series swivel railko bush nipple

[F'n_Rover]

has any one heard of centre / cross drilling the railko king pin and fitting a grease nipple to it? i was thinking of doing this to overcome the lube problems from fitting cv's (which dont splash the oil) also the fwh no spin thing.

i think the pins are made from a butter / biscut alloy steel so the actual drilling should be easy.

thanks

[ISUZUROVER]

Don't see why you couldn't, haven't heard of anyone doing it though. You are right that the pin is relatively soft.

The CV's provide plenty of lubrication to the pin though (if you don't have FWH's). The Stage 1, early rangies, and 110's all had CV joints and railko bushes.

[Tdi200]

has any one heard of centre / cross drilling the railko king pin and fitting a grease nipple to it? i was thinking of doing this to overcome the lube problems from fitting cv's (which dont splash the oil) also the fwh no spin thing.

i think the pins are made from a butter / biscut alloy steel so the actual drilling should be easy.

thanks

That what i did to mine when installing the stage 1 axle, i cross drilled the pin and also groved the railko bush for the grease to flow. My thoughts where the same when i went to the stage 1 axle. So now as i am greasing the balljoints i just pump a couple of doses of grease in the swivel pins as a good measure. I attached a pic but the quality is a bit poor.

Grem

[GURU]

why not change it to a bearing like the bottom??

thats what i did when i overhauled my Stage I front assembly. just used a bottom steering arm and cut the arm off and fitted a bearing (same as the bottom one)....makes a hell of a differance to the steering

[F'n_Rover]

thanks - sounds like the go.
i've seen kits adverstised in the uk for bearing tops, but assumed that was because stuff needed machining.

how did you go with the preload?

i would think you would shim it until it just starts binding?

[GURU]

yeah.

same way you do with the RR, or most other 4wd's which have bearings top and bottom

just shim it up till you get resistance when you turn the swivel

[Tdi200]

I tried the bearing route, i used series 2 bottom pins at the top. The problem with that setup was I could never get enough preload into the bearings and ended up with a lot of death wobble! I know the old ragies had bearings top and bottom so i thought it would work fine! but it never did, i guess due to the leafers castor angle versus the coiler????????? I went back to railko bushes, wobble solved and it easier to set up.

Grem

[ISUZUROVER]

Personally I prefer the bush, it spreads the load better than a bearing. The bottom bearing always ends up with deep wear/impact marks from constantly running in the straight ahead position.

[GURU]

thats weirded mine shimmed up fine

[F'n_Rover]

maybe the series 2 bottom pins are different to the series 3 ones ?

ive got some new swivels comming soon and have some s3 steering arms on order, i'll post some pics when i get around to doing the mods.

thanks

btw - i'd rather have bearings up top as the railko bushes require a fair amount of maintanence and replacement costs are a bit steep.

as long as the preload can be set right, i dont see how anything could be sweeter than taper bearings.

[ISUZUROVER]

maybe the series 2 bottom pins are different to the series 3 ones ?

ive got some new swivels comming soon and have some s3 steering arms on order, i'll post some pics when i get around to doing the mods.

thanks

btw - i'd rather have bearings up top as the railko bushes require a fair amount of maintanence and replacement costs are a bit steep.

as long as the preload can be set right, i dont see how anything could be sweeter than taper bearings.

SIIA and SIII are the same. If you have a lathe, you can machine out the bakelite like stuff on the railko bushes and replace it with a nylon bush - works well - you also need to re-face the pin though.