Scott, not surprising as the axle is the lower control arm in the rear
suspension on the Spit. Big loads in the corners. You should be ok now. Cheers,
Ed.
"Barr, Scott" <sbarr@mccarty-law.com> wrote: Sorry to bomb the whole list with
this, but for those of you who were in on the Summers Bros. Spitfire axles as
arranged by Ed Barnard...
What have the rest of you done to make sure your yokes stay put on the inner
end of your axles? How often do you check them?
When I originally assemble mine, I used a 1/16h" thick grade 8 washer (edges
ground straight to fit inside the yoke), backed by a smaller lock washer for
the 5/16ths bolt into the end of the axle. Loctited the bolt in place.
While swapping my diff this weekend, I checked the bolt/washer at the inner
ends of the axles which holds the inner yoke to the axles and discovered that
the side forces had pulled the passenger-side washer into a nice cup shape.
There was perhaps .100" of play between the inner collar and the outside of the
yoke. The driver's-side washer was also cupped, but not as badly. Use of
Loctite on the bolt apparently kept the bolt from backing out and allowing the
yoke to part from the axle. The marking paint on the bolt's head showed there
had been no movement there.
As you may recall, Tom Strange had his come apart in Canada Corner at Road
America a couple of years ago. From what we could tell, his washer got pulled
cup-shaped (possibly in a spin in the Kink the previous day). The bolt came out
of his axle and the yoke pulled off of the axle, ending his race at the
track-out of Canada Corner.
In reassembling my axles-yokes, I've backed up the full-width washer (edges
ground down to slide into the slot at the inside of the outer part of the yoke)
with a heavier hardened washer of the same diameter as the axles. More Loctite
and bolt heads drilled for safety wire -- will do that as soon as I come up
with something to safety wire to... This is the same as what Tom did to
reassemble his after it came apart the first time -- no problems since then. I
expect mine will be fine now, too.
Scott
Ed Diehl
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