The Griffith Pages - S Heath Drop links

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S Heath Drop links

Steve Heath has developed some replacement Rose Jointed Drop links for the front and rear.

What are they?

Their purpose in life is to try to keep the car's body from "rolling" in a sharp turn.

Think about what happens to a car in a sharp turn. If you are inside the car, you know that your body gets pulled toward the outside of the turn. The same thing is happening to all the parts of the car. So the part of the car on the outside of the turn gets pushed down toward the road and the part of the car on the inside of the turn rises up. In other words, the body of the car "rolls" 10 or 20 or 30 degrees toward the outside of the turn.

Roll is bad. It tends to put more weight on the outside tires and less weigh on the inside tires, reducing traction. It also messes up steering. What you would like is for the body of the car to remain flat through a turn so that the weight stays distributed evenly on all four tires.

As the original rubber bushing need constant maintainance these are a great replacement and in my experience have improved the handling of my Griffith ( with standard Suspension) especially the tramlining that can be experienced.

With the Rose jointed ones you eleminate the bushing wear and maintainance needed along with it working better with the roll bar and wishbone making it smoother application and better handling.

Whilst Steve Does have great instructions on his site TVR Extras I thought I would add to that witha few more pics and my experiences.

What you Get in each kit

Rose Jointed Rear Links

2 x Droplinks rear or front

Full instructions with colour pictures

Assortment of spacer washers and Nuts

Rose Jointed Front Links

Tools I Needed

Tools I needed

Hammer

WD40

Large adjustable Spanner

Ratchet with 17mm,13mm sockets

13mm and 17mm Open ended spanner. ( A Short 13mm can be helpful to get to the stud side)

Gas torch ( one nut need heating up to get of )

The Front Droplinks

As I said earlier you get great instructions with the kit and these are just a small addition that may help a little.

Jack the car up and put on Axle stands and remove both front wheels.

The old drop link

I then sprayed all the nuts with WD40 and left fro a few minutes to penetrate.

Then the retaining nuts are undone top and buttom using a 17mm ratchet on the nut and a 13mm open ended spanner on the stud side which has two flats that this will fit. On the lower stud i found a shorter spanner was better and could be wedged easier.

The lower nut on mine was extremely hard to get off and the gas torch( dont forget not to point it near any petrol/brake lines etc infact anuybody work either..disclaimer over ;) ) was used here, after a couple of minutes of heat it came of alot easier.

Front Link and Spanners

Once these are undone the link can be removed. On the first side (the drivers side in my case) I found taking the top out first and then the bottom by using a hammer and drift to knock the stud through at the top first. Than using a bar wedged between the chassis ( dont forget to use some cloth to protect the chassis chipping) and roll bar and levering it enough to get the link out.

On the other side I found it easier to do the bottom first which may be due to some weight on the roll bar been reduced by having taken the otherside off allready.

New and Old

Once off it does pose an oppertunity to clean up around the chassis there and redo any chassis protection if needed.

With link removed

Then the new ones can be added. Adjust the New link so that the stud goes through the roll bar and the wishbone bracket. Use the spacers and Nuts supplied to get the link as vertical as posible without any of it fouling against anything.

Once they are in position The locking nuts a can be done up and I done the jamming nuts up against the coloured rod finger tight until I had checked with a jack under the wishbone and jacking up and down and turning the wheel to see if it fouled anywhere.

I found the top of the one on the driver side was catching the rear of the wheel hub ( see pic below ) . So I had to undo that side and re space so it didnt and then test again. If all ok then the jamming nuts can be done up with some loctite ( thread Lock ) added aswell.

How close to the rear of hub!

New Link in place

Whole job took me just over 2 hours.

The Rear Drop Links

note: A large adjustable spanner is needed to do the top nut of the new drop link up. You wont be able to finish job without one, I used a spanner but will try and find out what socket is needed.

As with the fronts the car needs to be jacked up and put on axle stands to get as much weight of the roll bar.

With the wheels of access is gained to the drop link.WD40 nuts and leave to soak in.

As per Steve instructions undo the top nut that is through the wishbone, A 13mm socket was used and bothside came undone real easy on mine. Then the roll bar nut can be undone using a 17mm socket with a 13mm open ended spanner on the stud side where the 2 flats are as with the fronts.

The 13mm top nut

Once all are undone it should come apart pretty easy, I pushed the old link through the wishbone hole first with a little help from a bar wedged between he chassis and roll bar, Then it came out of the roll bar with ease.

Old and New

The new one can now adjusted to length and be attached, The top of my wishbone did have a washer welded to it but the drop link would still fit through mine ( some may not and need to be filed out slightly). Then attach the anti-roll bar end.

Rear wishbone fitting

Check that the top wishbone locking nut doesnt foul against the wishbone and then try and get the Drop link as vertical as possible, again using the Spacer washers and nuts supplied.

Once happy the lock nuts can be tightened, again I left the one against the colour bar until I had checked the clearances again using a jack to lift the wishone up and down. If its all clear the jamming nut can then be done up using thread lock again on it.

The end product

The end product 2

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