[ROVERNET - UK] P6B rear brakes - Oh no not again !

Vern Klukas vern at inkspotco.com
Tue Jan 1 22:16:10 GMT 2008


>Hi
>We  started to recommission Rip van winkle over the holidays . It's 
>apparent the brakes need a complete overhaul . Access to the rear 
>brakes is as bad as on  the late lammented E type ; so I decided to 
>do the sensible thing , drop the back axle and do it all in comfort 
>on the bench . The Rover workshop manual makes it look easy . 
>disconnect the hand brake , brake line and pad wear indicators drive 
>shafts etc , remove 4 bolts and you have around 150 lbs of iron 
>sitting on your chest !
>BUT
>The drive shafts are solid , with no splines allowing the shaft to 
>be with drawn from the disc ; instead we have a sliding De Dion tube 
>.How do we pull the drive shafts which sit in a depression in the 
>rear discs ?? The Rover shop manual[ which must have been written by 
>a refugee from the " tell them every thing but the one thing they 
>need to know ' Haynes publishing world ] is silent on this point , 
>elswhere when it covers replacing the rear discs it talks of " 
>extending the De Dion tube " but is silent on how this is done , and 
>how to re compress it when you have finished .
>RVW is at present sitting on jack stands under the rear spring pans 
>, marinading in penetrating oil .This arrangement is very stable , 
>lifts the De dion tube to a sensible height and allows reasonably 
>easy access to the rear axle . It obviously will not allow the De D 
>tube" to extend .At present  I can see no way to drop the drive 
>shafts
>I don't think I want to follow the manual's advice and  hang RVW 
>from jack stands suporting  2 pieces of steel poked into the rear 
>jacking points. Any similar support from the under body will allow 
>the rear suspension and the De D tube to flop down to the end of the 
>spring travel ,limiting access .. Under body support will require 
>heroic efforts with the trolley jack and packing to get the back end 
>high enough to allow me to get under the low flying De D tube.
>Does any one have any advice , please
>Cheers
>patrick

Heres my advice: You could do yourself a favour in your future work 
if you believed the manual a bit more :-) (but see below). As manuals 
go, it is a good one, trust me.

Speaking about the rear jacking point, anybody without a long jack 
should jack the car from the bottom of the diff, not the rear point, 
if you want to get under the car. I think the idea of the rear point 
was just to get the wheels clear, not allow access. I get the feeling 
this is part of you confusion, and of course is the rebuttal to blind 
faith in the manual referred to above.

Supporting the car from the jacking points (or from the floor pan 
just below, but make sure you use wooden spacers to spread the load a 
bit) is the best way to go. Then, you extend the tube by pushing on 
the tire with your feet while freeing the halfshaft. It doesn't take 
much force. If you are worried about access, chock the front wheels 
fore AND aft and just jack the car higher. I think you'll find the 
de-dion tube is not nearly as low as you think it will be. 
Re-attaching the halfshafts is easiest if you have somebody else 
push the tire inwards while you get a bolt or two started on each 
halfshaft.

This is something I've done at least a hundred times.

When I did it for money, we used a very long truck jack with a socket 
we had welded up on the rear jacking point and raised the car to 
about a 35 degree angle, which made it really easy but caution was 
needed as the arrangement is not as stable as a four point support.

Yours
Vern



-- 
Vern Klukas                             I'm a little . . .
Inkspot Type & Design
vern at inkspotco.com



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