I have the transmission out, and I'd like to complete removal of the trailing arms.

Is it realistic to complete removal and disassembly of the arms the way the car is now... or will I have to put the transmission back in to remove the stub axles, etc?

-Rusty

Long as the parking brakes work to lock the rear hubs from turning, its fine. Pull everything apart Dirk! You will find more to fix as you go.....
Geoff

No... sadly, they don't. P-brakes are disconnected.

Guess I wait on the rear suspension and axles until I get the flywheel, clutch stuff, ect done. Or, maybe I try and hook up the p-brakes. I don't have much else to do in the meantime.

-Rusty

I removed my trailing arms and took them to Brad's shop at the time. We used an air impact gun to remove the axle nuts. I believe I mounted a wheel to the control arm but I don't recall what else I did to brace it. Couldn't have been much more elaborate than wedge it in a corner and hit it with the air gun.

And these axle nuts were pretty well frozen on. I couldn't remove them on my own when the trailing arms were installed because the car was too light and I don't have air at home (something I must remedy one of these days).

Just my limited experience.

I just did this last weekend....I drilled two holes in a 3 foot long 1.5x1.5 angle iron and bolted it to hub (brake rotor removed)

The angle iron prevented the hub from spinning while I cranked on the big nut....no air tools, just lot's of grunting

Hey, go ahead and re-create scenes from Deliverance if you want to I'm too big a wuss.

I do something similar to what Mike M. described. I use a long bar between two of the wheel studs (or lug bolts), extended to a block of wood on the ground to prevent the hub from turning. I use my half inch breaker bar with a 30mm socket and a piece of pipe for an extension on the handle. Then I stand on the handle to loosen the nut while hanging on to the QP. I think the factory spec is 200 ft/lbs, but if they haven''t been off in a long while it might take more like 300 ft/lbs to loosen them. No brakes required, piece of cake.

I pulled the arms complete with rotors and axles and disasembled them on my workbench with just handtools and a breakerbar...
Still need to remove the shafts and the hub though. Will take the arm to a friend with a press for that

cheers,

Jeroen

Anyone still using WD40?

Haven't used WD40 for quite some time...

Used enuf stuff last night to give me a good buzz though:
Ospho (rust neutralizer), degreaser, paint-thinner, zinc-primer from a rattlecan, nice fumes and dust from grinding (3 disks worth) and then some welding fumes.

Only thing missing was some brake-cleaner to top it off

cheers,

Jeroen

Who ever said that old cars are not an "addictive" hobby? Let's go get a WD40 (or a Heineken if you prefer)!

I gotta go buy more brake cleaner (about a case) and some more penetrant over lunch today. I ran out soaking the heat exchanger hardware and the trailing arm bolts. Now I've got to start soaking all the front suspension stuff, too.

-Rusty

Good luck you guys with trailer arm and shaft removal.

Heating things up with a welding flame (not too hot of course) also helps sometimes. Not to be used on bearings though.

I tried burning the rubbers on the rear arm, like I did with the front arms
Lotsa nasty fumes, but no luck... next stop is a press

What are you going to use for replacement of the rubber bushings?

cheers,

Jeroen

Jeroen, a press works wonders for removing the rear trailing arm shafts.

What are you going to run on your car??

If the p-brake doesn't work use Chris's method to remove the axle nuts. Use lots of knock loose spray before hand and have a piece of pipe to extend the breaker bar to get better leverage. They come right off if you can stop them from spinning. I used a 4' piece of pipe to remove the rusted ones on the rusted 70 ones, came right off with a little grunting.
If you are suffering from DWD disease might as well take all of the rear apart and refresh it. How old are the rear bearings? New rear bearings are nice.

Geoff

Well, IF it ever gets running, it'll be on those rollerbearing thingies that some guy here on the BBS sells

cheers,

Jeroen

Unfortunately, I've decided to go with Weltmeister street compound bushings. With everything else that I'm going to have to pay for, my pockets aren't that deep this year.

-Rusty

Hey Lawrence,

I know just what you're talking about

When you go with the poly bushings, make sure you read up on some of the installation tips here on the BBS (specially about the rears! )

thread 1
thread 2

do some more searching and you'll find more good tips...

cheers,

Jeroen