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My new Manny 1 ton [message #240702] Fri, 21 February 2014 08:42 Go to previous message
kerry pinkerton is currently offline  kerry pinkerton   United States
Messages: 2565
Registered: July 2012
Location: Harvest, Al
Karma:
Senior Member
Back last year when I got serious about my coach, I ordered a Manny 1 Ton. Ken suggest we install it at his place using his rack and alignment tools but he was on his walkabout and then had Caddy problems and....

So with GMCMI coming up I drove down Monday and we installed it. If Ken is as tired as I was he didn't show it and I'm whupped!

How Bob Dunahugh did this whole job in a day by himself is beyond me! We had two full days of very steady activity.

It's a straight forward installation and Karen Bradley's instructions are very clear but for some reason we had a couple things that caused us to strain a bit.

The Ken had two torsion bar unloaders and I had brought mine also. Because of the difference in geometry of the lower arm, we had to raise the porkshop A LOT. A LOT!!!!

I don't know how long he and I were under the coach pulling on the ceremonial cheater bar on the unloader but my shoulders and upper arms are still sore. We ended up using almost ALL the length of the original adjuster screws. I'd recommend having longer bolts on hand and will suggest to Manny that he include them.

Doing the alignment was a real education and learning and understanding the process was worth the trip in itself. The only thing still to do is center the steering wheel. I (Kerry A. Pinkerton) did not have the steering wheel centered when we did the final alignment and as a result the wheel is oriented at 7 o'clock instead of 6 o'clock. Embarassed Embarassed I had to leave yesterday to beat last nights storms (tornado warnings and power outages) so we didn't have time to fix it. I can do that easily enough however.

Still drives much better and will be even better once the steering box is centered. NO rut wander. Brakes seem a bit better but will improve as they break in.

I'm very impressed with the kit. VERY well fabricated and complete. I thought I might want to do some additional welding or reinforcement but after looking the control arms over, it's clear that whoever did the welding knew what they were doing. All I did was paint them.

We did have one 'issue' during the removal of the original parts. We could not get one of the spindle nuts off. Ken had the correct big socket and a Craftsman extension bar and the ceremonial cheater bar and we were both hanging on it. The extension bar was bending about 2" and I suggested to Ken that we just leave it all together. A bit heavier but we got it off and out of the way. I've got a friend with a 1" impact wrench that will remove it.

Good product. Good friends. Good time. It is so much more fun to work on these things with someone else.

Kerry Pinkerton - North Alabama Had 5 over the years. Currently have a '06 Fleetwood Discovery 39L

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