Ball joint to link pin conversion beam

[dustymojave]

I'll look through my Gallery pics to see if I have any pics of my beam in there.

Note: This thread is about a ball joint to link pin conversion, and my beam is link pin in a link pin car. I HAVE BUILT conversion beams many years ago. And I worked with another guy to modify ball joint arms to convert the arms to link pin.

These photos are of the beam in my 1958 Baja Bug. It's the original beam, torsion leaves, trailing arms, Links, spindle assemblies and steering box.Those components now have about 960,000 miles on them, Baja Bug since 1975 and 375K miles, it has been driven hard on and offroad, nearly like an offroad race car at times. It's been used for pre-running offroad races since the 1970s. It wasn't used lightly before the beam was modified.

The shock towers are substantially modified. The links and spindle steering arms have been gusseted. It has Sway-A-Way style adjusters, upper and lower, and those now have 5/8-18 fine thread grub screws. The steering box has been rebuilt with fresh bearings and seals 1x in those years and miles, and is fine right now.

The snubbers are modified stock. The right one still has the VIN stamped in it.

Total wheel travel measured at the spindle snout tip is 10.25" with shocks installed. Those shocks are 8" travel. It gets some bump steer, but I don't notice it when driving it hard offroad.

Ball joint beams have a wider spacing between the beam tubes than link pin beams do. But beams can be made with different spacing than stock from the factory and still work just fine.

Converting a ball joint Bug from ball joint to link pin can be done in a few different ways:

1. Build a beam for link pin arms, spindles, etc. with ball joint tube spacing

2. Cut the arms off of stock ball joint arms, and fabricate arms and ends to take link pins. If you do this, you could make the arms longer than stock while you're at it.

3. Cut off the beam mounting plate and upper frame head skin off and install link pin frame head pieces to install a link pin beam. You CAN cut the whole frame head off a little way ahead of the Napoleon hat and weld on a complete assembly, but that makes it weaker.

4. Cut off the whole frame head, and use tube structure tied to the roll cage to support the beam the same as in a tube frame buggy.
_________________
Richard
Offroading VW based cars since 1965
Tech Inspection 1963 - 2012 SCCA/SCORE/HDRA/MORE/MDR +
Retired from building Bajas, Fiberglass Buggies and Rails in the Mojave Desert. Also Sprints & Midgets, Dry Lakes, Road Race cars. All types New and Vintage
SoCalBajas Member
Kicked Cancer's A$$...1st and 2nd round...Fight ain't over yet.

[dustymojave]

Here is a case of a ball joint Bug that the PO had cut off the top of the frame head to convert to link pin, but had not finished before he passed away. I completed it by adding to the front cage structure to support the upper and lower beam tubes, while the lower bolts through the beam brackets are still attached to that lower part of the frame head.

I also closed off the cut open frame head to keep dirt out, but installed an access plate to get to the shift linkage.

As it came to me:

Made the hole more neat and added frame structure:

Note that the tunnel extends all the way to the beam mount plate, which is why in my post above, I recommended replacing the outer upper skin and beam mount plate of the frame head, rather than cutting off and welding on an entire replacement frame head.

Plate welded to the frame head to close off the hole, with opening for access plate.

Access plate installed:

Overall view of the installed conversion to link pin:

_________________
Richard
Offroading VW based cars since 1965
Tech Inspection 1963 - 2012 SCCA/SCORE/HDRA/MORE/MDR +
Retired from building Bajas, Fiberglass Buggies and Rails in the Mojave Desert. Also Sprints & Midgets, Dry Lakes, Road Race cars. All types New and Vintage
SoCalBajas Member
Kicked Cancer's A$$...1st and 2nd round...Fight ain't over yet.