Loose Nuts: Pedro-ized

[Tinster]

Once again I am stumped with a Pedro problem.
I'm chasing/fixing rust in and around the front
suspension system as I rebuild the front end.

I'm on my back under the car and I see a bunch of rust
along the bottom edge of the radiator protection shield
piece. Greens book and Moss show one thru bolt on either
side hold the shield in place. So I decide just remove
it and refurbish it properly. Also, the sway bar is loose
and I need to get inside the shield piece for the u-bolt heads.

Dang it all- DPO Pedro has the radiator shield bolts in
backwards. I'm staring at a locknut and washer that go
round and round. The bolt head seems to be INSIDE the
frame with no access, I can determine. I cannot even
touch it with my finger tips in the frame holes.

I am wondering if Junkyard Joe put the bolt in the
wrong hole. There are three unused holes available.

Anyone offer me a suggestion? Here's the photo behind
the frame.

Always appreciated,

[/img]

 

[TR6oldtimer]

There are two bolts that hold the shield in place. Both are installed with the head inside the frame. They can only be accessed through the front of the frame. This is easy with the body off. However with the body on, you will need to remove the radiator to get to them.

The 'bolt' you indicate as holding the bumper support on, is not a bolt. Looks more like a lag screw and should be replace with appropriate hardware.

 

[Tinster]

Thanks for THAT bit of grim news.

Appreciated (I think)

I guess that means the new bushings I have
for the sway bar cannot be installed without
taking out the radiator either?

I think, given the car is usually a non-driver,
I'll just let sleeping dogs lie and treat the rust
from below.

It took me two entire weekends to change out the
radiator BEFORE I added the aluminum shroud.
I'll not soon repeat a radiator change out.

But thanks for the info for future needs.
THAT is certainly appreciated.

dale

 

[NickMorgan]

Quite right Dale. You need to drive and enjoy Amos for a while. I am sure the rust will still be there for you to sort at a later date! I don't think much of Pedro's choice of fastener!

 

[AweMan]

Just so you know Dale:
You are NOT the only one in the D.P.O. boat. Pedro MUST have lived in the U.S.A. at one time or another or he has relatives here. The reason I believe this is because My Motorhome has also been Pedroised. I have never in my lifetime seen a vehicle with more Half A** repairs than this. The more I look the more I find.
Here is a for instance:
The air ride system. D.P.O. unhooked the airlines to the airbags in order to use the air bag compressor to hook up a cheezy airhorn. When I saw this I just shook my head {as to say no I didn`t see that}. And I was wondering why the air ride system didn`t work! { I didn`t even know it had an air ride system until I was underneath checking the oil in the differental and noticed the air bags but no way to pump them up.
Some People!!

 

[Andrew Mace]

If you need further assurance, Dale....

A friend of mine and I went to look last summer at what turned out to be a 98% original and outstanding 1969 Triumph GT6+. He went ahead and bought it (he'd been looking for a twin to one he'd sold many years ago, and this was it). A year later, it's still a 98% original and beautiful car, but we're discovering some, er, interesting aspects of that other 2%.

Mostly they're little things, but not insignificant. Examples include the wrong nuts holding on the wire wheel adapters; "undercoating" apparently put on by a commercial roofing company, but not terribly thoroughly; and various handbrake and other pivots that appear not to have been apart and/or lubricated since the Carter administration. The last part wouldn't have been so surprising were it not for the fact that all the rest of the rear brakes were new shortly before my friend bought the car: shoes, wheel cylinders, hard lines from cylinders to flexible hoses, and the flexible hoses themselves!

Work that WAS done on the car by or for the previous owner appears to have been done well and correctly...up to a point. Why those last steps weren't taken is beyond me, but that's yet another "joy" of Triumph ownership. /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/wink.gif

 

[John_Mc]

Master Dale,
Having just completed the same job you are doing, I found exactly the same thing, at least as regards that internal hex head bolt hiding inside the frame. It didn't seem to make much sense to me since it looked like the frame was adequately designed to accomodate a bolt all the way through the frame. I went ahead a put a couple of grade 5 bolts through on each side so the heads were accessible on the engine side of the frame. (I didn't refer to any diagram). Seemed to look okay. Any engineer please correct me if I have done something detrimental.
You can see them in this picture:

 

[Tinster]

Thanks John,

Great photo!

To me, the radiator shield appears non-structural;
since there is a frame cross member behind it.

I was going to grind off the locknut and drill thru
the bolt hole to the other side, about where the
hex is in my photo. Then I planned to thru-bolt a
grade #8 on either side of the radiator shield.

Is that the procedure you used? Cut off the locknut
and thru-drill the same location?

Thanks,

Dale

 

[Bugeye58]

Any engineer please correct me if I have done something detrimental.

John, did you put crush tubes inside the frame to keep it from collapsing under the compression forces of the bolts?
Jeff

 

[TR6oldtimer]

Any engineer please correct me if I have done something detrimental.

John, did you put crush tubes inside the frame to keep it from collapsing under the compression forces of the bolts?
Jeff

/bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/iagree.gif

Exactly what came first to my mind.

 

[Tinster]

Ray,

Bentley says to torque to 25 pounds.
That does not seem very high to compress
steel.

I'm in the middle of this "maybe" procedure
and will have decided something by day's end.

I post later today.

dale

 

[TR6oldtimer]

25 ft/lbs torque on a 3/8's bolt may not seem like much. It certainly will not distort the single plate of steel it was intended to pass through. But to bolt through the box frame with out a compression tube, it will pull/distort the unsupported metal in the frame. Also over time because of the lack of a firm anchorage for the bolt and nut to seat upon, there is a good chance that the fitting will work free, not from the nut and bolt loosening, but from the frame contracting. If you look at your frame, everywhere a bolt passes through, it is supported from the inside.

 

[Andrew Mace]

Ray,

Bentley says to torque to 25 pounds.
That does not seem very high to compress
steel....

But, then, it kinda depends on the steel, doesn't it? How thick? Intact or weakened with rust? etc., etc., etc. ... /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/hammer.gif

 

[Tinster]

Hey Ray:

"If you look at your frame, everywhere a bolt passes
through, it is supported from the inside."

Wanna bet on that?? Now that's a good chuckle for
the day. My car's been Pedro-ized, remember?

I'm still finding metric fasteners or best of all
missing or no fasteners at all. Two bolts holding
the tranny to the engine- cool!! One bolt holding
the rear bumper.

I,m still pondering a solution.

d /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/wall.gif

 

[startech47]

You can drill out the hole further from the original hole in order for the stiffening tube to pass through. Kind of like a super shoulder bolt. This will prevent the frame from being distorted.

 

[John_Mc]

There are two bolts that hold the shield in place. Both are installed with the head inside the frame. They can only be accessed through the front of the frame. This is easy with the body off. However with the body on, you will need to remove the radiator to get to them.

I was able to get those off without removal of the radiator, but it was quite akward, which is why I couldn't understand why they hadn't just put the bolts all the way through the frame for easy access. Now I understand why. Maybe I'll try putting spacers (stiffening tubes) in there for strength. Not that I want to distort any part of my car, but would it make that much difference if these bolts did slightly bend the metal? We're so far forward here that we're beyond any frame structural strength issues (or are we?). True, we don't want stuff coming loose and falling off the car, but...?

 

[Tinster]

Please end this thread.

thanks,

dale

 

[Tinster]

Please end this thread.

thanks,

dale

 

[Brosky]

I take it that you've made your decision. If not, shut off the computer until whatever you decide is done.

 

[Brosky]

This was not meant to be a negative reply, only that if you stare at many options long enough, the decision becomes harder to make.