

| Subject: | Radius Rod (strut) Newbs: Clean First! |
| From: | neil n |
| Date: | Sun, 9 Sep 2012 11:10:50 -0700 |
Hi all. Am enjoying my foray into the newer style front end. Well, mostly enjoying. ;^) Last night, with a tired but determined mind, I made slow progress getting the radius rod outer nut off. It doesn't have far to travel but combine that lock nut with thread crud and a long wrench, it felt like it might snap! Cleaning the large portion of threads is obvious, but take a minute to clean the threads at rod end BEFORE turning that nut. Was using penetrating fluid, and turning the nut back may have helped, (as it did with the inner nut) but a minute with a wire wheel likely made the bigger difference. The older style radius rod also has these big nuts but of note, take the time to clean the threads at the lower 3 bolt threads. Image, new nuts installed: https://sites.google.com/site/tubaneil2/RadiusArmNuts.jpg Those nuts are also lock nuts. Turn each a bit at a time. You REALLY don't want this: (image of my '81 radius rod nuts): https://sites.google.com/site/tubaneil2/RadiusArmSnappedBolt.jpg Neil. -- Neil n 65 kb image Myford Ready For Assembly http://tinyurl.com/64sx4rp '88 Slate Blue Westy to be named. '81 VanaJetta 2.0 "Jaco" http://tubaneil.googlepages.com/ Vanagon VAG Gas I4/VR Swap Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/vanagons-with-vw-inline-4-cylinder-gas-engines
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