MK1: Putting late Struts complete onto an early car?

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Lauren
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MK1: Putting late Struts complete onto an early car?

Post by Lauren »

I have an early 86 MK1 and i want to put on my struts with Koni's and Fensport springs complete from an 87 car.

Obviously i know that another hole will need to be drilled on the rear of the front strut housing to accomodate the 4 studs that later cars had on the top mounts.

Reason for it is because i'm breaking my SC and naturally want to use the better suspension off it and transfer it to the earlier car. I know i could probably mix and match parts but by far the easiest way to do it is to simply swop the whole strut over.

I am also going to put the bigger brakes and reconned calipers onto the earlier car, i can probably do this complete at the front and may even just swop the whole front suspension over lower arms as well.

I know the rear trailing arm length is different on earlier MK1s so i'll probably just have to work out whats easiest to do with trying to use some of the poly bushes etc if possible.

My main question is does anyone know any reason why i might have problems with swopping the struts front and rear for those off a later car?

I am also going to use the later ARBs as they are a little bigger, the theory is that i ought to end up with an 'ideal' handling MK1 with the early cars advantage of the unequal length trailing arms.
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Re: MK1: Putting late Struts complete onto an early car?

Post by PW@Woodsport »

hi lauren,all depends what way you want to go about it,i swapped late spec suspension struts onto my B plate a few years ago,it wasnt straight forward but not a major mission either.

On the front struts as you know theres 3 holes on the top mount for the early car,now you can either drill the fourth hole into the top mount,or you can fit an early strut top bearing onto your late strut,or you can simply cut off the fourth stud from the late spec top,that is what i did as it was the simplest solution and worked fine...any of the above works though.

The rear is a little trickier,it all depends on wether or not you are going to use the late spec hubs as well or keep to the early hubs.The early hubs have a thinner mounting point where the two bolts go through the strut,this means if you are going to mount the late struts you will need to make a spacer plate that sits between the hub and strut.The answer to that is pretty simple though and all i did was cut off the mounting brackets from my old early spec struts and used the brackets as spacer plates,effectively narrowing the mounting point on the late struts.If you use the late spec hubs they are different in geometry and you would need to use all of the late spec arms and suspension mounting bracket too,which would make the swap pointless so the only real way to do it is with the spacer plate on an early hub.

The rear top mount is identical so no problems there.

You may have to alter rear drop link length to suit,i didnt but an 87 is one of those mixed up revision cars so god knows what its got fitted.Hope some of that helps and ive got more indepth details on fitting a late spec rear tube to an early if you need it.
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Lauren
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Re: MK1: Putting late Struts complete onto an early car?

Post by Lauren »

Many thanx Paul, exactly the info i needed.

Top stuff! :thumleft:

I definately want to keep the rear geosetup as i much prefer the handling of the earlier MK1s and this was one of the reasons why i like the early cars.

If you've got the extra detail easily to hand then i'd certainly appreciate it, though i understand what you are saying and i'm sure making a spacer plate won't be a major hassle.

I'm guessing (though pretty sure) that i can transfer the later brakes over to the earlier hub providing i transfer the caliper mounting bracket?

The Struts all come from Yummy and though that was a May 87 car it appears to be of all the later MK1s setup. I know from buying parts before that all later parts fitted no problem, so i'm pretty sure what i'm dealing with revision wise.

If the drop links are a problem i could always go aftermarket and get adjustable ones i guess.

Cheers for your help.

Lauren
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Re: MK1: Putting late Struts complete onto an early car?

Post by PW@Woodsport »

i will have to dig through my stuff to find the files ive got on the swap but its not rocket science...from memory i just cut off the brackets from the early strut and spot welded them onto the inside of the late bracket making it narrow enough to bolt up to the early hub.The spacing wasnt exact,i may have used the hammer technique to make it a good fit but it was close enough.

The brakes will swap fine providing you use everything from the late car.

I'll see what i can find from my swap archives but i think thats pretty much it.
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Re: MK1: Putting late Struts complete onto an early car?

Post by spudgun »

Yer Paul, just out of curiosity, you know those rear track control arms you gracious sent me a while back, what year were they off of? Because they had rubber bushes in the inboard end rather than the spherical type one I was expecting it to be.
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Re: MK1: Putting late Struts complete onto an early car?

Post by PW@Woodsport »

i havent got a clue mate,i had two sets at the time and i cant remember for the life of me what years they came off,i have a lot of crap lying around!
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Re: MK1: Putting late Struts complete onto an early car?

Post by spudgun »

Paul Woods wrote:i have a lot of crap lying around!


All the best spanner monkeys do. You should see the state of my garden shed.
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