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In the Workshop - A Shocking Tale, Part 2

 

As part of recommissioning, I decided the RAV4 should go back on the road. With the car MOT’d testing would be a lot easier and it also meant that it could do a Hill Rally at some point in the future (and in 2025 it was looking like there might be a Dorset Hill Rally event, but it sadly didn't happen). Additionally, getting the car to MOT standard is a good stake in the ground for its overall condition after so many years in storage.

 

For the Rav to be MOT’d the front shocks would need to be replaced. Both were old stock struts, but both were leaking. The obvious way forward was to replace with stock to get the car roadworthy, and then replace with a more race suitable solution once one was found. 

 

After looking around, the choice in the UK is fairly limited. I ended up with a pair of KYB Excel-G struts. These were fitted with the OME springs that came with the car and stock top mounts. To get the car to sit level, I also added a pair of 30mm strut spacers. This also gave a welcome (but slight) increase to the ground clearance. The RAV4 then passed its MOT in late February. 

 

 

The first event for the cars return was to be Bovington in April, but it was cancelled. This gave additional time to sort the required roll cage modification and to try to improve the front suspension. Discussing the cars return to competition with Paul Lund (who built the car) he warned me that the rubber top mounts were a particular weak point. Both he and another driver that had raced a RAV4 had experienced issues with them breaking up and delaminating, so a solid top mount solution would be needed.

 

After a bit of googling I found that CUSCO Japan make solid adjustable top mounts for the gen 1 SXA10 RAV4. These have adjustment for camber and a ‘pillow ball’ rose joint top mount. These are available via eBay, but are not cheap. The lead time was a couple of months, and the situation around import duty and taxes was unclear, so I decided to look for a local solution.

 

 

 

After a call with CompBrake, and a bit of trial and error we found an existing Mini top mount was a match for the RAV4 bolt pattern, so a pair were procured and installed ready for the first event. In the interim I had been driving the Rav around. A bit of green laning and a couple of trips to Salisbury plain to get some miles on it and chase out any other gremlins, and then tt was soon time for me to tackle my first event in the Rav at Bilsington Priory (report here). I’d convinced myself that the front suspension would be OK if I took it easy… but on the day of the race, I did get a bit over excited at a couple of points. The front suspension survived the race, but had some fairly significant issues.

 

On the last couple of laps there was also a rattle apparent from both sides at the front. I thought this was the top mount centre bolts coming lose, but both were tight. During the post race strip down I found play in both of the top mount spherical bearings. At first I couldn't work out why they had failed, but a bit more investigation is looks like that at higher angles of articulation the the 'top hat' insert (that sits under the bearing and centralises it on the shock shaft) was fouling with the outer bearing race. This then in turn meant that a jacking force is applied to the bearing, pulling it apart and causing the premature failure. There was also  bent near side front shock. This was undoubtedly sustained by enthusiastically tackling the diagonal transition from the lower open field to the final field before the finish and was helped along by my antics at 'the jump'. 

 

 

Meanwhile, at the rear, there was very little to report. The suspension felt a little harsh in places on the track, but the fox remote reservoir shocks ran well.

 

Overall, the 'off the shelf' KYBs did surprisingly well to survive at all in a race environment. Thy provided fairly good damping, resisting fading, but their design and construction was not up to the job of racing. A 'version 2' solution was needed, so I set about looking for alternatives....