Page 30: The Shocks
February 2010

Before: The shocks had been bead-blasted and then set aside. Some surface rust had formed on them, and as you can see in the top shock, one of the shafts had some serious corrosion.

And today: Rebuilt, painted, and with a Koni sticker, they look great. The bad shaft had to be replaced. Note that the rear pair on the left is a bit longer than the front pair on the right.

Here are the new springs. The green are front and the blue are rear. The yellow pair is a Bob Wallace update, to raise the back of the car up just a bit. The resulting nose-down angle is intended to mitigate the lift that Miuras are susceptible to at somewhere over 120 mph. (I've hear some say the front doesn't get light until 150 mph.) I'm thinking I'll install the stock ones and see how it goes.

I wanted to put one set together to see how it looked. Here are the steel mesh pads that go at each end of the shock. These were later changed to hard rubber pads, and many cars that have been rebuilt have been switched to rubber since these mesh ones are very difficult to get. Some rebuilt cars have no pads at all, which lowers the car a bit and upsets the suspension geometry.

These caps go on top of the springs, and the keepers hold them in.

Here are some parts ready to go together. I got a set of spring compressors for Christmas, and this is their first use.

I was concerned that the hooks would scratch the paint on the springs, so I took an old inner tube from the MGB and cut some rubber strips from it, and glued the rubber to the hooks with rubber cement.

Then I carefully put everything together. Isn't it beautiful?

Here is a close-up of the mesh pad at one end.

Unfortunately Koni no longer has new rubber bushings for these particular shock ends. I have found where to buy some in Europe, and will be ordering a set shortly so I can put the suspension together on my car. I'll take this one apart again just to touch up a few spots before they all go together.