[DML] Re: Door Adjustments

["Walter Coe" <Whalt@xxxx>]

> When you finaly do replace the struts then you will REALLY see
> "bounce"!!!! BTW not all struts from all venders are equal.

I have old Lift-O-Mat struts on my doors that are stronger than new PJ Grady
struts. I'm not saying that the Grady struts are weak because with no strut
at all my doors rest closed. According to conventional door adjustment
dogma, my torsion bars need to be adjusted up. My only complaint with these
struts is having to hold the door from bouncing open. They were on the car
before I owned it, so I have no idea how old they are (more than 2 years
anyway). Does anyone know which vendor sells this brand?

> Another little tip is to
> cut a small piece of rubber from an inner tube and stick it between
> the rear hinge and where the torsion bar passes by so it cannot get
> scratched. when adjusting torsion bars they can move around and touch
> the hinge, if scratched then the bar will fail.

Amen brother. On some cars the torsion bar rubs the hinge under normal use.
In this case what has happened is the epoxy has broke loose on the
fiberglass underbody allowing the torsion bars to twist & lift the metal
bracket that they attach to. The tension of both bars working together
tends to bow the bracket bringing the bars closer together. Hence, they now
rub on the hinge. Also this will raise the T-panel and make the bracket
creak as you move the doors.

To test if this has happened on your car, grab the torsion bar with your
finger and pluck it like a string. If you hear it click on the hinge when
you let go, then you have a serious problem developing. Now that I fixed
the bracket on my car (See Dave Swingle's article in the DML tech section)
the torsion bars no longer rub. They were just beginning to show a polished
spot from the hinges. David T's fix is always good insurance. On my car I
used a small sheet of teflon. It wore quite heavily before I fixed the
bracket.

Walt ("It's not heat, it's the humility." -- Tucker)