[Amc-list] Re; newer Strut Rod Bushings and more

["John Elle" <johnelle@xxxxxxxxx>]

They Fail!
The real question is why?
If I go out and look (or working off of an ever aging on 
some what unreliable memory) the following reasons
come to mind. 
Old age, heat causing the rubber to degrade. (It is a 
cool 108 today in an area that has well over 100 days 
a year of triple digit temperatures), neglect, abuse, 
a possibility of replacement parts being inferior, and 
maybe a few other things. 
Now if I could help answer the question as to why they
fail, maybe I could keep the next couple of sets I install
from failing prematurely. Tom's web site, excellent as
it is, does not cover one area that my suspicious little 
mind is beginning to raise flags on. 
Improper installation!
I have 3 TSM's, a 1970, a 1974 and a 1980.  As the 1st
AMC that I owned that I needed to do serious work on 
is my 1970 Javelin, I never had the need for suspension
work directions. My previous to this car AMC experience
as a used Rebel and a used Gremlin, both of which were
late model used cars and replaced before the suspension
caused a problem. One due to a traffic accident and the 
other due to the BW transmission letting go. No they 
never did have a reliability reputation. I fixed it and 
dumped it. 
In general rust would eliminate your transportation with
in 4-5 years of driving. 
So I bought a TSM and supplement and the parts shown
on Toms web site
http://wps.com/AMC/Strut-bushing-modern/index.html
and found that the 1970 TSM had instructions for the one
piece strut rod bushing and a drawing which seemed to
show one pregnant washer and one flat washer of the 
two piece design. This does not cover two pregnant 
wasjer applications. 
The new ones were packed however 
with an instruction sheet that indicated that they fit 
AMC, Ford and Chrysler applications. There was a time 
when instructions sheets told you what they fit and how
to install them rather than generic platitudes, with a 
picture of the parts and arrow indicating the direction
the strut rod went. However I believe at the time that I was
aware that the Ford Strut rod was under tension (the end 
was mounted at the front bumper) rather than compression
(where the end is mounted behind the front wheels as 
AMC does it) so I mounted the parts this way,
Back of car----------------------------Front of car. 
Pregnant washer) rubber I rubber) pregnant washer ----suspension
This was an educated guess on my part thinking about 
the function of the pregnant washers and IF they were
intended to support the rubber at the mounting location
and let the pregnant washer be the device that helps
keep the rubber from punching through the hole under 
pressure from the front suspension hitting things it 
made sense. 
Until sometime in the future when it finally dawned on
me that the second function of the strut rod is to allow
movement of the lower control arm in both and up and 
down fashion (twisting) and an Arc caused by Castor
adjustments (is bending a good word) which started 
me thinking about the purpose of the pregnant washers
again. 
This apparently seems to be the biggest problem Tom
has had to solve with his Rambler. Well this and no 
parts maybe.
So I looked at the other two TSM's I now have to see 
what they showed on replacement configuration. 
Low and behold they are different, which did not do 
much in the way of clearing up the problem, but it did 
cloudy it up quite a bit more. 
So my question is, looking at the parts, the pregnant 
washer placed closest to the suspension if placed 
pregnant side towards the rubber, would allow the 
rubber to flex with the arc caused by the movement up 
and down of the lower control arm. This would allow 
maximum flexibility at the mounting bracket for the 
suspension to go through it's motions but with the 
second pregnant washer mounted closest to the 
transmission with the pregnant side away from rubber 
would capture the rubber against the mounting bracket
for positional stability. 
Surely looking at the other two TSMs would clarify
the situation! 
Nope, they are all drawn differently. Thus giving me 
three possible ways to mount the same part 
plus the directions in the package if any. Going out
and looking at the 5 AMC cars in the driveway I 
find that those that I have rebuilt (3 of the 5) are 
all put together as described and I really have no
problem with them. One which has been rebuilt 
somewhere in it's life by some one has both 
pregnant washers facing the rubber and the last 
one has both pregnant washers facing away from 
the rubber. 
As the last two have front end problems and are
in need of rebuilding no real evaluation can be 
made, but as to the correct orientation of the
pregnant washers it still remains a mystery. But 
it makes sense to me if they are not orientated 
correctly, they can cause problems. If I only knew 
what correct was for sure!
 
The one piece option though is repetitive in my 
manuals. The pregnant washer on the suspension
side is pregnant towards the rubber. On the 
transmission side is pregnant towards the transmission. 
As this part depends on the rubber bulging up to 
to hold itself in place, the orientation makes sense
to me as I see it. 
Food for thought? Any comments, Does any one 
have other TSM's and what do they show? 
Or is their anyone who cares? 
John.  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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