Hi there,
here are some important things about this mystery wandering! It can have a
lot of reasons and some of them are very dangerous, so you better take
care...:
Front axle and steering system:
1)
I guess you have allready checked tire pressure! But the original diagonal
tires are no good at all. Try new radial type tyres and feel the difference.
Especially if you drive your Amphicar a lot, you won?t wanna miss them if
you have ever tried. Here in Germany everyone drives radial tyres, it gives
you much better road stability!
2)
Please make a test: Open front bonnet and watch your steering case while
somebody else moves the steering wheel right and left. Usually the case
moves heavily, which is extremely dangerous, because the casehouse can
break! That happened to a friend of mine, he totally lost steering while
driving, because the steering case broke! You better weld in a thick metall
plate connection from the wheelhouse to the steering case and screw it with
the case. That helps a lot and gives a much better steering feeling. If
wished I can send a picture of such connector like it is welded in my own
Amphi.
3)
Check the steering rod ball joints closely. Most times it is one of the
inner joints which is heavily worn, so remove the front axle cover plate.
Sometimes you even can see they are worn only after complete dismounting the
steering rods.
4)
Surely stub axle bolt and oscillating shaft should be in good order.
5)
Very important is the right length of the tie rod ( pic.42, front axle in
parts catalog). This gives the front wheels angels. If that is not right, it
causes a really bad wandering at high speed. Sometimes you have to
experiment a bit with the length.
The wandering may also come from the rear axle:
6)
Check the swingarms are really tight on the shafts. As somebody has
mentioned before (was it you David?) they may become loose. Once you drove
them loose without notice, the round hole becomes eggy. That?s too bad then.
If it is not that bad you may drill a bigger locking hole for a 2mm stronger
screw (use 10.8 only! No stainless!). Also wider the crack in the swingarm a
bit. Here in Germany we do this often also just for protection. The original
locking screw is not strong enough and may longer itself after a while so it
becomes a bit loose and so does the swingarm.
7)
One thing that really should scare you is the rear hub seat on the drive
shaft! You can not imagine the force at that point while driving. The hub
has to be tight on the konus and you can only force it into the right place
with tighting the king nut with enormous power. That causes a little bend
inside the nut, so PLEASE never use an old one! Always replace the old king
nut with new one when you mount your rear axle. Also I recommend not to use
the original nut with the split pin, but a self locking one. They are much
thicker and mean a double safety.
I had to learn this the hard way, when my right rear wheel came off at 60mph
on the highway going downhills, because the king nut gave up life.
If your hub was tight or not you can easily see on the key between hub and
drive shaft. It should always look like new. No worness. But this key causes
some other problems. The keys bed causes some bad tensions inside the konus,
however it is the thinnest point. The vibrations adding to the tension may
cause some time cracks. We had some really bad accidents here with Amphicars
surprisingly broken drive shaft ends. And they all broke at the keys bed
inner end. The danger is, that you will loose a wheel if that happens, and
if you havn?t changed your braking system yet to a two circle system you
will also loose breaks completely!!!
So make sure your hubs are sitting correct!
We havn?t found a 100% protection for the drive shaft breakings yet. So
watch out!
Oh by the way, before you now leave your Amphi in Garage scared forever I
should tell you, that we probably drive the Amphicars a bit more and rougher
than you do. For some members in our Club it is still their everyday car and
some uses it as off road cars as well. My friends car has got over 300.000
miles on clock! And he is a wild driver! Many people in the Club tow a
camper with their Amphicar to go some thousands of miles on holiday every
year.
The above problems may not be too serious for a car which is taken out for a
sunny sunday cruising on a near by lake only.
Greetings from Germany,
Ren? Pohl
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Arnold Hite" <ahite@Charleston.Net>
> To: <amphicar-lovers@egroups.com>
> Sent: Sunday, November 12, 2000 5:58 PM
> Subject: [amphicar-lovers] Help with a tracking Problem
>
>
> > My 64 Amphi is finally ready for the highway, but when I get up to
> about
> > 40 mph it begins to wander all over the road. It's too scary to go any
> > faster. There is a small amount of play in the steering, but it doesn't
> > seem any different from my other Amphi, which tracks great. The
tie-rods
> > and ball joint action seems normal. I remember a similar discussion
last
> > year but the focus was on the tires. My two cars have exactly the same
> > tires. One car tracks great, the other wanders so I don't think it's
the
> > tires. Any ideas? I'm stuck.
> >
> > Arnold Hite
> >
> >
> >
> > To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
> > amphicar-lovers-unsubscribe@egroups.com
> >
> >
> >
>
>
>
> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
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>
