Replacing Rover 75 Suspension Arms

After much procrastination, I got my finger out and fitted the new rear upper suspension arms on the 75 this weekend. It wasn't too bad a job, and everything came apart without serious issue.

This is the procedure I used; the Haynes manual suggests you need to remove the anti-roll bar and disconnect the bottom suspension arms, but that means disturbing more rusty bolts so balls to that:

• Preparation: give all the nuts/bolts a good dosing of WD40, etc, preferably a day beforehand.

• With the car jacked up and rear wheels removed, loosen off the bolts at the inner end of the upper suspension arms.  These go into a captive nut, and are accessed via holes in the subframe.  It's a 15mm bolt - access is a bit awkward, and it's torqued to 100NM so you'll need space to get a breaker bar onto it.  

• Next, I removed the nut from the other end of the arm, where it meets the hub. That's 18mm,and it needed a good scrub with a wire brush as the threads were covered in shite.  Leave the bolt in place for now.

• The brake caliper came off next - 2x 13mm bolts that are difficult to access (a ratchet spanner earned it's keep here). Once off, I sat it on top of the hub, and pulled the flexi-pipe free from the clip on the bottom arm.  This ensures the pipe isn't stretched during the next steps.

• Remove the drop links.  The lower one has flats you can get a 14mm spanner onto, to hold it steady. With these off, you can rotate the anti-roll bar back and out of the way.

• Put a trolley jack underneath the bottom of the hub, raising it slightly.

• Remove the bolt from the outer end of the upper arm.

• Undo the bolt on the bottom of the shock absorber.

• Unclip the ABS cables from the upper arms.

• Slowly lower the trolley jack.  The hub will drop right down, and you should now be able to pull out the road spring by turning it 90 degrees anticlockwise (it has a rubber bayonet fitting into the upper arm).

• With all pressure off the upper arm, you should now be able to pull out the inner bolt and BAM, drag that rusty old suspension arm out!  Look at it!  You could make one out of gingerbread that would have more structural integrity!  But I digress...

Installing the new arm:

• Transfer the ABS cable clips to the new arm, then slide the new arm into the subframe.  Refit the inner bolt; it might need a little wiggling to get it to bite but it shouldn't be difficult.  Don't fully tighten it yet.

• Refit the road spring - slot it into the arm first, then turn it clockwise to engage the bayonet fitting. Notice the 2 gaps in the spring base - make sure these align with the drain holes in the arm.

• Get the jack under the bottom of the hub again, and raise it enough to get rough alignment between the top bush in the hub and the upper arm.  Refit the nut and bolt, but again don't tighten it fully yet.

• Reattach the shock absorber, and tighten to 155NM.  yeah, 155.

• Refit the caliper, and slide the brake pipe back into the clip on the lower arm.

• Refit the drop links, again not tightening fully.

• Now put the wheels back on, and lower the car - all the bolts above must be tightened once the car's weight is back on the suspension.  This is a faff of course, so use ramps or similar.

• Tighten the inner arm bolts to 120NM.

• Tighten the outer bolt to 100NM.

• Tighten up the nuts/bolts on the drop arms.

• Road test!

Here's one I prepared earlier:

Finally, selling the old arms on eBay as pieces off the Titanic should get you most of your money back: