Am I right? strut carts for sectioned 240Z struts

[CruxGNZ]

From what I have learned from searching, if you section your struts 1.5" then you use 1980 VW Rabbit GTI carts in front and the 240Z front carts in back. Is that the right year VW Rabbit? I know jeromio had problems with having the wrong year VW. I will be using Tokico Illumina's. Anyone that has done their suspension this way, any sugestions, hints, or problems encountered? FYI- yes, I do have coilovers, but not yet installed.

Also, I have taken apart, well just about everything on my Z except for the springs and shocks. I really do not know what I'm going to run into when installing the coilovers, well I have an idea from seeing pictures, but no hands on experience, except for poly bushings (shrug). Any tips from you guys? I haven't even got my hands on a gland nut yet, I don't even know what one looks like . This is the first time that I will be doing any kind of suspension work by myself, so I'm very curious to play with my struts.

 

 

!M!

[jeromio]

I used Tokico Performas, part number HZ1083.

 

I think they were for an 85 GTI. They're working fine. The issues I had that were discussed at length here (years ago), were that the Rabbit cart was not supposed to require modification to the isolator, which is not true, and that some felt the valving was not appropriate. MikeG (SCCA) for instance, felt that the rear MR2 cart would be better due to valving and a slightly larger diatmeter shaft.

 

I've found the Rabbit carts to be plenty stiff though. It turns out I'm glad I didn't get the MR2 units. Not sure about the length of those, but the GTI carts are very short. I had to cut a section of pipe to use as a spacer (details at my site). Other than arriving at the correct length for that (15/16 inch), and the hassle of milling down that nylon spacer, it was fairly straight forward.

 

One helpful tip: I found a piece of exhaust tubing that had pretty much the perfect OD to fit inside the strut tube. Must've been 2 inch tubing. This really helped to get the strut tube perfectly straight for welding.

 

The gland nut - that's a wierd name for sure. It's not even really a nut since the threads are on the outside of it. It's the thing that tightens down on, and keeps in place, the cartridge inside the strut tube. I used a big pipe ("monkey") wrench on mine to get the old one off. The people at Tokico were very nice and sent me a new pair to use on the front since I obviously couldn't use the Rabbit ones. I don't know what the MR2 ones might look like. I suppose if you're carts have been replaced at some point, you could re-use the gland nut. Up front, mine were all OEM, if you can believe it. Totally shot of course. The rears had some equally destroyed Sears carts, but the gland nuts were mangled.

 

And the flat part of the isolator hole had to be drilled out. I used a grinding stone. I actually very much prefer the Rabbit style mounting which uses a hex key to keep the shaft from turning (while tightening the upper nut) rather than just a flat spot. I stripped out one rear cart which did not make me happy. Had to weld in more of flat on the one rear isolator to keep the new cart from getting hosed.

[pparaska]

Definitely check out the FAQ on jeremio's site on this topic:

http://240z.jeromio.com/faqdraft/faqchassis.html#struts

 

Also, note that sectioning may not be needed if you are going to coilovers and are doing away with the stock isolator. If you do camber plates, this will lower the car and maybe obviate the need for sectioning the strut.

 

When I sectioned mine (I kept the stock isolator), I laid the cut pieces in the inside of a piece of angle iron and clamped them down to keep them in line and parallel.