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Posted by David Sherman on Tuesday, December 30, 2008 at 19:02:33 :
In Reply to: Re: Shackle Hole Elongation Repair posted by Tom Petroff (IL) on Tuesday, December 30, 2008 at 17:52:48 :
Welding and re-boring a hole is a risky proposition because the weld metal will always be a different hardness from the base metal, which means the drill will head for the softer metal. A bushing will have to be thick enough not to wear through very soon, which means boring out the hole considerably larger than it originally was. To do that and keep it centered and square, you'd need to remove the bracket and bore it on a milling machine. So, the project grows.
To drill it on the frame with a hand-held drill, you probably don't want to go any bigger than absolutely necessary. Fortunately a bit of misalignment isn't critical here. Then, you end up with a thin sleeve which ought to be made out of hard steel (not just an old piece of water pipe). The problem is similar to putting a speedi-sleeve on a shaft -- it's a quick fix, but once the sleeve wears through, the shaft and seal (or in this case the bracket and pin) get eaten up quickly. The lesson to the rest of us is to keep our spring shackles greased.
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