OTish: Turning circles

My n/s/f went when turning right? I used the scissor jack to push the (remains of) the trunnion thread back up into it's socket, gave it a thump a few times to push it in further then make a Spanish windlass with some rope I carried and a screwdriver, pulling the track controll arm onto the damper arm sufficiently tightly to be able to drive the mile or so home. ;-(

I think it's a tossup between it failing due to the increased load (braking or turing in the opposite direction) and unscreweing the last remnants of thread.

Depending on which way you were turning of course. ;-)

Quite, and mobile disco days ... ;-)

My 1098 (Ex BT) van would do 70mph and return 50 mpg (but not necessiraly both at the same time). ;-) [1]

Cheers, T i m

The *reason* I was done was down to the 'Construction and use act' where they determined my Van was constructed as a 'Goods Vehicle' (even though it was taxed and insured as a Private vehicle and MOT's not plated etc). Had it had two side windows behind the drivers position of at least two square feet (along with the two rear windows of at least 100 square inches) I would have been good to 70 mph as it would have been classified as a 'Multi-purpose vehicle'. (or summat) ;-)

I had three, and two spitfires

Mere hearsay. Tru Ackerman is impossible anyway with a pure mechanical linkage

For sure at full lock the wheels were at such an angle you were likely to scrub the tyres badly if at any speed.

You are very stupid,. I have worked on that car suspension more than any other.

Of COURSE there was a kingpin. It was THREADED. Ball joint at the top, trunnion at the bottom and in between the kingpin carrying the axle assembly

The kingpin is the part of part 9 that screws into the lower trunnion part 53.

Very prone to shear if you didn't grease the joint.

I snapped a kingpin, fortunately doing 15 mph

I did have a Granada steering link fail when the rack screw threads rusted badly, about 3 years old.

Wasn't there once an advert showing the only way to get a turning circle in a VW Golf - strap it to the roof of a Volvo 240.

I had a couple of 240s, and they certainly had a good turning circle, but the degree of tyre scrub could only be fully appreciated if you tried it on gravel. ;-)

Chris

Best way is a handbrake turn

Daughters boyfriend managed to roll a convertible Herald completely over and both walked away from it without a scratch, no seat belts. Downhill S bend and young driver combination!

A king pin is a pin, a rod, usually of steel, pressed into an axle beam where the hub swivels to allow for steering.

As your link suggests, there is no pin, but an upper and lower joint attached to upper and lower wishbones.

Just in case you haven't seen a king-pin, or getting them confused with twin wishbone suspension:

My Dad ran a business and had a Bedford Van, which he used as his personal vehicle. He had side windows added in the rear part, and also added some bench seats along the sides, the combination apparently maintaining it in one lower tax class than another, or something. I think it came with windows in the rear doors.

Before the days of H&S, we had deck chairs in the back of the van. Built-in seat suspension.

That van towed our caravan as far as Zurich and back, and this was in the 1960s. Only later, when I started to tow cars around on a trailer behind the Herald, did I appreciate what that trip must have been like for the driver.

Similar when seeing an antiroll bar for the first time and finding out it's supposed to twist in use. ;-)

When it works they are pretty good, no moving parts etc. Not so go (on the MM) when they get in the way of the brake master cylinder bolts. ;-(

Cheers, T i m

ICBW but I understood that if it had been bought with seats and windows then purchase Tax would have been paid , A Van did not attract that or possibly a lower amount , doing a conversion on a reasonably new vehicle may have meant that some tax should have been paid. My dad did a similar thing turning a 1958 100E Ford Anglia Van into the estate version which if it had been a purchased version would have been called an Escort. He was always very cagey about driving it into town from our country home as he always had a worry that some copper would notice somehow and get him reported. The cut outs from the windows were still in his shed on a shelf when I did a Post Mortem clearout 4 years ago.

G.Harman

No, it isn't.

Its simply a name for whatever it is that allows a steered wheel to rotate about the vertical axis

The upper and lower joint form the kingpin

FFS its you who are confused.

I can't ask him now, but there was some good financial reason that it had to have the windows and the seats installed at the same time, presumably turning it into what is now called a people-carrier.

No confusion, just confusion on your part, believing a double wishbone has a "kingpin".

It hads a virtual kingpin.

And in te manuals that piece of threading on a herald was referred to as a kingpin

You're entitled to call anything you like kingpin, it certainly has a more colloquial meaning. The name is certainly leant to a suspension geometry such as kingpin inclination but the origin of the name is based in history of decades ago.

But regards the Herald and naming conventions, even your link:

You should note that in the referring page:

Number 5 is a "Top ball joint" and Number 53 is a "Trunnion brass RH & LH"

Nowhere is "kingpin" mentioned.

As others have noted the trunnion used to seize and shear. I have also known them to fail MOTs for too much play.

;-)

Yes, if you converted a van into a multi-purpose-vehicle you were potentially avoided paying the duty that would have been payable on a non-goods vehicle but I think it was a sliding scale over about 7 years or so. e.g. If the van was older than 7 years the chances are you would pay nothing extra.

I don't think you could carry passengers in the rear if there weren't suitable (fixed) seating (although that wasn't very specific at the time) and I believe you also need the side windows.

You also had to notify your insurance company of course, both about the 'modifications' and the number of extra people you intended to carry.

This was all easier with a 'car derived van' (like Fiesta) because all the bits (mountings) were there for seats etc, as opposed to something like a Morris Minor van that (I believe) only shared the front of the car version. ;-)

When we built the MkII Escort based Kitcar the original kit we happened to buy was in the format of a van so we had to cut the rear panels out and supply and fit the glass and there was a factory optional rear seat that we purchased. Because it was 'mostly' built (or most of the main components) from a single donor vehicle I only need to get it MOT'd (not SVA'd), I could keep the original registration and I just gets seen as a 're bodied vehicle'.

Cheers, T i m

IME MOT trunnion failures are very dubious. Very few testers can define what is too much play. It used to be a good little money earner!

It's the higher CofG when there is a load on the roof which makes it lean out when lapping mini-roundabouts at speed :)