Not an unusual problem when we push our cars hard - there's been others e.g. my rear seams have been welded up after a couple of spot welds let go.
Kevin, this is more involved I think, not meaning to put your damage below mine but this really scared the **** out of me and was not at a good time if our fix doesn't work.
Bascially I found some substantial damage under Ruby Scoo. It had me quite worried about her future. It started out when Matt (nachaluva) fount some cracks when checking out Ruby's undercarriage on our Walhalla 4wd trip:
I wasn't happy and thought it may have been a large pot hole or two that did the damage but really had no idea. So we watched these cracks and continued on our way. They didn't move which was great.
Then when I was putting the little boots back on after enjoying a week of 27 inch rolling goodness I found that there were identical cracks on the left hand side. Not good. Then I thought I'd check out the repair my uncle and I did on the LHS radius rod/gearbox x member mounting bracket, specifically that plate that is welded to the firewall that has two of the three captive nuts for the RR/GCM mounting plate. It had developed a crack so we put a bolt on it to hold it back on the firewall. All good.
Then I found this to my horror:
I went a bit funny shortly after this. So I organised to drive it home ~400km off a large mountain with a twisty road and get it welded up at my best mate's joint. We had a closer look and what I found out was that it wasn't the plate moving away from the fire wall, it was the firewall that had moved from the plate, and to balance things up the plate then pulled all the spot welds to be where it naturally was from the factory. Crazy I know.
I had previously thought that the torque twisting of the EJ in low range with the 27's and some tough 4wd'n was responsible for the plate moving away from the firewall. But once I found out it was the other way around it was clear to me that this was done pre-season when I was 4wd'n with Richie and Roger below dinner plane area. We had a "rally section" where we gave our 4wds a fair flogging, Ruby Scoo out front being the lighter unit. I've been driving all season with this un-ware of what hideous mess was lurking under the bonnet.
A freshly graded road sometimes gives large ripples that bounces the front then the rear of the car. I was coming over a hill on the throttle, noticed the road started to curve to the left so I started braking with the hill dropping away quickly - too fast on a road I didn't know. I then hit one of these ripple sections which put the car airborne, nothing spectacular, just enough for me to slow the wheel speed down lower than the airborne vehicle speed which had the front end landing with an almighty BANG! It really felt like my captive nuts were cactus on the radius rod plate and that everything there had moved about an inch backwards. This is where I think the firewall was moved, captive nuts still look good and are holding up well.
So after a couple of rums, a few hours and some photos of Jimmy doing his best upside down Ruby Scoo now has a new lease on life and a few scars. Here's some pics of the progress of work:
Rear right being welded:
This is the LHS floor that I hammered out with a block of wood and BFH, once that was done everything lined up perfect under the bonnet. I was on fire watch while we welded this section from below. The holes (3) are the spot welds that were pulled out, you can clearly see one in this pic, the dark little circle:
The front LHS being welded:
Not the prettiest welding, but being upside down while doing it using a Mig I wasn't expecting a great looking weld:
Rear left all welded up, ground back and sprayed against rust:
Very happy with the finished product - Ruby Scoo now feels very tight on the road and doesn't float around which I thought was a worn component on the front end, so I wasn't really worried about it. Now to monitor the whole thing and make sure it doesn't happen again or start to crack again.
Needless to say I'll be taking it easier on unknown roads to avoid the same situation.
HUGE shout out to Jimmy for his help and the use of his vast facilities! His hoist really helped out with the job, that thing is an amazing piece of kit! And good times had catching up as well - been too long between drinks for us!
Cheers
Bennie
Can't wait but need some parts, hence why I'm not working on them now...
As you know she's in a state of "heavy maintenance"...
