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Hi All,
On returning from a car show today I had to go over some speed bumps located in a shopping precinct area. I was only travelling at approx. 10 to 15 M.P.H. and suddenly the steering wheel started to kick from side to side and stopped when I slowed down even further. I then carried on a few more yards and the same thing happened. Anybody have any idea what caused this to happen? It does'nt seem to happen on a straight flat road.
Thanks in anticipation
Terry

If you do a search for wheel shimmy, there are a few posts from last couple of years and suggestions related to the subject.

Typically, reasons can be:

1. Front wheel balance. Best to balance the wheel, tire and drum as a single unit.

2. Looseness of the suspension, anything from the shackle bolts to tie rod ends to drag link ends to kingpins.

3. Alignment.

4. Any of the above could be exacerbated by empty or non-functioning shock absorbers.

You've pretty much got to track these down one at a time. Large truck service centers that deal with I-beam front axle vehicles can be of great help with wheel balance and alignment.

Exact same thing happen to me last year. The U bolts that bolted the axle to the springs were loose. It was discovered as I was askingthe mechanic if I had to much play in the steering wheel. As I moved the steering wheel he could see the front axle move back and forth.

I thought it was pretty amazing that only a speed bump really showed up the problem.

Thanks guys,
I will try to get under the car this week and have a look and will report back a.s.a.p.
Terry

While you're checking for looseness, take a good close look at the wheels, especially the spoke heads at the hub end. The spokes on the Eight and Super Eight wheels are not held by threaded nipples like the Twelves but are shrunken/welded in place. You wouldn't be the first (or even the 10th) person to have a spoke break which then will lead to subsequent breaking of the adjacent spokes until ultimately the wheel fails completely with lots of other damage then possible. I'm speaking here from personal experience though I did catch it before any other damage resulted.

PS - I didn't mention it before, but you might also check for excess play in the steering gear box, and make sure the pitman arm is tight - if it has worked loose chances are the splines may have been damaged. Tapered wedges were used between the axle and spring to adjust caster or king pin inclination, if in fact the spring U-bolts are loose, these adjusting wedges may have fallen out. And alignment will tell if they are required, and how many.

Hi Guys,
This is what I hve found thus far. Some nuts slightly loose on the shackle pins and the drivers side shock absorber in-operative.
Re-tightened the nuts and pulled the shock. Refilled the shock with oil and managed to get it going again with some minor leakage from the dampening control arm.
It will probably need re-building at some time. Any good places in the States that do shocks of this vintage?
Dave your last listing sounded horrendous and i'm glad it was'nt as bad as that.
Got to go and find some more speed bumps now for a test.
Once again Guys thanks for the replies.
Terry

Yes, I was lucky with that wheel failure, and I first noticed something was wrong by a wicked wheel shimmy. It happened on the highway perhaps 30 years ago but fortunately I changed to a spare and got home w/o further trouble. I was even luckier to find some spare wheels in good shape - I expect that those wheels are no longer easy to find which leaves the option of respoking, not cheap!!

Some shock rebuilders that folks have reported good satisfaction are:

Apple Hydraulics on the east coast,
Five Points on the west coast.

Don't know what viscosity you used for shock oil, but you can mitigate (in the short term) the leak a bit by using a higher viscosity. Here in the US Mobil offers hydraulic oil in SAE 10 and 20 weights, Mobil DTE-24 (SAE 10) or DTE-25 (SAE 20) hydraulic oil.

I had a couple of unused $25 discount coupons from Apple, if I can locate them, you're welcome to them but I fear I may have discarded them after finding no takers for them among the locals here.

PS - Guess you know this, but it's not necessary to pull the shock to refill and expell the air. The filler port is a hex head machine screw with a screwdriver slot near the upper edge just forward of the arm pivot. Fill to the bottom of the threads, disconnect the link and work the arm up and down to expell the air, and refill again if needed. Best to insert the filler plug while pumping the arm.