Trailing arm spring bolt cushion retainer cup

[Tracy C.]

Should the spring bolt cushion retaining cups be swaged over to grip the trailing arms? The holes in my 63 trailing arms are about .25 larger in dia than the retaining cup through hole and there isn't enough material on the retainer to roll out and reach that far.

Thanks,
tc

[Joe L.]

Re: Trailing arm spring bolt cushion retainer cup

Should the spring bolt cushion retaining cups be swaged over to grip the trailing arms? The holes in my 63 trailing arms are about .25 larger in dia than the retaining cup through hole and there isn't enough material on the retainer to roll out and reach that far.

Thanks,
tc

Tracy------


The retainers were originally "swaged" to fasten them to the trailing arm (as well as the spring). The current retainers are not the same part number (or configuration) as the originals used for 63-E67. However, I though that the OD of the tubular section was the same. I do not understand why the holes in your trailing arms are so much larger than the OD of the tubular section of the retainers that you can't peen them over.

[Domenic T.]

Re: Trailing arm spring bolt cushion retainer cup

Tracy,
My originals were and the replacement was a tight enough fit to stay in place. I thought about swedging it but didn't want to mess up the cad.

DOM

[Tracy C.]

Re: Trailing arm spring bolt cushion retainer cup

I'll get some measurements and post a pic tonight. I can't think of any reason for those holes to have been "enlarged".

tc

[Joe L.]

Re: Trailing arm spring bolt cushion retainer cup

Tracy,
My originals were and the replacement was a tight enough fit to stay in place. I thought about swedging it but didn't want to mess up the cad.

DOM

DOM-------


...mess up the cad? If you mean mess up the cad plating of the retainers, then you have some non-GM retainers. The GM pieces were natural steel; no plating whatsoever.

[Domenic T.]

Re: Trailing arm spring bolt cushion retainer cup

Joe,
Your right, I hate rust and wanted to keep these longer than the originals. Even though they will probably out last me, I just wanted them to look good.
I did the sin and cad plated most of my original fastners, the rest were blackened.
I have chosen to loose points as I gaze at a rust free car. After all the reason we love these cars is that the body does not rust. So I figured that I would go all the way.
I do realize that they are not rust free fasteners but they will look good as long as I keep the car here in the dry lands.

DOM

[Gary B.]

Retainer cups; Krylon satin clear works well

Dom,

An alternative to cad or zinc plating is to spray the cups with several light coats of Krylon satin clear. Based on a side-by-side comparison of a cup sprayed with Krylon satin clear and an unpainted cup I find the difference to be essentially undetectable. A touch up with the satin clear after swaging the cups will re-protect the part of the surface that is damaged during swaging.

Gary

[Tracy C.]

Re: Trailing arm spring bolt cushion retainer cup

Tracy------


The retainers were originally "swaged" to fasten them to the trailing arm (as well as the spring). The current retainers are not the same part number (or configuration) as the originals used for 63-E67. However, I though that the OD of the tubular section was the same. I do not understand why the holes in your trailing arms are so much larger than the OD of the tubular section of the retainers that you can't peen them over.

Joe,

The holes in the trailing arms are 1.075" and the OD of the repop retainer cups is .925. The difference is closer to .15" rather than .25" but still seems too large for a proper swage over. These are the low profile retainer cups and barely gripped at all when installed into the spring's 1.0" dia hole.

tc

[Joe L.]

Re: Trailing arm spring bolt cushion retainer cup

Joe,

The holes in the trailing arms are 1.075" and the OD of the repop retainer cups is .925. The difference is closer to .15" rather than .25" but still seems too large for a proper swage over. These are the low profile retainer cups and barely gripped at all when installed into the spring's 1.0" dia hole.

tc

Tracy------


I can't explain the size of the hole in the trailing arm. I'm just not sure what the hole size is in these arms. Maybe it was even different for 1963 for some unknown reason.

However, I think the retainer you have could be "swaged" and function properly. In the original installations the retainer was not actually bent over very much. It was just kind of "expanded" into the hole in the arm and very little material was actually "peened over" onto the surface of the trailing arm. The problem I see for you is that it will be difficult to center the retainer in the hole in the arm with as much clearance as there is.

[Alan D.]

Re: Trailing arm spring bolt cushion retainer cup

The hole in my original trailing arm is 1.06 (ID) while the repo retainers I have are 0.97 (OD) - think I got from LI.
And as Joe mentioned "very little material was actually "peened over" onto the surface of the trailing arm" In fact I just used a screw driver to pop mine off to clean.

[Tracy C.]

Re: Trailing arm spring bolt cushion retainer cup

The hole in my original trailing arm is 1.06 (ID) while the repo retainers I have are 0.97 (OD) - think I got from LI.
And as Joe mentioned "very little material was actually "peened over" onto the surface of the trailing arm" In fact I just used a screw driver to pop mine off to clean.

Thank you Alan for the confirmation of the hole size in the TA. I'll forget about welding up the perimeter and focus more on enlarging the tubular section of the retaining cup. I have a couple of ideas for that.

tc

[Tracy C.]

Re: Trailing arm spring bolt cushion retainer cup

Thought I would provide an update to my retainer cup issue. The cups I had were reproduction from LICS. The tubular section is undersized by a notable margin. After a couple of frustrating hours of trying to expand this section of the repop cups, I threw in the towel and contacted Gary Beaupre about buying a couple of his modified GM cups. Wow big difference !! I also asked Gary to rent the tool he designed to simplifiy the installation. I have nothing but great things to say about the whole experience.

I posted a few pics to tell the story. The first is another picture of the reproduction part in my trailing arm. It doesn't leave much to swage over with alot of air between the cup and the edge of the hole.




Here is a shot of Gary's modified cups. Now we are talk'in baby!! This part almost filled the hole with plenty of material to swage over.




Here is a shot following the installation. Gary's 3 stage swage tool makes this installation so simple a caveman could do it...



In summary, the low profile LICS repro cups worked fine for the spring as the hole in the leaf is somewhat smaller. They come zinc plated, but a 10 minute swim in a muratic acid fixed that. Follow up with a baking soda water bath and fresh water rinse and they are good to go.

As you can see, Gary's modiified parts are the only viable solution for the trailing arms. I highly recommend getting with Gary when it's time to replace yours.

tc

[Larry M.]

Re: Trailing arm spring bolt cushion retainer cup

Tracy:

I too used the swaging tool from Gary, and it worked perfectly. I purchased my retainer cups from DR REBUILD. He had original GM cups without the zinc plating. I told Gary about this, and he may have bought thr DR out?? Not certain DR has any left.....but suggest others who need the retainer cups give DR REBUILD a call and see.

As you mentioned, the current GM stock can be acid washed if desired to remove the plating. If you do, use a satin clear to prevent quick rusting.

Larry

[Gary B.]

Trailing arm spring bolt cushion retainer cup

Tracy:

... I too used the swaging tool from Gary, and it worked perfectly. I purchased my retainer cups from DR REBUILD. He had original GM cups without the zinc plating. I told Gary about this, and he may have bought thr DR out?? ...

Larry

Larry,

I didn't buy out the supply of good Dr, since I didn't care for his price of $3.50 ea. gmpartsdirect.com sells the current GM service part (plated, I suspect) for $2.63 each (in bulk, with S&H), but currently I'm about to compare a reproduction retainer cup from Paragon to see if they are identical to the GM cups or not. Paragon's price is $2 each, which is attractive if the cosmetics are correct.

Thanks to you and Tracy for the kind feedback about the swage tool. It's been used by about a dozen people so far and people seem to be happy with how it works. Only one person has destroyed the compression bolt and nut so far, by using an air wrench at too high of a setting, I suspect.

Gary

[Mike E.]

Re: Trailing arm spring bolt cushion retainer cup

A few member noticed a some little things wrong with the rear spring to trailing arm bolts I installed in my '65 chassis from some photos I posted in a different thread most of those I think I have fixed.

The biggest item Gary Beaupre noticed was the T/A and spring had the incorrect mounting cup install as shown in 1st photo. These were part of a spring mounting kit from LIC for 1963-1966E, never the less they were wrong. The part for those years should have a profile that has curved sides and is not as tall. The correct shaped part is shown in the next images. The retaining cups I bought from Corvette Central has the same issue discussed earlier in this thread, the tube diameter is too small for the hole on the trailing arm as see third photo (Sorry about the focus). Both parts probably have the same source, the CS part does appear to have a different duller plating but from what I understand the part should not be plated at all.

The last photo shows what the repo part looks like installed using the tool rented from Gary. I did get a small crack, that was probably caused by the tube diameter of the repo part being undersized.

Thanks to John Hinckley, Paul Oslansky & Gary Beaupre for helping me get this close to correct.









Mike