With the body being restored it was time to get on with the rest of it. The front and rear suspension seemed a good place to start. My thinking was that having these items ready to go will simplify transport of the completed body back home.
After some research I soon discovered that rear hub removal was likely to be problematic. Reference Valve Chatter.
The rear hubs need to come off to remove the discs for skimming and bearing replacement etc. My car currently has disc wheels which means the axle nut is easy to get at (unlike cars with wire wheels), making removal simple.
The factory manual specifies the Churchill Tool JD. 1 as being the tool required to remove the hubs. As nothing had been very difficult to remove up to this point. I decided to ride my luck and not worry about the Churchill Tool. I borrowed a hefty puller from a friend and decided to have a go.
This was a great puller. You could lock the jaws in position and really apply some force with the aid of an extension bar. I stopped at the point I felt something was going to fly apart, and I was pretty certain it wasn’t going to be the bond between the hub and the axle.
OK, the next step was to borrow the real tool for the disc wheel model, the Churchill JD. 1. I managed to acquire this for a few days from one of the local Jaguar specialists.
As you can see the JD. 1 is a massive thing, and the one I borrowed had seen a fair bit of action.
I think these tools are supposed to have an axle protector that fits on the end. The one I borrowed didn’t. I intended to make one up from some brass I had, but decided to have a quick go with the tool and see if the hub popped off without all the palaver of a protector. Rushing is always a mistake. We were about to head off on an overseas holiday and I was determined to get this done first.
With the aid of an extension bar, I began to apply some pressure, its moving surely? Yes definitely! I’ll give it some more … eventually I realised things weren’t right and decided that it wasn’t coming off. Once the puller was removed …
I had been forcing the end of the tool into the axle and I had managed to compress the end of the axle. Time to go on that holiday and lick my wounds.
Think you need to clean that floor!
On the list for next weekend!
This job had to be one of the most frustrating restoration tasks of all. I hope that I never in my lifetime have to do it again! You have my sympathies.
Lin
look at hub pullers on ebay or google it
Thanks for advanced warning ! About to embark on this job on a friend’s mk1 with wire wheel adaptors. Might try a bit of heat as well as puller
Good luck! Let me know how it goes.
Phil
trying to do the same job but with little success, think they must be welded on ,just ridiculous even with heat
Eddy,
Yep, I agree! They either seem to pop off with the usual ingredients of a decent puller, a few whacks with a hammer, and maybe a bit of heat (so people tell me), or they don’t, like in my case. Anyway, as you’ve probably read, I ended up removing the half shaft and hub as a unit – which proved far easier. Not so simple if the diff is still in the car though!
I hope you manage to get them off.
Phil