Refurbishing a Midgets dampers (Who, what, where and how?)

[thisisnotaspoon]

The suspension on my 1500 is pretty much dead. The kingpins were worn, one of the hub bearings was dying, the dampers range from "wolowy" to "shot" and the springs have sagged horribly on the drivers side.

I want to end up with a car that's 'nice' but without either being overly expensive or costing too much to re-do in the future if I decide to rip it all out and do some more comprehensive upgrading (i.e. spend a fortune upgrading the Armstrong dampers if the end result is I later buy a telescopic kit).

Shopping list so far is:
New kingpins/uprights/trunnions
New wheel bearings
New tie rod ends
New drop links
New ARB bushes
New polybushes everywhere
New 1275 height leaf springs from frontline
New 1275 -1" 340lb front springs (total drop about 0.5" below 1275 ride height) from frontline

Only problem is, where to get 'uprated' dampers from? Some places charge £30 a corner, others charge £90! Seems that over the pond in the US there's even more options, even adding adjustments to them and more discussion of the pro's an cons of various re-builders, even a 'factory tour' of one showing the pile of incoming shock parts that didn't pass inspection (apparently they wear out when the oil level drops). So on the one hand I don't want to be spending almost as much on the lever arms as a cheaper telescopic kit costs, but on the other it needs to actually work for a few years!

Does anywhere sell the kits to rebuild them DIY? I quite fancy having a go, the instructions looked pretty straightforeward, and would at least know it was done properly and what the condition was like inside. And I could play with the internal damping adjustments without resorting to what most places do "stick 25wt oil in and paint it red".

[nta16]

most reconditioned LA dampers, uprated or not, are very poor quality and don't last - at £30 for uprated they have jump a lot in price so perhaps they're a bit better but consider, how bad was the damper before it was reconditioned, how many times was it reconditioned before and how well - £30 retail still isn't a lot to allow for work on them, take off the VAT, retail margin, reconditioner's margin, materials and transport costs, ect.

many swear by the guy from America's work, better than original

a Spridget owner found a UK source that was he said very good at reconditioning his dampers, if I can find the details I'll let you know

there may be places that sell kits, I can't recall but others will know, I think you're quite right with valve adjustment rather thicker or thinner oils

if you look in the MG BBS Midget and Sprite Technical forum Archives you'll find a lot of info

thisisnotaspoon said:

New 1275 -1" 340lb front springs (total drop about 0.5" below 1275 ride height) from frontline

on a 1500 that may be so but on a 1275 I fell for being told by them that it would only drop the car 1/2" as I was very concerned about ground clearance

when I went to collect the car it was clearly lower, was told "no I said 1/2"-3/4" - you can tell when they're lying because their lips are moving - it dropped over 1"

below third exhaust clamp scrapped almost completely through, this won't happen on your car as the 1500s sit higher and I also had them fit their front damper conversion (the idea and design for which was 'borrowed' from someone else I later learnt)



for springs and other stuff a decent trader and person to deal with is Kim Dear of Magic Midget, I've got his '9.5" freelength 360lb rate. Retains standard ride height' springs to replace the 1" lower springs from the other place, much better - http://magicmidget.co.uk/