Reinforcing the rear toe arm...thoughts?

[eraezer]

Hello,
due to our cars age and IJ accident I have decided to reinforce my toe arms.

The idea is to wrap it in 1mm steel according to the pictures.
It will reach about 10cm from the bushing housing.

It will look like this, but on both sides: (dimensions are not correct this is just to get an idea)

Sooo....any thoughts?

 

[IJ.]

I was thinking more a pair of flat plates with holes cut in them so they're welded 360 degrees around the eye extending forward either side of the tube for 150mm so the form a H beam with the tube as the cross beam of the H.

 

[eraezer]

how thick do you think that would need to be? is 1mm enough?

 

[IJ.]

I'd use at least 2mm maybe even 3mm.

The stock tubes are quite heavy wall so you want close to that thickness.

 

[eraezer]

the thing is that I already have alot of 1mm so I would like to use that.
what about two layers?
so that the welding holes goes like this:
---O---O---O---O---
O---O---O---O---O-

 

[hvyman]

Seems to me you might as well just make a custom beefyier arm than reinforce the old stocker. Beech performance makes some arms that looking pretty nice.

 

[IJ.]

the thing is that I already have alot of 1mm so I would like to use that.
what about two layers?
so that the welding holes goes like this:
---O---O---O---O---
O---O---O---O---O-

A piece of 3x 75mm bright flat bar is only going to be a couple of $ a metre I just see it being worth the time/effort to do it with 1mm, yes stitch welding would make sense for this job.

Seems to me you might as well just make a custom beefyier arm than reinforce the old stocker. Beech performance makes some arms that looking pretty nice.

All depends on what Joints Wes uses, I don't like Heim/Rose joints on road cars, also depends on the structure as for this part failure has huge consequences... look at my situation and how much worse it could have been..

 

[Freshmaker]

Do we know exactly what kind of steel the stockers are? I hope we arn't hurting it by welding...

If you have a bunch of material, why not just make 2 strips go the length of the arm? Assuming you have flat stock, make the 2 holes and radius the ends. Then, slide it right over the existing member and do some skip welds along shaft and bushing tube.

 

[IJ.]

General rule of thumb is to look at how it's made this is a good indicator if it can be welded safely, stock arms have the eye welded on so it's not a problem, I wouldn't make the gussets the entire length as they're interfere with the other arms as the suspension moves through it's range of travel.

 

[Freshmaker]

Good call. I did just have those trailing arms in my hands about 4 months ago... But i didn't check for welds.

Well surely we could design a full length gusset that is both strong and doesn't interfere. I have only seen a slightly belt trailing arm, but it was bent reasonably close to the middle where a typical gusset(as shown above) wouldn't re-enforce much.

 

[IJ.]

Good call. I did just have those trailing arms in my hands about 4 months ago... But i didn't check for welds.

Well surely we could design a full length gusset that is both strong and doesn't interfere. I have only seen a slightly belt trailing arm, but it was bent reasonably close to the middle where a typical gusset(as shown above) wouldn't re-enforce much.

The "issue" isn't bending....

Resulting in this>>

 

[Freshmaker]

QQ I wish I hadn't looked at that pic right before bed...

GL with the re-reinforcement man! Let us know what you end up doing.

 

[eraezer]

Seems to me you might as well just make a custom beefyier arm than reinforce the old stocker. Beech performance makes some arms that looking pretty nice.

custom arms will come later when I have had time to do some calculations of proper lengths.
This is a thing to make the car safer.
Today I got a call and the person in the other end told me that my garage lease is up in three months.
I need to have the car rolling then so I can move it if I find another garage. So the quicker the better.

 

[eraezer]

What about these?
It takes 5 parts to reinforce one arm. It's made out of 2x20mm mild steel. The welding holes around the bushing housing is not showed.

Overview with some of the welds

One of these

and four of these

 

[IJ.]

Would work well just looks way over complicated for such a simple job

 

[fool'ssupra]

Just use a set of gussets, properly fitted to the tubes and stitch welded. That would greatly reinforce the joint that failed in IJ's picture.

 

[eraezer]

Well what do you know, it was 2 mm plate that I had a lot of I must have blanked when I wrote 1 mm before.
We'll see which design I go for, but it won't be just a gusset on each side since I don't think that will be enough if something goes wrong, have the age in mind when re-reading this line.

 

[IJ.]

As I said earler I'd cut a hole that fits over the round end and extends forward 150mm this way the end is captive, you'd only need the hole's ID + 6mm for it's OD to work as the plate will be in shear if the joint fails.
(which it can't really as the gussets will stop it flexing enough to start a tear, it fails in time not all at once)

 

[Enraged]

IJ, what are your thoughts on making a new arm rather than reinforcing the stocker? I recently bought a small mill, so I was thinking about making a new bushing housing out of aluminum, welded steel for the other end, and connect it with sleeve.

 

[IJ.]

IJ, what are your thoughts on making a new arm rather than reinforcing the stocker? I recently bought a small mill, so I was thinking about making a new bushing housing out of aluminum, welded steel for the other end, and connect it with sleeve.

How are you going to do the tapered ball joint end?