Morris Minor Owners Club

Hi Guys

I have aquired an escort axle casing and halfshafts from another axle (I left the diff because it was siezed solid )

Its already been modified to have anti tramp bars (the sort with 2 bars on each side). In order to fit it im planning on doing quite a lot of fabrication. I think im going to have to mount the anti tramp bars through the box section under the rear seats, and im anticipating having the front mounts just inside the passenger section so I can actually take the things off without having to cut the box section up (again). I am planning to put "channels" inside the big box section for the tramp bars to run in.

Next I am planning too fit coil overs on the rear, to do this I think I will have to put turrets in the rear floor these will be obviously welded in to the floor pan with spreader plates etc and box sections above and below the floor connecting the 2 turrets. I am going to keep at least the top leaf for axle location, and will decide how many of the others I want to keep when its all uptogether

(I am also anticipating junking the front suspension and sorting something a bit more modern shortly)

What do people think?? Have I missed anything obvious? BTW this is a fast road car, at the moment its got a 90hp engine but im not anticipating that that will stay in forever and I would rather get the suspension and brakes up to scratch before putting something more powerful in!

Are the tramp bars parallel to the springs - or angled ? Either way - seriously consider a Panhard rod or even a Watts linkage to keep the axle in check across the car. Note the rear floor is horribly weak - you will need to tie into the 'chassis' members and the rear seat diaphragm to get any strength.

Tramp bars don't exist yet, only the mounts on the axle ;)

There will be a lot of metal work going on to make sure the mounts etc are strong enough and more than sufficiently tied to structural parts of the car

Aye - but the point i'm making is that tramp bars are just that - what you really need is axle location arms - the single leaf springs will do very little indeed for axle location.

Dont worry BMC, plans are afoot, just havent decided how im going to deal with it yet

My TR7 has very heavy duty parallel arms AND angled arms (with coils and teledampers) - but Panhard rod is also fitted for any competion use, although for road use the axle location feels fine to me!

one option is to fit the parrallel arms to a strong bracket and make that bolt on to the car. This allows you to get at the arms when needed without having to completely redesign the car for access points.
The mounting for the rods/bracket will need to be pretty substantial though!

If you fit wishbones instead of single arms to the mountings on the axle, this could sort your axle location in one go.
However as BM already mentioned - competition use is likely to lead to fitting a panhard as well. If the panhard is done well, it will help against the torque reaction to the live axle.

why not have a close ook at eh stuff john beardmore did to his van? there are loads of photos.
cheers,michael.

coil overs with 5 link is the way to go in my opinion.

ie; panhard rod for location and 2 link rods each side one above each other.

When I do it I will prob buy an escort kit off ebay for about £120 and make it fit. I already have an esc axle though (fitted).

If you are confident with a welder I can't see any problem putting the link boxes in and any strengtheners needed.

Good luck and I will watch this space.