Now the front wishbones are hanging in position, the front hubs need some attention before fitment.
These were sourced early in the build from Ebay and were in need of a good clean before being re-painted with some black hammerite,
Out with the wire brush attachments on the electric drill and away we go cleaning up the hubs and removing general grim, dirt, surface rust which had accumulated over the years.
The wheel studs will need replacing with longer versions so I intend to apply the same methodology of removal that I did with the rear drive shafts and use a ball joint splitter and liberal doses of WD40 to break the seal between wheel stud and hub.
The time is approaching where I need to give consideration to getting the rear driveshafts fitted onto the chassis, however before fitting, the shafts need some serious TLC having come from a sierra donor. Time to reacquaint myself with one of the first purchases made when I embarked on this fascinating kit car build.
First task was to take a wire brush drill attachment to the shafts and remove as much of the surface rust and grim as possible, this task proved quite rewarding and is worth taking the time and effort to get as good a finish as possible - I was pleasantly surprised at how well the shafts were coming up.
I also want to replace the universal joint rubber gaiters with new ones whilst the shafts are removed from the car so I took a sharp knife to the existing gaiters and stripped those off the driveshaft - promptly releasing grease/oil onto the garage floor as a had forgot the gaiters contain a surprisingly large quantity of lubricant!
next step remove the hubs which fit onto the spline - this was a challenge and required a three legged puller to remove the hub from the spline - remember the nut which holds the hub on has a reverse thread so don't make the rookie error of inadvertently tightening it.
Finally, the present wheel studs are too short for the alloys which I ultimately intend to fit so I took the opportunity to remove those which in turn will be replaced with 47mm studs at a later date. These are extremely difficult to remove and I ultimately found the best tool to do this job was a £9.99 ball joint splitter from machine mart which together with some brute force releases the old stud from the hub.
So the driveshaft was now in a position to be fully degreased and be prep'd ready for some Hammerite paint.
Next stage, fit new rubber gaitors....
Weather has been a bit nippy recently to be spending long amounts of time in the garage during the evening (must get some heating sorted out...), so took the opportunity to continue the refurb of the differential conscious it is going to need fitting into the chassis in the not too distant future.
A couple of evenings work in the kitchen with some silver Hammerite paint and the outside of the differential is looking a lot better than when I first sourced it last year.
Special thanks to Sue for the "loan" of the table!
Took the opportunity to order the differential fitting kit from GBS which although I have the original bolts which came with the differential some fresh ones won't go amiss plus I get the necessary spacers with the kit to centralise it in the chassis, come fitting.
Just need to source a ready volunteer to help manhandle the unit into the chassis, need to put some thought into method and possibly further support to the chassis as its not exactly light in weight
