Racing Green 89 Mini

[94touring]

Yeah that's strange with the rust look discoloration. Are they possibly burnt and have a rust appearance? 

[MiniDave]

I never felt them get hot, and I checked them every time we stopped as we drove home from South Dakota, but they def looked weird. It was odd that the pitting wasn't all the way around the rollers either - it just seemed to be on one side.

At any rate, it's fixed now.....on to the next problem - whatever that turns out to be.

I'm going to drive it later today or tomorrow morning and see if I still hear anything, if I do I'll tear down the right side too.

[MiniDave]

I decided to go ahead and tear down the right side and check the bearings - the good news is they looked fine, and I noticed I used Timken bearings and not Chinesiums......I'll repack these and put them back in - I wasn't hearing any noise but thought if the left side looked that bad I should at least check.

I also found the end of the axle all beat up - no idea how the heck that happened as like on the left side, I know I'm the last one to work on it and I could not have gotten the nut on with the end of the axle damaged like this.

On top of that, another mystery - the cup in the upper control arm is broken on this side too......what in the heck causes that?

So, I guess I'll pull the bonnet back off as it makes it much easier to work on,  plus I have to remove the wiper motor to get to the big ass bolt, and I can't get the spring compressor in there with the bonnet on either.

[MiniDave]

All better now, I did have to remove the bonnet, it just made it worlds easier to get the wiper motor out of the way so I could use the cone compressor.

I was lucky that the remains of the cup came out ok, sometimes those things are really stuck in the control arm. There was a small bit of plastic that had been beaten down thru the little hole in the control arm but I was able to get it out with a set of bent nose pliers. I also greased all the zerks before I put the wheels back on so the front end should be good to go for a long time. Looking at these pics I can see I need to put another turn on the hi low to get it where it was.

Everything went back together smoothly, so all I need to do now is give it a good bath. Our MINI club is meeting for ice cream Saturday evening so I want it looking good for that.

[94touring]

Good deal.