Right rear lower shock mount bolt broken.

Posted by Craig Hendrickson On 2014/10/8 16:34:21

In 2006, the right rear shock bracket on my 1955 Patrician broke. It was an inferior design to the 1956 version, so I just swapped it out since I had one and they are otherwise interchangeable. Here's a pic of the broken 1955 one:



Here's 1956 (left, on the car now) versus 1955 (broken):



OK...fast forward to 2014. The T-L suspension on my 55 Pat was acting kind of "weird", so I decided to jack it up and take a look. Whoa! The right rear shock bracket attachment BOLT was missing. It had obviously broken off on the inside of the bracket and fell away "somewhere." I don't have a picture, because that would just be a picture of "nothing." So, I removed a shock mount bolt from my 1956 parts car (they are special double thread ended with a fixed washer stop), cleaned it up and remounted the shock. All is now good in Packardville.

My question is: anyone else have this kind of problem and if so was it also the right rear? Likewise, does anyone have any theory about why the right rear would apparently be under more stress than the left rear?

Craig