So, after buying my new-to-me Dark Silver '05, I realized that the passenger strut tower was very, very deformed. I'm not a fan of the idea of hammering the sheet metal, so started to think of better, safer, and more efficient ways to fix this issue on R53's. I'm working with someone to build a tool that will fix mushroomed towers without any hammering. It will use an oversized under-plate, a central T-bolt, and a hub up top that fits in and over the strut tower opening.

Is the community interested in renting such a tool? I'll have more photos and information soon.

 

Personally, no. 3lb sledge and a soft 2x4 does the job just fine if you're careful.

 

ditto, mine were quite deformed...all good now. Installed some Madness under plates and has been good for years.

 

A 2 X 4 and dead blow hammer are what to use and hammer away. Have a pair of tower defenders ready, no point in going to that trouble if you're not going to prevent it from happening in the future. Remove the strut nuts, install the plates then re-torque to 25#.

 

Good intentions but the posts reflects that there are allot of "hammer" mechanics here.

 

"Re-bending" the material is...rebending the material. Either method IS stressing the material. Both methods should be done slowly and carefully. Using a hammer with just a coupla good dead blows is NOT a good method.
BUT, as long as the person wielding the hammer uses care and some basic body working skills/knowledge, the material should be fine with the hammer method.

Rebending with a fixture... That "could" be somewhat of a can-o-worms. Depending on exactly how, how much, where the major amount of deformation is, could actually require different fixtures, or at least different sections of a given master tool.
Same thing here. If the tool is just pushing the material back into shape with a couple of turns of a wrench...not really a good idea. A slower more careful method stresses the material less.

Mike

 

No worries. This is about what I expected, honestly.

As an Engineer, I try to do things the correct (or at least better) way. If everyone is happy pounding on their towers with wood & hammer, that's perfectly fine. I was able to bring a massively deformed tower perfectly flat in 2 minutes without banging on things with a 3lb sledge.


Conversely, you feel that any hammer-wielding amateur can properly assess and straighten the sheet metal better than a tool that covers the entire area of concern, and flattens it uniformly? I respectfully disagree. Currently, there is no better, slower, or more careful solution to flattening towers than this tool or one like it. Though, the bar is certainly set low when the only other solution involves a sledge and wood chunks


This isn't exactly accurate. The Residual Stresses that remain in a material after shaping/forming are not identical across all shaping/forming processes. Agreed though on your points about blindly banging on things with a hammer.




2 Before photos and 1 After photo are attached. Obviously I installed new tophats (and undertower plates AND STD's) following the work.

 

My younger brother was a engineer, dual disciplines; civil and structural. The Sunshine Skyway went down when he was in college. I remember him telling me they were figuring the pull out calculations on some bolts and he asked the professor why they had to do calcs when there were books that did it. The answer was "That is why bridges fall." Of course that was before the time of grade school kids doing math with calculators. He also told me about another engineer that was designing a new column to be placed on an existing pile cap. The guy had the placement tolerances to like a 1/16" of inch. My brother worked with our family in the field and knew that as concrete aged it got REALLY hard. Add in a laborer with a hammer drill trying to drill an 1 1/4" hole with a drill bit that had a tip that was basically rounded to 1/4" and the 1/16" factor was out the door.

Back on topic, I found that most engineers had such high safety factors figured into everything they did, it took a real bad screw-up to really damage something beyond repair.

Oh and back in the day, we on the construction side were usually always smarter than the A and E's we dealt with. The game was letting the A & E's think they were smarter than us . . . . . . . .

 

Point taken. Hands-on field experience and having a firm grasp on the actual science/concepts are not synonymous, nor can they replace one another. I'm actually an Engineering Technician, so I get to play both sides; practical and conceptual.

Anyhow, I just wanted to offer this to the community, because I feel it's superior in several ways to using the wood & sledge technique.

 

In case no one's said it--thanks a bunch for your concern. It's people like you that come up with innovative ideas that help solve problems...

 

Ebay seller "Donald The Bonald" is the actual creator/builder.

I just hope someone can get some use out of it, or make their own.

 

This is one of the DIY tools I've seen in the past. He made a tool to pull the tower back down and used a wood block and hammer to "fine tune" the towers. The tool sounds similar to yours, but definitely looks homemade. Pics are in the link of the first post.

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...om-repair.html

 

I've seen that post- thanks. This tool is similar in appearance and functions the same way.

What I found is, the tool was effective with just a plate or hub that centered over the strut mount hole (achieved ~75% flatness), but was 100% effective when used in conjunction with an upper strut tower defender plate (ECS, VIP, etc). The reason being, these defender plates actually lay directly over the deformed area, whereas a centered hub does not. Because I made this a two-step process and used STD plates to aid flattening, I didn't need to use a hammer at all to achieve the result posted above.

 

Great idea using top strut tower plates to pull everything together.

I think the VIP plates have the most attention to detail and design. The perfectly contoured recesses for the strut tower ridges seem a lot stronger than the square edged grooves in other plates, and the machined T-nuts give more thread engagement without making the plate weaker by recessing the holes.

 

Agreed. The custom nuts are a thing of beauty. I'm using the VIP upper-plates in conjunction with 4.5mm thick under-plates. I put longer mounting studs in my strut tophats for more thread engagement. It's looking.....strong.

 

is there any harm in leaving it with a tower defender or camber plate under it?

 

I'm not sure I follow. An assembled strut/spring or coilover can not be mounted to the car when the tool is in use. Does that answer your question?

 

leaving the mushroomed strut tower alone, a camber plate or strut defender mounds under it, and wont even touch the parts of the tower that are typically bent up

 

I apologize, but I truly don't understand your question.

Your statement above is generally true; an Under-tower plate or camber plate will not touch the deformed areas until the sheet metal is flattened.

The tool uses a double-thick undertower plate to act as a mating surface for the soon-to-be flat strut tower.

 

Just as a follow-up, this tool will likely soon be available from Ebay Seller 'Donald The Bonald'. He also makes Under-Tower plates, Fixed Camber Plates, Adjustable Rear Control Arms, etc. Everything is overbuilt and well-finished. Even better, his support for his products is better than many of the other Mini specific vendors.

 

Moving out of pot hole states is the permanent solution...

 

Are YOU “Donald-the-bonald”?

 

No matter how you "reset" the tower you are forcing metal around that has already been stretched.

As mentioned, if you happen to be one of those guys with a certain set of skills that can magically make origami swans from a flat plate of titanium (aka a real sheet metal master) then you may be able to take a day or two and get the metal to shrink properly as not to create or minimize stress risers in it.

If not, it doesn't matter how you apply the force (Tool, Hammer, Sibling's skull), you're still forcing the tower back into the shape (or close) it was and creating stressed points in the steel.

If you like buying one time use tools that do the same as a hammer you already own, have at it.

 

No, nor am I directly affiliated.

 

As is said before, residual stresses are not uniform or equal across all sheet-metal forming methods, but, if you feel that blindly hammering on your car with a sledge is akin to what I'm proposing above, perhaps you're not the type that understands or appreciates the advantage.

The reality is this: Somewhere along the line, somebody took the quick & dirty route of hammering their towers back in shape, and shared it with others. This appeals to people because it's inexpensive and fast(?). This is different than being good or even correct.

Let's be clear, since reading comprehension is in short supply these days: The idea was to rent the tool, because as you so astutely realized, buying it wouldn't make sense.

I am not directly affiliated with the manufacturer of this and am not receiving anything in return for mentioning the tool here. I merely worked with "Donald The Bonald" to realize the tool, and wanted to share a better method with you all. Happy Hammering.