[y b normal]

Wish I could help, but I've never had death wobbles in a leaf sprung vehicle. Only the patrol.
You've got good people helping already, so it'll be sorted. 👍👍

 

[Foo]

There was someone on here many years ago with the same problems but if my memory serves me right, this was/is a common thyme with the Patrols and their front geometry setup. Can't remember what the cure was though. 🤔

Foo

 

[Ethanissan]

There was someone on here many years ago with the same problems but if my memory serves me right, this was/is a common thyme with the Patrols and their front geometry setup. Can't remember what the cure was though. 🤔

Foo

Yep, plenty of people with death wobble before me, I'm certainly not the first, and nor will I be the last.
Any vehicle with a solid front axle will be able to get death wobble, just the nature of having so much unsprung weight and a pivoting lever on each end. There's a lot of causes, anything from worn out bushes, to bad bearings, to loose bolts. If something in the front end is worn out and has movement it's possible for it to get a harmonic wobble going that spirals out of control (death wobble).
Hopefully my new leaf spring bushes are the cure, if not I'll be looking at the kingpin bearings next.

 

[Ethanissan]

Doin’ some work 😁

The bottom will be harder to mount, but we’ll figure it out


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[rgren2]

Nice, 👍

 

[Ethanissan]

Huh? I didn’t order th-

Oooohhhh

Ahhhh I see

That was very quick, much quicker than Garry predicted, so big kudos to Nizzbits for getting these in from Japanese and Australian suppliers all in one neat package.

I reckon these will be going in on the weekend.


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[Ethanissan]

Man these metal bushes are a pain:

But they’re both in now and I’m happy about it.
Also guess what happens when you’re hammering away at the shackle mount that you didn’t brace last time:

Bad photo, but it’s cracked as well, unsurprisingly. But now we’ve got an excuse to weld it up properly as well so it doesn’t happen again.

Also went down to @y b normal ;’s place yesterday and got these new spring bushes pressed into the leafs:

So all the bushes as mentioned are oem Nissan bushes from Garry @ nizzbits, just got to plop the rubber shackle bushes in, weld up the shackle mount, and the front suspension bushes will be lookin’ snazzy, fingers crossed it’s the cause of the death wobbles.


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[Ethanissan]

Another thing, I’ve pretty much finished mounting the intercooler, so I’ll show how I’ve done that.

The top bracket is just a piece of L-shaped steel that I’ve drilled holes in so that the cooler can be mounted to it, and it bolts onto where the bonnet latch support used to go:

Doesn’t look like much support, but I’ve had it hanging from there and it’s very sturdy. The cooler will be taking the place of the support, and through testing I’ve determined that it provides good support for the bonnet latch.
The bottom is a little more… sensitive. If you hate the idea of cutting something up stop reading now
I did actually cut the old bonnet support to make the bottom intercooler bracket:

I decided that the bottom mount was perfect since it already had bolt holes and would easily support the bottom, I just needed to decide that if I ever have an engine with no intercooler I’ll just have to fabricate a new support. Or just leave the cooler where it is for looks lol.
At the moment I’m trying to decide whether to have side support straps to stop it from twisting or just fill the space with rubber, I’ll have to put it all together now that that bottom mount is all welded and painted up, and see how well it resists twisting. Even just with the top bolt in it’s actually pretty good, so with the 2-bolt bottom end it might just work.

I’ve also worked out where all the pipe work will go and bought the silicon bends for it, Autobarn had 25% off everything so it worked out to be only like $20 more than if I ordered online from a website I originally looked at called BendBrothers, very happy with that.
Just need to make the holes in the firewall* (using a Bunnings nibbler), and get the straight bits of metal made with flared ends and it’ll be able to be plumbed up. Very exciting

*edit: lol nope not the firewall, definitely the radiator support
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[Ethanissan]

Oh yeah… I did also chop some of the lower metal grille piece to make a bit of wiggle room too
Aaaand I’ll have to trim the back of the plastic grille.
But it’ll all be invisible from the outside so it’s alright. I’m usually set in the mindset of “don’t do a mod if it can’t be undone” especially on a clean example of an old vehicle; but since this is for the benefit of the car and can’t be seen unless the grille is off I think it’s ok.

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[Ethanissan]

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[Ethanissan]

Went for a longish drive tonight to make sure the bushes have worked. So nice to get out and just drive it without constantly fearing that it's going to randomly try to shake me to death. Went all manner of speeds up to 110kph and seems all good, hitting small bumps every now and then which before would have sent it into the shadow realm.
The old bushes must've been really bad to cause wobble that bad.

Anyway.
In other news, the intercooler now has proper full mounting points, and I've mapped out the pipework. Just waiting on some straight bits of pipe being cut and bead rolled so I can plumb it up, and she'll be intercooled .
Will have to do some more driving tomorrow night with the factory no-intercooler setup to get good examples of where the egt's and maybe boost pressure sit and fluctuate, video the gauges while doing different bits of driving to compare to later. The pipes should be done tomorrow or Friday, I'll be picking them up Friday either way because work tomorrow.
Then it's off to autobarn to replace the silicon bend I cut to replace the factory piece (that turned out was fine), and get all the hose clamps I need, and hopefully by Friday lunchtime I'll be able to drive it.
Assuming, of course, everything goes to plan. Which notoriously doesn't happen when I actually plan things out properly.

 

[james008]

You'll lose a bit of the old HT-15B whistle with an intercooler. Luckily that is the only redeeming feature of standard turbo, so its the perfect excuse to upgrade.
Also a good excuse to upgrade the air box. Pre filter housing isn't a great design, nor does it seal terribly well. I personally would like to use a filter box based around a VT-VZ LS, VE-VF LS or BA-FG Barra turbo panel filter. More than enough flow, easily available and cheap.

Shackle/spring bushes must have been pretty bad to cause a wobble. Doing king pins and checking old ball joints is still a good idea, with new bushes replacing anything else that may become an issue is a good idea.

 

[trev zd30]

You'll lose a bit of the old HT-15B whistle with an intercooler. Luckily that is the only redeeming feature of standard turbo, so its the perfect excuse to upgrade.
Also a good excuse to upgrade the air box. Pre filter housing isn't a great design, nor does it seal terribly well. I personally would like to use a filter box based around a VT-VZ LS, VE-VF LS or BA-FG Barra turbo panel filter. More than enough flow, easily available and cheap.

He hasn't had a chance to post yet but the intercooler is all plumbed up and working. We were just talking about upgrades to the airbox too, thinking along the same lines re: panel filter.

We'll have to let him drive around in it for a few days now to see if he's noticed much difference in response and performance. He has a few ideas here too for the future but I'll let him explore that with you all when he's ready.

All in all it's coming together pretty well and this thread is a pleasure to read with a mixture of humour, wit and irony. He certainly has a gift for keeping the entertainment value of each post, something he didnt inherit from me😉.
I wish I had more time to help him with it, but then he's pretty strong willed and definately needs to build it his own way. Cant say I was any different when I was his age 🤣🤣🤣

Keep up the good work Ethan @Ethanissan