Do you have wire wheels? If so, be very careful when you
disassemble both sides of the front or rear
suspension. The previous owner of my car had reversed
the two front hubs. Consequently, occasionally
as I came to a stop one of the spinners would go flying
off the car and take off down the street. More
than once, I held up traffic while I chased down a wild
spinner. Of coarse, as I started this restoration, I
forgot to write down which way the spinners turned on
each wheel. But I'm no fool - don't bet on that
my wife says, you can't even tell time. Remember the
2 to 3 month estimate to fix that Morgan. Its been
over 2 years now! - I put each spinner on its hub, labeled
them, and set then on their respective sides of
the car. Unfortunately, I removed the labels when I cleaned
and painted the hubs, not to mention the fact
that they all ended up in one pile. Oh well, maybe I
still have a few lessons to learn. The hubs should go
on so that the spinners are tightened in the opposite
direction to the way the wheel normally turns.
The last easy item is to check the front end alignment. All the shops with their neat whiz bang laser targeted, computer controlled machines will really love you. Their computer won't have any idea what to do with you. Here's were you can tell the men from the boys. The boys don't shave yet and like to push those button on dem dar computen things. The men on the other hand will usually need a shave, and can't and don't want to spell dem dar computen things. They like to do it the old fashioned way, T square, ruler, and a chalk line. Well each to their own, we only want the job done. One word of caution here, be sure that you stay with your car.
The only item that is readily adjustable is the toe in. This can be done by the do-it-yourselfer easily and can be safer then letting a shop do IT to you!
If you take your car to an alignment shop, be sure to tell them you want to know the Camber angle, Castor angle and the kingpin inclination. Don't you tell what the values are supposed to be, let them tell you!
Toe in should be set to 2 degrees (or 1/8-3/16") of toe in..
Camber angle should be 2 degrees positive camber (the top of the tires slant outward like this "\ /") for all 4/4 Series II through Vs and +4s with the TR engines. I don't have any information on the post 60 vintage model 4/4s, +4s or +8s.
Castor angleshould be 4 degrees for all 4/4 Series II through Vs and +4s with the TR engines.
Kingpin inclination should be 2 degrees for all 4/4 Series II through Vs and +4s with the TR engines.
These last 3 items are fixed by the design and assembly of the front suspension. While it is conceivable that they can be adjusted it is done with brute force. So stop and think about it before changing any of these settings unless the car has just been in an accident. (I would be remiss if I did not point out at this time that there is a "modification to the front suspension call a "negative camber" mod. This will change the tire stance from " \ /" to "/ \" ). However, this modification will take a little work and there is some discussion as to its applicability for street use. Fred Sisson as a nice write up about it in his book.
If none of the above has helped solve the front end vibrations, you will have to come face to face with the mystique of the Morgan front end.
Tuning Up Front
©By: Jerry WillburnI will not attempt to go into the pros and cons of decambering your Morgan. Suffice it to say that all of the racers do it, most people recommend it if you use radial ply tires, and our SNOBMOG is not decambered.
To decamber your Morgan, you must move the bottom of the kingpin outboard with respect to the top. This can be accomplished in several ways. On the Le Mans cars, Chris Lawrence had longer bottom tubes made for the cross-axle. The local slalom crowd has been using "Decamber Plates". This is a replacement base plate with the hole for the kingpin moved 3/4" outboard. This is a very simple modification to make and the only drawback seems to be that a greater strain is put on the two mounting bolts for the base plate (because of the greater offset). Grade 5 or better bolts should be used here and torque them to 20 lbs. feet.
Editor's Note: I would suggest that you manufacture the new base plate (see drawing) before starting the following procedure.
The Procedure
The easiest method that I have found (aside from taking
the car to your friendly local alignment shop) for adjusting toe-in is
to use a plumb-bob. Any weight, like a nut on the end of a string, will
do.
1. First, jack up
the front of the car, spin the front wheels, and mark the approximate
centerline of the tread with a piece of chalk.
2. With the wheels pointed straight ahead, drop the plumb-bob from both the front and rear centerline of each front wheel. Mark the position of the garage floor with a piece of chalk.
3. Now, measure the distance rear to rear, front to front, and the diagonals. As in the sketch.
4. The toe-in is the difference between the front and rear measurements. If the rear distance is greater you have toe-in. If the front measurement is larger, you have toe-out
Toe-in Adjustment
Enjoy your Morgan