[DML] Door Struts, Ball Studs and Torsion Bars!

["Todd Nelson" <tan5732@xxxxxxx>]

List:

Last year I found out that my lower door strut ball stud mounting points (there must be a shorter name) were bent.  I figured it was 25 years of constant pressure, but I now have a feeling that the PO replaced the struts at some point with longer variants and expedited the process.  So I'm getting ready to install PJ Grady's super duper heavy duty brackets to prevent any further damage but have a few questions.  Does anybody have any experience with these brackets, mainly installing them?  I've talked with Rob about them and they do sound quite involved to install, but I do have both rear quarter panels, the weather stripping, and the headliners removed, so now is probably the best time to do this.  My other question is if my torsion bars are too lax and need to be tightened.  Last summer I loosened the drivers side down one notch because after replacement of the struts it hopped open pretty quick.  They both seem fine now, but when I use the trick of letting the doors just hang with no struts, the doors will touch the striker posts and close.  This leads me to believe that I am relying on the struts too much to open the doors and I might be putting too much stress on the ball stud and not enough on the torsion bar.  This seems rather surprising since I've installed John Hervey's struts which are apparently made to the original specification.  I'm just trying to make sure that all is set up correctly before I do some real damage to the underbody.  For anyone who is interested in what a bent ball stud looks like I've uploaded a picture:

http://www.rit.edu/~tan5732/ball-stud.JPG

You may also notice that there are a few minor fiberglass fractures, this is what really got me concerned about the problem and hopefully Rob's brackets can fix the problem before it gets worse.

Thanks,
Todd Nelson
1561, Vermont
http://www.rit.edu/~tan5732


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]





To address comments privately to the moderating team, please address:
moderators@xxxxxxxxxxx

For more info on the list, tech articles, cars for sale see www.dmcnews.com

To search the archives or view files, log in at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/dmcnews 
Yahoo! Groups Links

<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/dmcnews/

<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
    dmcnews-unsubscribe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
    http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/