Putting the truck into the shop...

[flagmanruss]

As I've posted before, the spring cups where the front springs sit on my front axle are badly rusted out. Dodge only sells them with the axle housing. (yeah, right!) It's not going to pass inspection without it. (It shouldn't have passed last year but after I spent a grand at the diesel shop they put a sticker on it so I'd pay them & take the truck away... They refused the job.) I called all over to find someone who would do it. The price they want to have the parts fabricated & installed is pretty steep but I'm out of options. I didn't tell them I couldn't find anyone else. So they are going to do that & install 4 new HD shocks. Yes, the shock mounts are lumps of rust too. I'm looking forward to new shocks... when I hit RIs notorious pot holes / frost heaves, it'd be nice to know I'm going to come down in my own lane! LOL. (Not as bad a New Hampshire frost heaves... I recall cruising down a NH back road with a buddy. We go by a sign says "Frost heaves next 7 miles". My buddy says better slow down. I slow down a little. A little bit down the road, I spy the first one... had to be 2 FEET high. I jam on the brakes before we crash into it. The freakin road is like a mine field... like driving an obstacal course. No way you could drive over them... ) See if I have any money left after this to mess with mirrors. Some things have to be prioritized...

[Mopar1973Man]

I'm surprised you did find a complete axle from a wrecking yard...

[flagmanruss]

NO, NO axle. They tried to find a bent axle to torch the parts off of with no success. I think they are going to be fabricated from steel stock & welded to my axle, at least that is the plan.

[bh115577]

Any chance one of these will work? http://www.summitracing.com/search/?keyword=coil spring cups&dds=1

[flagmanruss]

The ones pictured appear to be for the top of the coils. The ones that are rusted out are the bottoms, welded to to axle... part of the axle assembly according to Dodge. Sorry, I should have got a picture before the truck left this morning.

[flagmanruss]

I got the truck back. The shop fabricated the front spring cups... my buddy & his Dad has a couple of sec gens with the same issue so he crawled under to scope it out. He said it looked like they cut out a donut from 3/8" plate with a rim of thinner pipe/tubing that they welded on top of the OEM cup, Fabricated tabs for the sway bar links & undercoated the whole business. Looks very sold. The guy says this "will not rust out again".

[dripley]

Godd to hear. Is your wallet still solid?

[flagmanruss]

Wallet is quite a bit lighter. This is the only guy in the state who was willing to do the job... and he knew it! The big Palmer Spring shop (does all the state DOT trucks) I called said they would "if I found the parts" which they already knew to be unavailable. The guy I used, says he does welding / fabricating work from the spring shop. It is fixed, truck has state inspection.

Wifee's Subaru did not do as well. Appears her head gasket done only a few months ago, has gone again. We have to get it back to the shop that did the work. I don't know if they'll stand behind it (they did stand behind the trans line repair that failed on my Cirrus). Sheila drives alone at night a lot, picks up grandkids... must have a reliable car. We have decided, that the Subaru will be leaving us one way or another. (Repaired or not repaired). Bye Bye, Subaru!

--- Update to the previous post...

Sorry, I should have got before pictures. The cup the spring sits in/on was all but rusted away. The mount for the sway bar link was rusted off.

The nuts to remove the shock tower were just blobs of rust.

[ISX]

Good god! What causes all the rust there? I thought it was bad here where they use salt all winter to melt a stray snowflake.

[flagmanruss]

Rhode Island is in New England... use huge piles of road salt. Oh, yes, truck was supposed to be rustproofed but wasn't. Park on gravel. Actually the front suspension seems to have the most rust, the frame & body (except the doors) seem to have realitively little.PS Did yas not believe me when I said it was rusted out?!

[Texas CTD]

God that's bad rust! I'm glad you got it worked out.

[MarbleCrusher]

Looks like a nice job, glad i live in Texas boy thats alot of rust!-Jordan-