Ur-Q suspension rehaul...

[audidudi@delphi.com (Jeffrey J. Goggin)]

Well, so far, so shitty ... my Ur-Q certainly looks pretty up top but
underneath, practically every nut and bolt is rusted.  The rotors are rusted
to the hubs; the driveaxles are rusted to the hubs; the balljoints are
rusted to the strut housings; the tie-rods are rusted to the steering arms,
etc.  I had forgotten what it's like to work on cars that have been driven
in snow but after spending 20 hours underneath mine yesterday and today, I
don't think I'm likely to forget it again any time soon!

And as if all that isn't bad enough, while replacing one of the control arm
bushings, I found a crack in the control arm.  Since I'm autocrossing the
car and don't want to take a chance with it breaking in the future, I'm
going to replace it instead of welding it ... the problem is that I can't
get to my spare until Tuesday, which means I'm going to be busy Wednesday
and Thursday nights since I leave for the San Diego Divisional on Friday
afternoon.

And the grand finale, of course, is that when I wasn't able to push the car
back into my storage room/workshop because one of the front corners was
being supported by a floor jack, I decided to lock the center diff and drive
it in instead.  This worked fine, except for my having forgotten to
reinstall the oil cooler line I had removed to get better access to the a/r
bar mounts.  Needless to say, my mood didn't improve much after I had to
spend another 45 minutes cleaning up the resulting puddle of oil...

On the positive side, judging from the condition of the struts and
suspension bushings I replaced -- believe it or not, but the front strut
bearings came out in *several* pieces! -- all the work I've done should
prove worthwhile.  If the car was fun to drive before, it should be even
more fun after I've finished!  :^)
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    / |      _| o    | \       _| o     Jeffrey Goggin
   /__| | | / | | __ |  | | | / | |     audidudi@delphi.com
  /   | |_| \_| |    |_/  |_| \_| |     http://people.delphi.com/audidudi
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