front has a "select a drop" adjustment, I have one adjusted all the out and the other all the way in. so one spring is slack till the the suspension moves far enough.

hope this helps

Yes, thank you. I didn't want to weld in the adjusters, so I opted to remove 2 springs from the top tube. putting is back together now. hope it works out.

How do you plan on using your buggy? If you are going to be mostly street, then cutting one of the torsion springs might work out just fine. If you are going to be off-road for a significant amount of time, you may want to leave it a bit stiff. Ours seems stiff when parked and putting weight on the front end, but when we are off-road, if we hit a rut or rock at speed, the front tire will still push up into the wheel well enough to contact the bottom side fiberglass. Keep in mind that tire pressure has a huge amount to do with how hard or soft the ride is.

I am having the same problem with my front axle. I have a '69 ball joint axle that was all rebuilt by the PO. Urethane bushings and he also replaced the spring packs. I know that because he gave me all the old parts from when he did the work.

The problem is the torsion arms are pointing down when sitting on the ground. When I jump on the front axle it will not move at all.( the body is off the car as I am building a Manxter 2+2.)
If I jack up the front under one shock mount I can raise both wheels off the ground and there is no movement in the suspension.

Where do I start?

Thanks, Brian

New ball joints tend to be pretty stiff and vary depending on the brand. The Fibi-Bilsteins tend to be the best and they still are a little stiff new. It usually takes a little use to loosen them up. You can check the stiffness by jacking up the car and seeing how well the car will steer.

Your trailing arms can also be binding on the urethane bushings. There are better bushings that can be reamed to fit you trailing arms and not bind.
https://www.kartek.com/parts/saco-ball- ... axles.html

Thanks for the suggestion. I will try the steering experiment. I will also check the orientation of the ball joints as I note they are supposed to have notches pointing front and back.

Brian

OK...
Jacked up the front end and the steering is a little tight it did not bind at all. the steering box is a new TRW unit, thanks PO.
I looked at the shocks and they seemed to be at full extension. I removed them, KYB Gas shocks, New. I tried the bounce test and I can get it to move several inches. At rest the torsion arms are not parallel to the floor like stock but they are better. I think I will try this setup before going into the actual leaf spring area. Now to get , as Bruce Meyers suggests, cheap soft shocks. Anybody want to buy some new KYB Shocks?

Thanks, Brian

When we changed out the front beam on a ball joint front end, we initially went with the poly bushings. The front end was bound so tight, it would jar your teeth when driving. Finally removed them and went back to the stock style mica bushings. Moves freely now with no issues. I learned later that the poly bushings need to be turned/shaved down a bit to fit right. As I don't have anything to do that, or know anyone that can do it, we stuck with the mica bushings and won't go back (I hate any poly parts anyway).

By removing the KYB gas shocks from the front I was able to get the thing to bounce normally. However, it is still riding high though.
What would happen if I backed out the center hex screw on one of the beams releasing the spring leaves?

papya wrote:By removing the KYB gas shocks from the front I was able to get the thing to bounce normally. However, it is still riding high though.
What would happen if I backed out the center hex screw on one of the beams releasing the spring leaves?

The "Grub Screw" keeps the the spring pack centered in the tubes, The internal center and the spring pack are both square so it still will not allow the spring pack to rotate.