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

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

Author
Discussion

thisisnotaspoon

Original Poster:

177 posts

172 months

Tuesday 12th August 2014
quotequote all
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".