clonk.. moving ital axle problem

[Jam Mad]

hmmm.. help needed please. toward the end of a recent trip i noticed every now and again a clonk from the rear of the car. nothing that upset the handling really, but every now and then in a hard corner.. clonk !

 

i have just been in the garage and have found the following, but don't know what to do next. i had loosened the nearside rear wheel nuts and it disappeared. tightening them up again, it was back. so i jacked the car up and grabbed the wheel. it moved in and out by a couple of centimetres, with the same clonk. off came the wheel, and i grabbed the drum brake. it didn't move, until i grabbed the outer drum, which clonked. off came the drum, and i saw the problem... i'm not sure what to call the particular part of the assembly, but the part of the axle that attaches to the drum can be moved easily in and out by 1-2 cm with a clonk.

 

help !!! what do i do ? any ideas ? i'm in two minds as to whether it is a simple matter of tightening something, or if it's a serious job of opening up the diff.

 

cheers all,

 

j

 

ps car for sale too, so will of course be sorted before anyone acquires it. i intend to be above board with the chap coming to see it tomorrow. cheers, j

[Graham Sewell]

This sounds like the old migrating bearing problem which is normally fixed with shims to stop the bearing moving along the axle tube. Talk to Caterham Midlands or Ratrace (who did mine). Also search the archives as this is a common problem.

 

Low tech luddite - xflow and proud!

[Violet Elizabeth]

Sounds like the classic symptoms of "live axle clunk" to me James !

 

James Whiting once explained it to me, but i won't insult the techies by trying to repeat it, but the the gist was "it's the way the thingy was made, being pressed onto another thingy rather than firmly fixed so they all do that at some time or another".

 

Shims or tack welding appear to be the answer. SPC axles used to come pre-tacked welded (i have one and it never clunks) but seem to remember there being some debate here as to whether or not this was a good thing. Think this answers was no, and shims being best.

 

My original SPC axle clunked, hence the JW discussion, and the suggestion was that it was not too bad a thing. Not good if you are trying to sell the car though.