Vixen crush-tubes - Where to purchase
Discussion
I'm about to rebuild my Vixen S2 rear hubs, where can I purchase the crush tubes, are they a TVR part or Triumph?
Or is there a rebuild kit available with all I would need?
I know some will say don't use them, machine solid spacers, however I want to put her back as she came out of the factory.
Or is there a rebuild kit available with all I would need?
I know some will say don't use them, machine solid spacers, however I want to put her back as she came out of the factory.
Dont use crush tubes. They are crap and not the best way to have your uprights.
All they are is s
t quality ERW Tubing of a thin wall diameter. Measure the uncrushed end of your old ones and buy some matching tube if you are hell bent on compromising your car!!
N.
All they are is s
t quality ERW Tubing of a thin wall diameter. Measure the uncrushed end of your old ones and buy some matching tube if you are hell bent on compromising your car!!N.
Edited by heightswitch on Sunday 18th November 14:23
pigiron said:
Thought this would get the know-alls out of the woodwork. I hear what you are saying and am willing to learn, whats the procedure exactly?
"Know-alls" sounds slightly derogatory to people trying to help! The original squash tubes were fitted to 1950 Triumph Renowns behind the dashboard to stop the ashtray closing too far. If people ordered new cars without an ashtray they were obviously not used. At the end of production of the Renown Triumph had a load of squash tubes left over, TVR bought them all, designed the rear hub assemblies around them and the rest is history.Precision machining solid rear spacers takes me up to 4 hours each side, you can,t buy them.
Edited by thegamekeeper on Sunday 18th November 22:06
I believe it is a length of light weight metal tube that goes between the two rear wheel bearings. Basically a big nut is tightened pushing the two bearings together and "crushing" the tube until the correct amount of end float is measured.
I have know idea why it is considered by some as such a bad design and was quite surprised to learn they were originally designed to stop the ashtray rattling or whatever?
Seems to have worked ok for a few thousand Triumphs and not quite so many TVRs ? Maybe not ideal for the stress's and strains of motor racing but ok for a Sunday afternoon potter round the country lanes?
Regards "where to buy" I would presume any of the Triumph specialists or the TVR specialists who cater for the older models, Exactly TVR or David Gerald ?
I'm sure the op intended no offence with the term "Know it alls", maybe something lost in translation?
The last time I did my rear bearings I bought new crush tubes. I couldn't get them to crush. I have no idea how much force it would take to cause those tubes to fail in compression but it's a hell of a lot and certianly more than I seemed to be able to apply. I'm guessing but there must be some sort of trick where one creases them first to, effectively, "fail" them first.
By coincidence my father-in-law owns one of the rare Renown’s without an ashtray. As a heavy smoker he finds it quite difficult to double-declutch whist tapping his cigar ash out of the window. He found an ashtray at a jumble sale a number of years ago but alas missing the fabled tube stops! I’ll send him a text, something else he struggles with whilst driving the Renown. He’ll be stoked that he can finally source the tubes and fit the ashtray.
Edited by eric0 on Monday 19th November 12:45
Which 1000,s of Triumphs are these fitted to, or are you commenting on something of which you have no experience?
You are absolutely right, always take advice from those specialists like DG or A@. All the "know-alls" on here ever do is spout rubbish.
How can "know-alls" be lost in translation, the inhabitants of Australia are all descendants of exports,all be it not the most eloquent
If you got some squash tubes that dont squash then they are just tubes. If they wont compress with 20ft/lbs of torque (or whatever they use nowadays) all you are doing is trying to break the quill shaft. As an absolute minimum before you consider any "tubes" is crack test the quill shaft, 70% of the ones I have done have failure cracks and the rest I throw away.
Recently a Vixen owner brought me his car to look at, he had had solid spacers fitted by a TVR "specialist" as part of a rebuild. When he took it to have the suspension geometry set up they couldn,t do it because it had end float in both the rear bearings. When I had a look there was over 8mm end float on the O/S, the outer oil seal had fallen out followed by all the grease, the wheel bearings were all knackered and were chinese chocolate ones anyway. The spacer was not thick walled tube (which is important to have the correct wall thickness as part of the improvement) and was obviously too long.
The other side had the original squash tube hammered flat and reused and had failed. When I gave him a price for putting it all right he d a go at ME because he had already paid a pile of money already.
Some may accuse me of being a know-all but I can assure you I,m notI do know a LOT about these though. Maybe better to refit the old squash tubes, just potter round country lanes and HOPE!
You are absolutely right, always take advice from those specialists like DG or A@. All the "know-alls" on here ever do is spout rubbish.
How can "know-alls" be lost in translation, the inhabitants of Australia are all descendants of exports,all be it not the most eloquent
If you got some squash tubes that dont squash then they are just tubes. If they wont compress with 20ft/lbs of torque (or whatever they use nowadays) all you are doing is trying to break the quill shaft. As an absolute minimum before you consider any "tubes" is crack test the quill shaft, 70% of the ones I have done have failure cracks and the rest I throw away.
Recently a Vixen owner brought me his car to look at, he had had solid spacers fitted by a TVR "specialist" as part of a rebuild. When he took it to have the suspension geometry set up they couldn,t do it because it had end float in both the rear bearings. When I had a look there was over 8mm end float on the O/S, the outer oil seal had fallen out followed by all the grease, the wheel bearings were all knackered and were chinese chocolate ones anyway. The spacer was not thick walled tube (which is important to have the correct wall thickness as part of the improvement) and was obviously too long.
The other side had the original squash tube hammered flat and reused and had failed. When I gave him a price for putting it all right he d a go at ME because he had already paid a pile of money already.
Some may accuse me of being a know-all but I can assure you I,m notI do know a LOT about these though. Maybe better to refit the old squash tubes, just potter round country lanes and HOPE!
JDinoM64 said:
Steve, having had my "Vixen" converted to solid rear spacers has been the best money Ive spent on it.
Why?Personally I wouldn’t have a problem using crush tubes, If set up correctly. If you were to replace them with spacers the length is critical, 0.008” out would be a worry let alone 8mm.
Nobody sells off the shelf spacers because you have to calculate the length, compensating for factory tolerances and wear to the hub, recessing etc. Using the old crush tube to get the length seems the offer the simplest solution. Mic’ing both bearing inner races, mic’ing across the inner races with the bearings fitted, only. Taking the race thickness away and adding in the required clearance or preload in another application. Making the spacer slightly thicker, trial fitting, them m/cing whatever off to achive the required length. Fitting spacers wont eliminate the chance of error.
What does fitting spacers give you for all your trouble over correctly set up bearings with crush tubes? You’d be spending hours, not including back and forth from the machine shop, unless you have a lath at home, to get what?
If anyone wants to make spacers the O/D required can be found on the SKF website.
Edited by eric0 on Monday 19th November 16:04
Edited by eric0 on Monday 19th November 16:26
Edited by eric0 on Monday 19th November 16:28
Edited by eric0 on Tuesday 20th November 08:43
Having read those replies ...
I already knew what a crush tube is, but couldn't understand why they were bad, when as said above they were fitted to thousands of Triumphs with (apparently) no issues.
So what you're saying is that crush tubes are bad mainly because no-one supplies the right parts any more ??
(I can see why solid tubes for race track might be good, but not convinced for road use)
I already knew what a crush tube is, but couldn't understand why they were bad, when as said above they were fitted to thousands of Triumphs with (apparently) no issues.
So what you're saying is that crush tubes are bad mainly because no-one supplies the right parts any more ??
(I can see why solid tubes for race track might be good, but not convinced for road use)
I think the point is here that any crush tube available is made from seamed tube and it crushes indiscriminately, (I have stripped so few of the Vixen..maybe 30-40) but built maybe only 15-20 (because I got hype-critical on rebuilding these using the old units) and have used machined tubes each time, it is possible that a crushed version could tear at the weld and fail in use.
Adrian@
What Triumph is this used in then?
Adrian@
What Triumph is this used in then?
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