Pot Joints
Turbo Mini Forums

Did I read on here that not all A Series pot joints are the same?

We did some more tweaking of the injection the other weekend and noticed a general increase in vibration levels particularly in the steering wheel. Not the sort of vibration you get from out of balance wheels but higher frequency, more like you would expect from solid engine mounts.

Anyway, a quick inspection revealed all mounts and steadies OK. However, it the ocurred to me that I had had a lot of problems with Pot Joint boot clips in recent months. I've been trying to use plastic tie wraps, but they kept coming loose on the passenger side and the boot kept sliping off. I finally managed to get one to hang on for the rolling road day and it seemed fine. We had a particularly high speed run home that day :) What I should have done at some point is replace some of the grease that was now splattered along the floor of the car.

I've just had the car on the axle stands for a closer look. There is a huge amount of play in the offending pot joint, so I took of the clip and what seemed to be engine oil spewed out

Eventually it stopped flowing, so I think that it must be the grease broken down due to high temperature. There were no metal particles in the oil/grease so I can only assume that at some point I may have mixed up different size pot joints.

I put a load of grease back in and took it out for a blast and the vibration has gone.

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

Indeed there are two different sizes.

The "base" of the outer part of the joint is actually a small diameter pressed in steel cap - the hole with the internal splines is a through hole (to allow the splines to be broached) so is sealed after with a cap pretty similar to a core plug.

I'me sure this has been discussed on the forum before but it's quite obvious if you clean the insides out thoroughly before re-greasing it.

If you have had high vibration from mismatched parts, it may have become loose.

It is what seperates the engine/gearbox oil from the grease.

And yes, there are different sized parts but I think this is mainly because of re-con pot joints where they regrind the "slots" and use larger balls.

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

The play is around 5-10 degrees of rotation, say about 1-2 inches of free rotation.

So it is highley likely that I have fitted a reground outer to an original cage and balls.

I remember when we took the 1275 out of the car, one of the pot joints would not come out of the box, in fact it is still in the spare box. So I must have got another outer out of the spare parts bin.

Oh well, live and learn. The engines going to be changed soon so i'll sort it out properly then. As long as it is OK for a final run on the NMS rollers in a few weeks.

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

use metal ties dude. looks nicer & don;t come off.

they are easy to put on with you use a rag & some pliers.

or the special tool, that no one seems to stock or wants the price of you're first born or no you can't borrow it lol

Apart from the reground re-con ones, there may have been a change to metric sized internals late in life. Metric balls are a lot cheaper than imperial sized ones as the vast majority of ball bearings and similar ball races are all metric nowadays.

And as per NickG I usually use the metal ties - but I have the proper tool :)

Annoyingly the last set of inners didn't come with metal ties, just poxy nylon cable ties, but there is a seller on eBay that does the proper metal ties in virtually all sizes and even does them in stainless if you want....

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

Yes I need the proper tool, but first of all I need to get matching parts.

Is this the tool? There seem to be lots on ebay of varying price and quality.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/CV-Drive-Shaft-Boot-...=item4833c4b249

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

John bought one of those kits. The instructions where crap and we didn't get on with it. We ended up using cable ties and haven't tried again sinse

I think its cos the clips with it are crap.

If something is worth doing, it's worth doing half of.

I've got a tool like the one in your link Paul, its fucking shite to say the least, I've tried and failed to do a proper job with it.

The one I have which is good, is like a pair of pincers, with sqaured off instead of sharp jaw ends, and a pusher effort. it is for crimping the type of clip which have a raised "lump" which you squeeze together to tension the clip. I've just had a 2 min look on ebay and couldn't find one similar, but that could be down to me searching wrong.

This one then ?

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/PLIERS-CV-BOOT-CLIPS...=item2a0ad701a9

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

My tool is the same as the "good" one Tom describes for the metal clips, like pincers but flat shaped ends, "borrowed" from work ages ago because we used to use similar clips with "ears" for gas hoses - but the version of the clip for gas hoses got banned by some H&S regulations so a few of the tools went missing :)

Schrödinger's cat - so which one am I ???

I am not sure where the play is in your joints, but play can be had in the side cover bush, the diff output shaft and the offset sphere joint itself.

If you decide on replacing the joints be carefull. I had a nightmare trying to get two off a diff earlier this year. We ended up removing the diff as a whole, drilling a hole in the core plug thing and twatting it very hard with the aid of a drift and 4lb hammer. The spring clip on the end of the shaft had large gouges in it from the splines and one broke in two. It turns out that, as I had been told by another member on here, the splines did not have a large enough lead on them, to allow the spring clip to compress! I know for sure there is another member on this forum will have the exact same problem when he comes to remove the joints from his LSD.

My new inner joints are just the same. I will have to modify them over the winter.

This is the guy with the good clips

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/CVJ-Boot-Clips-89mm-...=item1e5ecdee5a

Obviously you need to measure and order to suit.

i remember this topic from last time, did anyone manage to find out the supplier off the dodgy stuff?

Yes i moved to the darkside

Instagram @jdm_brett

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

i use the metal bands, but the kit i bought has completely different clips to any of the above, still dirt cheap, but work a treat

ill try find a link

"Turbo's make torque, and torque makes fun"

"did you know you can toast potato waffles?"

heres the other thread with pics

http://www.turbominis.co.uk/forums/index.php?p=vt&tid=294653

but the ebay link i posted shows a different clip type to what i got, he must have updated his advert with shitter clips??

"Turbo's make torque, and torque makes fun"

"did you know you can toast potato waffles?"

The tool is fabulous- but the clips he supplies (or the ones he sent with mine anyway) were crap.

did you get the ones in the current pic? or the type in my pics?

i think the ones i got were fab, and reusable

"Turbo's make torque, and torque makes fun"

"did you know you can toast potato waffles?"