Last minute panic bodging today.....
Loaded up, with the two of us fat bastards jumping up and down on the rig, we decided that the shock wasn't up to spec.
Armed with three or four old shocks from the cellar and various 'odds and sods' bins, we got out the whirry sharp tools and started playing
That's the unit we settled on, with a progressive spring on it
The bottom mounting point would have to move back a few inches. The suspension tower would have to be strengthened up as well...we didn't like the 'feel' of the look of the top part, it just 'felt' like the weak spot IYKWIM
Before the new piggyback swingarm went on (we like making up new engineering terms
)
Out come the choppy uppers
The bit of angle iron going across the 'swing arm' is going to be to glue the piggyback swingarm to.
You can also see the cleaned surface of the spacer between the two swing arm plates here
Offering it all up and prior to strengthening fillet/paint
Then a strengthening fillet at the top of the suspension turret, and if you look at the end of the new piggyback swingarm, you'll see we cut a v in that, bent it up half an inch with our impact adjuster (XL) and welded it back up.
That was all to add an extra half inch or so of preload to the spring.
Back on with the mudguard and it all looks pretty good (well, we think so
)
Out she goes, and we run it around the yard a bit with the fattest bloke on site (That'll be me then
) jumping up and down on the sidecar floor to do a proper scientific controlled measurement of all the exact suspension parameters that are crucial in setting up a sidecar for a trip to the Elefant next week.....
feels good
yup that's ok too
fuckit, it's fine, let's get the kettle on
.