Wonderful work today and that you did a pre measure was really a good way for us to see where we made improvements.
What a disappointment on those bushings from Welsh, scary!
Sorry they didn't show, don't worry we will get there.
Sure are having a lot of looks, you are famous. LOL
Get some rest and do the shock mounts when you can.

 

Just talked with Tyler at Energy Suspensions and no help in finding a spring pad. They are not making anything near the size we need, I'll get the neoprene sheets. Painful and he said, "maybe I should get someone to make it". DUH.
Not once, at any time, did I ask how much it would cost to make what we needed. I did tell him it was for a large group on a Forum.
Kind of let me down, not much entheasum.
Rant over.

 

You guys rock!! Who woulda thought just the shock tops would generate so much discussion (or cussing) for any car.


Maybe I should have put zerk fittings in mine when I rehabbed them last year. But all is good now with no noises or clunks. Hopefully I will never have to do that again, LOL. I have the lowly URO mounts with I guess 2000 miles on them from the last disassemble. Good so far but did not expand at all when I took them off the shock, they remained at about 1/4", just FYI.
In another thread I posted these pics of my car after putting in springs and shocks in the front week before last. Ride height is up (16" + a little) from the droopy thing I had before. I don't like it as much as the lowered look but the camber was not right. New tires on the rear too, the fronts were in good shape and I had already spent enough. I had the right side wheels rehabbed locally since I curbed them and put them on the left seen here. TM

 

Giani,

have you thought about zerk fitting the rollbar bushes ?
we are tracking with great anticipation...heinz 57...

max

 

Wayne,

looks like you will need to quit your job and go into full time production of your mounts.
if I can get the pic copied over; I’m wondering your thoughts on the motorcarltd kit someone else was discussing...

standing by,

max &
XKRFACE

 

wayne...et al,

A computer guy I am not...can’t get the pic to post however it is on a thread posted today.
I have not, previously, seen the kit as an option till today...it does NOT look to be anything close to your efforts in quality.

max

 

...Perhaps ? .. a higher level of awareness (above Tyler) could (should) be reached...

lol..

 

Just made it home and look at what was waiting for me inside the garage!




I’m going to be working on this a bit today but as soon as the sun sets I’m off to do a PowerPoint presentation.

 

Yes I did heavily consider it, however I can’t see a way the zerk would be accesible for the front roll-bar, especially on the left side. The rear roll-bar should be quite easy to reach if a zerk is fitted.

 

Max, I did see the Motorcarltd one in the other thread and yes it's something we need to have a look at.
It was a lot more than I was thinking about, but if it's that good, well, there you go.
Mine in kit form would be about the same items, but I hope to include a spring pad, crud as it might be until I can get a cutter the right size. What I'm doing gets a little hairy.
So much will depend on Gain and he is finally in a position to put what I did in his new front end.
Yeahhhhh, sure got banged up, but all in one piece.

 

Guys, I have hit a snag. Hopefully someone can come up with an idea here.

The inside of the shock bolt is stripped and my Allen key will not grip. Because of this, I can’t get the old shock mount out.


I also can’t seem to find a Torx that would fit. T50 is too small and T55 is too big.

 

As a last resort you may be able to move bump stop down from underside of top mount and grip shaft through coils with Vicegrips then rattlegun nut off.
the shaft at grip point should be outside swept area so any damage shouldn't matter.

 

Yeah, it feels like this is what I will have to do, however, tightening the nut again feels like it would not reach the appropriate torque value doing it with this method. I will attempt finding an appropriately sized Torx. If none can be found, then I will have to resort to this method or buy a couple new shocks. I don't have the budget to buy another pair of CATS shocks, could I buy a pair of non-cats shocks and keep my rear cats with the control module disconnected or am I better off doing a full conversion to non-cats shocks if it comes to that?

 

Wayne...et al,

I found the website and “black dog” kit however I really can’t tell the quality...it does say poly..does anyone know what Welch-ers mounts are made of (material) ?
the kit would allow for modifications to the plates that you have pointed out are cutting thru the rubbers... you still look to be building a superior component.

max

 

A air or battery powered air gun should do it, but what Baxter suggest is the answer if you are using hand tools.
Hate that for you but we all run into something every time. Needle nose vise grips get in a lot of places.

 

Alright, I'll give it a shot with the vice-grips. Another thing I could consider doing is selling a few shares of my stocks and outright buy a set of shocks with that money, financially that's a terrible decision, but then, when were Jag owners known for their good financial sense? Haha

 

Welsh mounts are poly.
Poly is very easy to cast into shape and various levels of hardness/flexibility are possible. The trick is getting that level of hardness right.
I did cast myself a spring isolator and a fully encapsulated shock mount with bonded washer, which should eliminate any chance of movement, for when my mounts failed. Never fitted them since my welsh mounts are still holding up well.

 

Baxter, before I started my quest to see what I could do. I paid attention to what the flexes were on some of the other cars I work on.
The Hyperflex was not only what I used in some other situations but also on BMW's and some nicely set up Autocross cars.
I might be way off, but soon time will tell, do not want to go any softer and a certain amount of flex will keep it in place. OK, my theory. LOL
From what I have observed, that is what went wrong with Welsh, no flex after install from the original position and way to soft. Getting it to move and return back to position was what I was looking for. The test in the vise worked, now lets put a car on top of it.
Go Gain.

 

So, I have four Jag-original shock mounts purchased in the winter to help fix the 'front droop/degradation' on two of mine. I also have a Shore A tester (who doesn't?), used to roughly characterize material stiffness for materials in the range of those used for the 'donut' and interior of the shock mount.

Slowly as usual, over the course of months, I have finally measured the Shore A values for all of them across multiple sites along the periphery, top and bottom. My application, as yours, was to find replacements for the next time since replacing the donut and center (donut hole?) should be a good strategy.

Interestingly, there are clear round Shore A test marks at three points on the bottom of all of them suggesting that is where the properties are best determined since the factory probably did it there. So, the results of my averaging 144 measurements across all of them, the three load surface Shore A values are:

Shore A - Bottom (appears to be virgin foam, also where the factory QC test may have been performed) - 36.4 (range 32-39)
Shore A - Top wide ring (appears to have been in contact with mold walls, appears stiffer than the bottom) - 50.1 (range 47-53)
Shore A - top narrow ring (appears to be even more stiff and not particularly representative of the whole) - 53.2 (range 50-57)

The donut hole appears to be similar to a compressed virgin foam, like the Bottom, but it is essentially impossible to get a measurement without taking the mount apart. Since these are quite pricey, I have elected to not do that.

So, I would guess that the Shore A value for these foams is in the range of 35-40 in bulk with limited apparent creep over 15-30 seconds.

There are a number of promising tougher materials for this application including sorbothane @35-40 Shore A. I think the issue is that we need limited creep on a fairly soft material with substantial damping (energy loss) since the primary role of these materials appears to be high frequency/high velocity short stroke dampening of the large displacement damper below it (i.e. what happens at the very beginning when Gian hits the trailing edge of one of his Puerto Rican-style potholes). Those requirements are somewhat contradictory and the tradeoffs are not apparent to me yet.

Most of the materials I have looked at can be cast, and I will post a drawing of the pristine donut in the next few days to support mold making as an alternative to machining since if one wanted a softer material (around Shore A = 35-50), it would be difficult to machine without using tricks like freezing (which rarely works well because the tool heats up the material as soon as it hits). Soft materials around 80-90A can be machined.

Fascinating project.

 

Good research Dale, we all need to know that on the newer ones.
I do think what I'm dealing with is in the 60A to 70A range after compression. The mounted bell in the vise after the replacement of the Speedway lower bushing showed no movement with the weight of the shock until I grabbed it. The bushings were holding that in place, note the holes in the center are not anywhere near the stem of the shock on any of the systems because of the drain hole.
Some, including the originals could be squeezed with my finger tips, no chance.
Thanks again, we are headed in the right direction.