Bent trailing arm

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May 26, 2011 | 12:13 AM

SoCal73

Thread Starter

Intermediate

Joined: Mar 2011

Posts: 29

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From: San Marcos Ca

Bent trailing arm

I have a LH trailing arm bent. Not sure how to proceed with the repair/replacement. I have purchased a new, made in usa trailing arm with bushing. I was wondering if a good alignment shop would do a rebuild with usable parts type of job. The few people I've called in North County San Diego don't do that kind of work. It seems maybe a bit more than I want to deal on my own. I am considering buying a complete online but i wanted to sound it off of some people that have been there don that.

Thanks!

May 26, 2011 | 09:40 PM

terry82

Le Mans Master

Joined: Jul 2000

Posts: 6,664

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From: columbia city in

you will have to buy a couple of tools to do this job .some say its not hard .but for me i will do this job once .i bought them ready to bolt in ready to go .i was happy with just bolting them in and taking it to a shop for the alignment.i bought my parts fromhttp://www.muskegonbrake.com/v4/go.g...e&cat_id=10984and was happy with there parts and service .

May 26, 2011 | 09:44 PM

Gordonm

Race Director

Joined: Dec 1999

Posts: 19,610

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From: Forked River NJ

Actually if yo uare going to use the same bearing housing and parts from it and use the same bearings you can just swap the parts over. No need to reset the clearance as you are just changing out the trailing arm not all the bearing stuff. You might want to clean it all up and put in new grease but if they have been rebuilt in the last few thousand miles and the bearings look good you can reuse them. Most of the time the wear comes from the grease just going south and the bearings running dry and they seize. If the bearings are good just reuse them. How many sets of front bearings are just cleaned and regreased after a brake job.

May 26, 2011 | 09:44 PM

TopHat

Intermediate

Joined: Nov 2009

Posts: 37

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From: Greenfield Indiana

I had the same problem but it was the passenger side that was bent on mine. I went to van steel and ordered new ones, I did a little checking around and it seemed trying to fix the old one was going to be too much hassle.

May 27, 2011 | 11:11 AM

Easy Mike

Team Owner

Joined: Jun 2000

Posts: 38,923

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From: Southbound

Cruise-In II Veteran

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gordonm

...you can just swap the parts over....

Bundle and mark the shim stacks before removing the bent trailing arm. They reinstall in the same position.

Last edited by Easy Mike; May 28, 2011 at 11:07 AM.

May 27, 2011 | 11:34 AM

Rally68

Burning Brakes

Joined: Sep 2008

Posts: 805

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From: Naperville Illinois

Here's a recent post with a good picture. You can get in behind the spindle face and remove the nuts from the 4 studs in the trailing arm, then you can transfer the bearing carrier, caliper bracket, shield, parking brake assembly and spindle to the new trailing arm as a unit.

http://forums.corvetteforum.com/c3-t...iling-arm.html

May 28, 2011 | 01:16 PM

SoCal73

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Joined: Mar 2011

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From: San Marcos Ca

Great advice

Thanks for all the good advice I am going to attempt the swap. I have taken the spring loose and removed the brake line and e brake line. I have the shock mount nut off and the pivot bolt loose within a few turns. I need to get the 4 bolts loose but they have a keeper of some sort. Looks like it needs to be pounded flat to access the bolt heads. So far so good, not a small project but not too bad. Thick smell of penetrating oil around here!! Lots of small victories that's for sure! Having an excellent memorial weekend for sure! I need a bigger workspace

May 31, 2011 | 08:41 PM

SoCal73

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Joined: Mar 2011

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From: San Marcos Ca

Complete!

Trailing arm reinstalled and not nearly as bad as I was expecting.
Drove to J&D Corvette in Bellflower on Saturday. Those guys are great!!
Purchased a rebuilt and on my way home. Took me about 2 hrs to get it all back together. 30 mins being spent on the pivot bolt of course DAMN that thing. I have to reconnect the leaf spring as I left a bushing retainer on the old trailing arm. They are mailing it to me. Cheers to those guys @ J&D Corvettes and thanks to this killer forum for all the great help!