Wishbone Seam Welding??

[Craig!]

Just thought I'd ask before jumping in and doing it, at the moment the Cupra's wishbones are currently spot welded together in all the places marked with a red dot on this picture;

There is around 30mm's gap between each spot weld, now I was thinking where the two plates meet, welding a few 15mm lines in between the dot's. Now I'm not going to run one complete weld due to the risk of warping the wishbone, however closing up some of the gap's with weld should surley reduce some flex.

Has anyone got anything to say before I do this, reccomended or not? Any different methods that I should use? Currently I'll be using a MIG welder on it.

Any help, opinions and advice is much appreciated!

 

[WeeJase]

i seem to remember dub sport selling similar for mk2 golfs.poly bushed and seam welded

 

[Craig!]

Aye well as you can see already fitted the poly bushes just need to know how far I need to go with the welding, a few strips or as many as possible etc. Should offer some gains no matter how small, and may aswell do it now whilst the car's in bits!!

 

[RobT]

how do you know they flex ? - personally I wouldn't bother especially given your not running rose joints - when my ibiza was on narow track and harder polybushes than you (the black compound) and slicks it seemed ok

but there are people who do this so maybe it is of benefit

have you tried to fit em to the car yet ? the rear bush was a total pig to fit on my car as the captive nut up in the subframe was slightly off center and given the hole in the middle of these bushes is smaller than originals (which are slack), the bolt wouldnot go in....thought I'd stripped it at one stage and that would have been an absolute pig to sort out

 

[Craig!]

Not tried to fit them yet, was worried about the hole sizes differing and in general polybushes are a pain to re-fit. With the engine bed out I will no doubt fit it to them prior to lifting the bed back up.

Did you have to do anything to the bushes you got due to the bolt hole sizes or was it just luck that it went back in?

 

[RobT]

lots of filing to get em to fit inside the metal ridge U shape in the subframe - filed the bush not the subframe - took a whole day of swearing as I didn't want em slack

 

[Craig!]

So you just filed the inside of the metal insert till it went in? Thanks for the head's up can see I'm going to have fun putting it back together.

 

[RobT]

filed the outside of the metal insert till it went in - on one side only

its the fault of the car not the bush, if the nut had been central then its a 10min job, you may be fine

second time round when I went widetrack, used vibratechnics rear bush and this went in no probs as the central hole is slightly bigger a-la-standard bush

cheap upgrade is to use TT rear bushes - harder std bush

 

[m0rk]

The MK SEAT Rally car used to bend wishbones when stuff got hit, the seamwelded some up, and that stopped the bending (but probably moved it to somewhere else)

 

[RobT]

personally I'd rather bend a £20 wishbone than the chassis

 

[ganda_cupra]

Fitted my wishbone polybushes last month, they are a bit of a pig though.

If you prybar the subframe open slightly where the rear bush goes in it makes it alot easier, don't worry about prying it open as when the bolt is torqued up it pulls it tight again. I found this out after I'd already done one side as one of other lads at work told me above, the other side was so much easier.

Also the rear bush bolt goes in easier when the weight is taken off the strut, at work I used a 2 post ramp to do them and used a huge axle stand (1.7m high) on the bottom of disc and lowered ramp, making sure strut stayed central. Then using prybar/screwdriver tap metal centre of bush and it flicks into locators then put bolt in and nip it up. Raise ramp then put balljoint back in bottom of the hub.

If you need any more help PM me.

 

[Craig!]

Fortunatly my car's in many more bits (see the Overhaul thread) this should make life easier in places. Thanks for your help Rob & Ganda, if need be I'll PM you but hopefully things will go straight forward... I wish, LOL!

Rob, you have got a point about it mosing the stress to another locations, however I'm only thinking of running a few welds bewtween the biggest gaps so I'm hoping it won't be too stiff.

Just wondered if my method would be correct, running a few lines of welds down the V shaped gap where the two plates meet.

 

[Fl@pper]

Just wondered if my method would be correct, running a few lines of welds down the V shaped gap where the two plates meet.

was thinking the same

but im with rob - unless you strengthen the frame/chassis id rathe bend the arm

needs a shear point at least

 

[m0rk]

for sure... it was an application rather than a suggestion!

 

[Craig!]

So that's settles then, don't bother.