Just about gathered all the bits together for my 'rolling restoration'. This is already on



and so are these:



Now it's time for this little lot:



I've also got front drop links, roll bar rubbers and I'm trying to sort something out for the rear subframe bushes. Subframe and front struts should be coming off tomorrow or Thursday. Hoping to get it all done in time for our hols.......

You'll need a holiday after all that!!
Fair play, only getting around to doing a few jobs myself.
Do I see the swing arm bearings there in the middle of that lot???
I still have mine in a nice box in the shed!!....looks like a beeech of a job bit planning doing them with swingarm in situ.
Marty.

Good luck!!
When I changed my clutch and dmf we dropped the subframe...this made changing the wishbones a piece of ****...just a bit of advice if u need it.

I must confess I've had to wimp out on the clutch and DMF fitting. I'm so busy with work at the moment that I've had to pay someone to do it. Of all the fitting jobs, it was the one I was least looking forward to so I can't say I'm too disappointed. It's a job that's a lot easier for two people to do (I haven't got a second bod to hand) and on a ramp (I haven't got one of those either!).

I am looking forward to doing the suspension bits though. I plan to strip the rear subframe completely and have it shot blasted and powder coated. I still harbour ambitions of getting custom PU bushes made for it. Hopefully, doing the trailing arm bushes will be fairly easy with the arms removed from the car. I've already renewed the drums, shoes, cylinders, brake adjusters and brake fitting kits (springs etc). I'm not going anywhere near the ABS sensors (too fragile!).

There's a guy in a small workshop just up the road from me who's got a rather nice floor mounted hydraulic spring compressor so I can get the old struts apart and the new ones together without risking life and limb. I was thinking about getting PU bushes made for the front wishbones, but looking at the way those bushes are made I don't think that will be on.

Be careful when doing up the rear mounting on the arm...I managed to strip one...as the alu is soft as anything!

Wish I had the balls to do this. I also wish I had the know how.
Fair play to you.
Ta

Bloody hell! total rebuild! The bushes went in fine but you really need a press!
I sweated mine in no problem. Which shocks did you go for B4 or B6? Apart from the a/c compressor and DMF Ive done all that over the last four years. Just returned from a 2356 mile round trip from Germany including the Nurburgring no probs!
The rear brake lines needed to be cut off as they had seized. You can order the real things from fiat or make copper ones up. Theres also a set of plastic clips on the subframe, there about £2 from fiat as they need to be cut off(like a band with a mounting for the brake line). I also used locktite on the 4 bolts holding the subframe on. I just sanded the sub frame and painted it with red hermite and then hamerite.
Where did you get the callipers refurbed? Big red? Is yours a face lift or an original shape? I would recommend a four wheel alignment as this will set every thing back up. If not it can easily scrub a set of tyres off if its not set up properly.

Only Bilstein B4 are available for the Multipla. Originally I tried to go with Koni dampers, but gave up - they would have to be built at the factory. They didn't appear to know which drawings to work to, they only supply the damper insert, so the original damper leg would have to be used and the bottom of it drilled to accept the cartridge, and they couldn't give any idea of how long it would take. The Bilsteins were a doddle; ordered from Balance Motorsport (they were the best price I could find) and a few days later they turned up, direct from the Bilstein factory in Germany.

Clutch, DMF and timing belt kit (inc. water pump) were done without a problem by Optima Motors. To all the folks with a small oil leak from the bottom of their clutch bell housing - the crank oil seal was leaking. It's a big diameter seal, so the rotation speed at the seal tip will be high, leading to high wear rates. The old one looks tired. The oil seal on the gearbox side was fine (and much smaller diameter). They're not cheap (about £30) but in the overall scheme of a clutch and DMF replacement, worth doing while it's apart.

It will only cost me a tenner to get the rear subframe shot blasted and it will be a far better job than I could ever do with a cup brush and sander. I didn't get started on it today (chucked it down with rain this afternoon and didn't fancy being out in that!). Will be on to it tomorrow if it's dry though. I really want to get the PU bushes made for that subframe!

Yes, the calipers were refurbed by Bigg Red. Cost was about £125 including postage both ways. I sent my own calipers up to be rebuilt rather than exchange. All new seals, pistons, slider bearings, and the carriers were blasted and recoated as well. They did a very nice job. The steering rack was completely rebuilt with shimming checked and all seals, bellows and track rod arms/ends replaced with new parts. I had trouble finding somewhere that could do the rack - took it to a company in Bristol in the end.

Finally, mine's a round nose :slayer: The square-nose isn't fit to wear the badge :yuck:

I replaced all four coil spring in April with Sachs and rear shox. Did the front shoxs last year. Got oem from my local dealer they turned out to be monroe shox's… The old rear ones were done as it bounced down the road! As I said Ive done nearly everything you have done. When you do the trailing arm bearings, save one of the old bearing cups to use as a drift for the new one. I had a bug nose for 15 months then got a c-max but hated it as they have no space. So we got a facelift Multi and we have had it 4 years now. I need new brakes soon as the pads are nearly done. I'm going to use Ferodo DS2500 as Ive heard good thing about them.But they are not cheap at about £120 a set and grooved discs. Ive have green stuff now but they don't have enough bite, but they seem to be getting better with age. The are an adventure… one of the guys at work has a Civic and he's only ever replaced a bearing in the box in six years!! There's a couple of blister rust spots appearing which I will attend to soon as I don't want them taking hold. We intend to keep it a few more years yet as I can't think of anything else to do the job barring a Touran but they are still more expensive.
Good luck with yours.

It'll be interesting to see what the Bilsteins are like. I'm not after firmer damping, just better control than the tired originals I've just removed. Rear subframe, both front struts and wishbones removed this afternoon. All went pretty smoothly - only two small bolts got sheared, everything else behaved itself. My Multi is now sat on the drive on four axle stands. A little bit of Toxteth in the Wiltshire countryside .

DS2500 are good, but as you say they are scary money. Probably overkill for a Multi. Interesting that you've got greenstuff though. I was wondering about a set of those. I had a good quality set of grooved discs on my old Mondeo ST and I will never get another set - they make a real groaning racket under braking and eat pads for lunch.

I'm not at all impressed by the Touran. Way over-priced SH and a horrible step in the floor with rear seats removed. They're nowhere near as well thought out as the Sharalaxy and don't drive particularly well either. If only the Multi had a more potent diesel; it does feel gutless compared to some of the other diesels I've had. At least it revs failry sweetly (for a diesel).

A friend said grooved discs eat pads some made be a set of brembo or omp or oem brake discs next time. I managed to get oem last time from a guy selling a load of genuine bits for £37.00!. I know what you mean about the power… could do with a 130bhp motor, although I had not problems on the autobahn. Steady 80/85 no prob! Just a bit light at the front end with all the weight in the back over 85mph. We did over 300 mile every day for 4 days no probs at all. Once cruising the lack of power wasn't an issue. As I said I do recommend a 4 wheel alignment done as well. Made a big difference with mine as I had shredded 2 sets of front tyres running off on the inside.
Any chance of a picy seen as you know how to upload them? We have a mac pc and don't have a clue how to use it properly!
If only VW had made the multi! then again it would still cost a fortune!
I'm glad I sorted the rear bushes out.. as the had lasted 90k miles… Just at some point I'm going to have to do it all again if I keep it that long!

One of my new discs has been mullered. Not by me but I've got a pretty good idea who. They've only been on for a couple of thousand miles so I'm not too happy . However, they were the cheap discs from a2z on ebay and wasn't overly impressed with them, so now's the time to replace them I guess. Not sure which ones to buy. EBC have a good reputation but they're not cheap; I'm open to suggestions!

Anyway, here's a photo or two. Not much done this weekend because of other commitments, but hope to finish stripping the subframe tomorrow evening and take it for coating on Tuesday. Despite the front subframe bushes being completely shot, I ended up having to burn them out because they simply wouldn't budge. The rear ones were simpler - a few belts with a club hammer and they popped out.





BTW, for anyone that's interested, these are the correct measurements for the rear subframe bush holes:

Front - dia.64.5, rim depth 13.5mm, fixing bolt M12 fine (1.25 pitch) x 90 long approx.

Rear - dia. 74.5, rim depth 12.5mm, fixing bolt M12 fine (1.25 pitch) x 100 long approx.

There's a hole in the bottom of the (hollow) swing arms which lets crud in up to the back of the bearing spacer. This is a stupid design as other than this the inside of the swingarms would be a sealed void which would help to preserve the bearings. These holes are dia. 29 or 29.5. I'm going to see if I can find a hole bung for them.

One other thing - the wires from the rear ABS sensors can be unplugged. I you trace the wire forwards, it goes through a grommeted hole in the floor/sill. If you remove the plastic threshold trim in the rear doorways on both sides, you'll find the connector. Unplug this, prize the grommet out of its' hole and then you can pull the whole lot out under the car. I unhooked the two exhaust rubbers, disconnected the brake lines, released the handbrake cables at the yoke where the three cables meet, unplugged the ABS sensors on both sides and then dropped the whole lot down and dragged subframe and all out from the back of the car. Took two of us less than 45 minutes. I was amazed - thought it was going to take a lot longer than that .

One question - how do I get the front ARB out? Can't figure out what to undo - the bolt heads seem to be hidden!

Nice looking multi... Mines the metallic blue.
What's that called???... Haven't seen one that color around here(southern Ireland)

I see you have the stains below the mirrors aswell... I'm gonna try some autoglym super resin polish on mine... Will let u know if it clears it up.
Marty.

Love the pile of bits out the back of the picture!! Thats what mine was like when I did mine! Good quality brakes are what you need! No skimping in that department! Glad things are going well… keep the updates coming.

Quick update. Some photos of the rear subframe:

First up, as removed from car. Bump stops, top mount for dampers all pretty sound. All four subframe mounts are shot (fronts more so than rears). Rear mountings have already been removed in this piccy.



Next up, stripped subframe, ready to go for paint stripping and shot blast. The bump stops are a pain to get off (think I got lucky there judging by the number of people complaining about theirs coming adrift in other threads) but all fittings can be removed without destroying them if you take care. The pressed steel cones that the bump stops fit to are a thinner gauge steel than the rest of the suframe - check them for rust holes. Generally, lots of surface rust but nothing too serious. Shot blasting will reveal all however.

I'm taking it for cleaning up and coating later today, which will take around a week. Also ordered new pinch bolts for the front struts and wishbone/front hubs (not cheap, and MOQ of 5 pieces, which is a pain). All the old ones were slightly stretched. The nuts for same are extortionate (over £5 each with the VAT , so make sure you don't loose them) so they'll be going back on with threadlock as they're in good nick anyway.

Front ARB bolt heads are accessed through holes in the subframe, they're a standard size (10 or 13mm), if you feel for the bolts on the mounting brackets it's fairly easy to work out which hole to use.
N.B. You'll need an extension to put the socket on, be careful when withdrawing it as it's easy to catch either the bolt or the socket and lose them in the subframe.

Thanks momoe. So it's just one bolt per side?

I replaced all my nuts and bolts, shox and anti roll bar bolts and nyloc nuts. Wish I had got my subframe shot blasted but couldn't find anybody local to do it for cheap. Did you have any trouble getting the swing arm bolts out? One of mine seized in and had to be cut out. I copper slipped them both when I reassembled them. I have 2 spare brake hose bands and a couple of clips for the trailing arms. The ones that clamp the abs sensor and brake line if you are interested? Email me if you want them and I will post them. When do you expect to have it all back together? Its a great feeling knowing you've done all the work and not paid anybody! Thanks for putting up the picys… Good luck.

Did you use Fiat nuts and bolts? That would have cost a fortune.

Quick progress update. I got the subframe back from the powder coaters yesterday (Thursday). It wasn't the usual place that I used, but they were recommended to me because they do a lot of car restoration work. They weren't cheap, but I'm really impressed by the quality of the job they've done. The prep was obviously very thorough - the surface finish is lovely, with the exception of those areas that had been pitted by rust, but all of the rust was blasted out. They also linished all the sharp edges before coating, so there isn't any thinning of the finish at corners etc. Perhaps the best sign is the amount of effort I had to put in to remove the coating from the inner faces of the subframe bush holes - it was a real bar steward to get off. I also got to see the grey primer powder coat that they told me they had used. It's in a different league to the oem finish.

Anyway, on to the pictures. I fitted the subframe bushes this afternoon. In the end, I cooked up a collection of bits and pieces to make a simple press:



I bought three bits of tube from a local steel stockholder to fit around the mouting faces of the bushes and press on the outer body flange. They charged me £12 (bloody rip-off) for bits that they'd normally chuck in the bin. The jobsworth manning the tube saw couldn't have cut them more on the p1ss if he had tried. Needless to say, they won't be getting a Christmas card from me this year . I then slit the tubes along their length to ease them around the bush flanges (above and below the subframe) and drilled a couple of old bits of angle iron to act as the cross bearers. A long M12 bolt goes through the whole lot (including the bush) and the nut tightened to press the bushes into place, like this:



I can post the sizes for bits bits of tube if anyone's interested.

It worked a treat. I didn't have to file the holes for the larger (rear) bushes out much beyond just removing the powder coat. The bushes are an almost perfect press fit. As you can see, the force applied bent the angle iron a little, but wasn't anywhere near enough to stretch the M12 bolt. The holes for the front bushes had to be filed out a little more. I went for an interference fit of 0.15-0.25mm and that was just about right. I used a smear of PTFE lube on the bushes to help them into place.



All in all, I'm pretty happy with things so far. One small annoyance is that I pressed one of the larger bushes into place rotated about 20 degrees out from the correct orientation in a bit of a senior moment (the larger bushes are directional for stiffness). Tomorrow I'll fit the trailing arm bearings, springs, dampers and all the other little fittings (including warming up some waxoyl to run down the inside of the cross tube), then it will be ready for putting back on the Multi. Assembled with trailing arms etc, it's a heavy lump so I'm hoping to get a local mechanic to give me a hand with that in the week, so I'll move on to the front end.....