Talk Morgan Forums Morgan Sports Cars Maintenance & Servicing Play in the kingpins

Your right about the fit Graham, should never be inference as that's far too tight. I set them the way I was taught and have demonstrated it to quite a few on this DG that I have done the job for ;-). Dry the pins should be free to fall through the bushes when held vertically but when coated in engine oil the pins should be able to support their own weight. I can assure you that takes some practice but it is possible, you also need a highly accurate adjustable reamer. Mine is a spiral fluted 3 element job with one spiral opposing the others, not cheap and cost in excess of £300 but it cuts like a knife through butter. As its adjustable I can get it resharpened and readjust it, I am told to lie down when told what a regrind will cost so I am using lots of cutting fluid and hoping ;-). If you want a drive up to Leicester I have a Hydraulic press as well ;-). Coffee if your lucky ;-).

Note there should be a tiny amount of play in cold bearings as they tighten up when used. Procedure for setting is do up nut to no more than tight with your hand 1/2 way along the spanner. Then loosen until movement can just be felt.

It's not widely realised but there should be two holes in the stub axle at 90 degrees to each other. The second one is usually blocked with grease and can be hard to find the first time it's used. Very rare that one of the two holes along with castelations in the nut don't give you the right setting.

But, as said by others, inspect with an assistant first as you do want to fix the right thing, not mess with the others.

My 4/4 had done 20,000 miles when the MOT tester noted play in the nearside kingpin. I contacted Colin (Spanner Juggler) and he supplied new hard chrome kingpins and fitted and reamed spiral groove bushes. On inspection, the drill-through on the top of the original offside upper nut was blocked, in fact it had not been drilled through properly in the first place. So no grease was reaching the kingpin from the upper feed and there was notable corrosion and pitting on the kingpins.
Arriving at Colin's with stub axles, I was away again with the job complete in less than 3 hours, and that included a cup of coffee. It was then a relatively simple job to re-assemble (and fit leatherette gaiters top and bottom)

And that included a good old natter and putting the world to rights....

It normally takes an hour to press the bushes out and in and set up and ream them, clean out swarf etc.

It was a pleasure to see you here, great few hours and glad your cars all sorted for many years to come. Coffee always ready if your passing.

My Roadster had a strange history. It came new with 'plastic' bushes and steering damper blades. The first owner had a big disagreement with the dealer and MMC about bump steer which he felt was dangerous. So early on the stubs were replaced with the later version , 06 onwards, with metal bushes.It doesn't look like the pins were changed. So at the second MOT with about 6k on the clock I got advisories on the pins. I changed them about a year later and both pins were badly worn. I don't know how well it had been greased leading up to that point.
I do believe though that there is little QC on the new pins & bushes and some are over reamed from new.

I can confirm that Dave, I was at the factory in late 07 with my dealer and another chap and we were both looking to spec our new builds (that lead to my 08 4 seater). In the chassis shop one of the guys picked up a hub assembly and the king pin fell straight out and nearly landed on his foot. Being a nosey bugger I wondered over to the chassis behind it where no one was working and up to the stubs on the floor and both sides the pins were so loose as to be ridiculous. I asked one of the chaps who was really helpful and chatty and he said they used to be so tight that you used to have to put them in with a rubber mallet, he laughed and said 'I think they bought a new reamer'. The worse wear I have ever seen was on my 02 +8, I pulled it down at 1500 miles and 12 weeks old to fit. 300mm brake kit from Peter M. As it was the first kingpin job I had done on a Morgan I pulled the whole front apart to have a look and see what is what, the bottom few inches of the mild steel kingpins was heavily corroded and it was on the nylon (Devol) bushes the lower on both sides was oval and chewed to hell. At that time Peter did not have the oversized OD phosphor bronze bushes so I put Devols back in with Hardchrome pins and pulled the whole shooting match apart again as soon as he had the bushes available. The standard pins used to corrode as you looked at them.

Really appreciate all the advice, going to let it all sink in before the conversation with the garage on Wednesday. Bang goes my remap if I have to spend £££ on this.....