With all the great info posted here on TGO, thought I'd contribute my current project on bringing my 85 TA back to life. Brief backstory: I bought this car in in early October outside Tulsa, OK with plans to recreate the first car I owned, a yellow 85 TA that I drove all through college, then sold after graduation because I couldn't afford the upkeep. 24 years and three kids later, I found another 85 yellow TA to relive my college days. I had been planning this project for awhile, and started it in bits and pieces. The recent self-quarantine has managed to accelerate my efforts a little bit. Is that the silver lining?!

Have redone the brakes and complete steering linkage. Since it is going to need an alignment for the new tie rods, decided to also replace the lower ball joints. Heck, while doing that, why not pull the complete front suspension - clean/paint and add in new springs, struts, and strut mounts?! Talk about snowballing...

Seriously though, there was so much oil/dirt/gunk caked onto the driver lower control arm and spindle that it was like concrete. In places, it was hard to tell where the gunk ended and the actual metal began - it was baked on there THAT hard. Here are some pics of the disassembly:


Last time it will be in the air with the 35 year old suspension bits!

Big gaping hole, allowing easy access to the K-member

All the original parts out

 

My primary reason for getting everything pulled out was to clean off all the grime. I had spent a couple of days under the car scrubbing and pressure washing off the Oklahoma dirt from the underside, but couldn't begin to touch the control arms or much of the K-member because the access just wasn't there. It looks like the shocks had been replaced at some point, possibly Monroe brand?

I forgot to take any pics of the disassembly, but followed the usual routine supporting the LCA, removing the strut nut in the mount, then slowly lowering the jack, allowing the spring to release its tension (had it safely secured to the K-member in case anything surprising happened). Once all parts were out, got to see the incredible amounts of crud:

** Additional pics do not seem to be uploading. Will add in later **

 

All parts have been disassembled and prepped for sandblasting. I have a cabinet I purchased years ago and used with 80 grit glass beads. Plan to blast the control arms, spindles, brake dust shields and hardware. The sway bar is mostly ready for paint - thinking of hitting it with a grinding disc to see if any of the harder crud or rough metal can get smoothed out.

Painting with some Tractor and Implement oil-based enamel from Tractor Supply. Have the primer and black paint to spray.

K-member has been de-grimed with a putty knife, stiff bristle brush, and LOTS of time. Must have pulled 5 pounds of dirt from inside, just caked in over the years. Needs a good hot soap scrub and Purple Power degreaser, then it should be good to go. Spraying the suspension components, going to brush on the K-member.

Hopefully get pics up soon!

 

Very nice. Hope to see more pics soon. I'm smack dab in the middle of pretty much the exact same project on my IROC. Got new ball joints and poly control arm bushings pressed in today.

Looking forward to your updates.

 

Trying pics again with before pics:

Somewhere under there. Is the castle nut and cotter pin.

After chiseling away with a hammer and screwdriver, the castle nut is finally visible.

Sway bar needs just some cleanup and paint.

 

After some serious scraping and hitting with the pressure washer, I got the lower control arm prepped for the sandblaster. Took a really long time!

This picture is after the first round of scraping and pressure washing. Had to keep blasting it off in chunks. Needed to use the other side that was less dirty to figure out what the shape of the arm was supposed to be, so i could see qhwre to chip away.

 

About four hours standing in front of the sandblaster today. Cleaned the away bar brackets, hub caps, hardware, dust shields and both lower control arms. I bet the LCAs took 3 of the four hours to get cleaned up. Still need to hit both spindles, and see what I can clean off the sway bar with the grinder and a flapper wheel.

Pics of the action today! Sipping a couple of beers now and swallowed some pain pills for the sore back and shoulders.

Been awhile since i had fired up the sandblaster, so started with easy, small pieces (sway bar bushing brackets pictured).

Before and after on dust shields

The top LCA is the same as pictured in my post above (#6). It is the same as shown in the booth in this post. Took a long, long tine but it finally looks presentable!

Nearing the end of work today. Pretty shot by this point, but really wanted to finish the second lower control arm.

 

Congrats on the project. Progress looks good!

 

great job. May be the angle of the pics, the hole for the end-links looks a bit wallowed out. Check that out so you're doing all that work on something which may not be serviceable

 

Here are pics of the control arms in primer. There were poly bushings for the sway bar end links.

All the work done now, painting is the easy part!

I have a parts car, could always swap the control arms, but don't relish the idea of getting those springs in and out!

 

Weather wasn't conducive for spraying today, so I opted to prime the K-member. Had scraped and scrubbed all the grime off it, so after a wipe with mineral spirits, I painted it in the car with a foam brush. I had thinned the primer a bit to try and smooth out any brush marks. Not sure it helped any, so jury is out.

Scrubbed and prepped.

Primed, will let cure for a day then start with top coats.

 

Top coat started today on the suspension parts. Still waiting for the primer to fully cure on the K member. Painted yesterday, surprised it is taking more than a day!

 

Oh how I remember those days. The type of work that takes forever. Good job and stick with it. Cooler whether can effect dry times. But primer usually dries pretty quick.

 

Since I painted with a foam brush, I know the paint is not uniform in thickness. I'm testing areas that appear to have thicker applications. Hopefully dry tomorrow as we have high chance of rain, so no second (and final) coat on the other parts. If cured, will give me a chance to put theoretical coat on the I member. Definitely keep it a thin coat.

 

Had a productive day today. Sprayed the parts and was having enough fun that I kept going and painted the K member. This pic is before the second coat, but really happy with how it looks. This is high gloss paint. Might be too shiny once all reassembled, but liking how it looks now!

First coat of black. Second coat painted today.

 

With parts all painted, I turned to one of the last steps, pressing in the ball joints and bushings. Used the Advance Auto rental tool again. Hardest part of the process on the bushings was figuring out which fittings to use and juggling them all in place while tightening the clamp down. I had followed advice from W.E.B., a member here, and had built some spacers to keep the the control arm flanges from crushing. Worked pretty well.

Spacers on, getting ready for action


I had wanted to use my shop press for the bushings, but there was just not enough room for the bushings to be centered under the press. However, I was able to use it for the ball joints. It was really easy, but was a lit of work to get the arm, joint, and fittings all centered so the joint would press in evenly. Once it got seated properly, was just a matter of working the lever.


All done! Big step towards wrapping this project up.

 

Nice work. Went through that last summer with my 84 Z. Drives much better. Now a pleasure to look at every time I remove a wheel or work underneath. And easy to wipe off new dirt.

 

FRONT SPRINGS ARE IN!! FRONT SPRINGS ARE IN!!

I'm just a tad bit excited, but starting to come back down to earth. A couple of Shiner beers helped, had to celebrate the work being done!

After researching here A LOT on what I felt would be the safest way to install the springs, I stumbled across a post from 2013 that John in RI put together with excellent detail. It involves a jack on each end of the control arm and an internal spring compressor. It worked great! John quotes 45 minutes per side... I was closer to 2 hours... EACH... That's ok, stuck at home anyway.

Anyone in the future that comes across my thread, here is the link to the tutorial that John wrote: HERE

So just took my time, worked the jacks up along with the spring, and all went pretty well. My only addition to John's excellent work is that when you line up the control arms, do your best to get them positioned as far inward as possible. I accidentally did that on the driver side, and it was fairly easy to use a pry bar on the inner part of each K-member pocket to pry the control arm forward for the bolt holes to align. Failed miserable to replicate on the passenger side and struggled mightily to push the holes inboard. Even dropped it down and started over, trying to get it positioned further inboard. Better, but still took serious work to get them positioned.

My stretch goal was to get brakes, sway bar, tie rods bolted up and wheels on the ground today. Nope, just the LCA assembly. Everything is torqued down that is currently on the car, so hoping an hour or so of further assembly will have it all finished. Fingers crossed!

Will follow with another post from my phone with pics of today's efforts.

 

Getting started on driver side. Had to bring car down to liwer setting on Quick Jack as the little red jack didn't have enough height to lift the LCA into the K member.

Compressor in place, the dance beginning

Driver side done! Time for lunch. Also, getting hot today in Central Texas!

Passenger side. The exhasut downpipe makes it really interesting to access the rear bushing.

Done!

 

Wheels are on and car is on the ground. Sway bar took much longer than I thought to get installed, found out easier to start with getting the end links started, then used a floor jack to lift the bar supports up to the frame.

Been a long time since all four tires have touched the ground. Time for alignment and cruising.

Sway bar painted and ready for installation. Found a drip from the paint job that was not 100% cured, even though it was painted last week. Guess i should have used some hardener.

Both sides done and ready for wheels to be bolted on.

 

This was a nice walk through. I'm gearing up to do the same job on my '83.

Did you ever drive the car afterwards? Was there a big noticeable difference?

 

Thanks for the tip on starting with the end links up front, I was wondering what is the best way to do it especially considering I have a Wonder Bar. I recently POR 15'd my rear axle and cleaned up/spray bombed my rear sway bar and springs along with replacing the bushings and links with poly units. Hopefully before spring I will tackle the front bushings and end links

 

Front suspension rebuild is definitely a big project, thanks to those big honking springs. However, I am constantly blown away by how tight the car feels and handles. This was one of the very first projects I did on the car after my purchase, so I do not have a lot to remember about the "Before" status. One of my joints, either a ball joint or tie-rod end link, was loose in its socket and the bushings were all in decent enough shape, just really old. Probably just replacing the 35 year old springs helped were the biggest contributor to improved handling with all the other new parts being an added benefit.

To put in perspective, I feel the car today at 35 years old and new front suspension handles better than I remember my first 85 Trans Am handling when it was only 8 years old. This car is more solid and much less squeaks and rattles.

My front end ride height is 28.0" on Driver side, 28.1" on Passenger (from ground to bottom of fender lip, measured on center of the wheel). Like an idiot, I forgot to measure before taking all the suspension apart.

I'm going through Rock Auto right now putting together the parts to rebuild the rear suspension, plus new motor mounts as that rubber looks old too.