A wise move, my bikes only have to have a dust cover thrown over them in the bike house, but a car outside is going to be hit with the sun drying out the screen rubbers and cooking the dash and top of the steering wheel
The ship has sailed on to Ghana so my GTM (hopefully) is sitting on a dock in Lagos, still waiting to hear more from the shipping agent when it is cleared
John

Disappointingly I've had to return my front shocks to Pro Tech for refurbishment, got the car out of the garage the other weekend to wash off the grime from going to Exeter only to find a puddle of oil on the floor from the nearside shock. They've achieved 9 years and 36K.
Pro Tech were very quick, turning them around in less than a week and got them back yesterday . Cost £84 inc postage + £13.35 to post to them =£93.35.

Bob

I've just fitted the first Protech rear shock & it is very close to the tyre - probably about 1mm gap. This seems a bit too close to me. Can anyone else with Protech rear shocks please tell me what gap they have.
The base of the Protech shocks are much wider than the Avo's that i had before, but i'm only running 205 tyres on the rear & i'm sure quite a few of you run 215's.
Wondering if i need some wheel spacers or is it OK as it is?
Cheers

Bob
Was that the cost for both or each. Just wondering, for future reference (in 9 years )
If for both, thats not too bad - works out at a tenner a year

sven
The problem you have with clearance is likely to be due to protech redesigning rear shocks to make them more standard design due them being so long. To do this they used information Don gave them from his car with mk 1 type rear suspension and unknown wheel offset and 205 tyres on maybe 7 inch wheels I think yours will be the same as Sidewinders wheels which are 7.5 inch wide giving least amount of clearance have at look at his posts titled AP 4pots or suspension woes and you will see the differences. 1mm clearance no good any flex or wear in balljoints or wheel bearings then it will rub tyre so may have to space wheel out to get safe clearance

Thanks Mark.

Mine's running 7x 17 inch wheels & i think mk1 suspension.

Here's pics of it


With the Protech


As it was with Avo's

Have to agree with you that its no good as it is (it would just worry me).
I'm thinking of 5mm spacers - do you think this is enough or should i go more?

Hi Sven

That was for both,cost was reasonable but I expected them to do more than 36k.
Repair each £30 + £10 postage + VAT = £84.

What camber are you running Looks a big gap with the Avo's but tooo close with the Pro Tech's, will rub on the first corner you go round or even going over a bump.
My rear Pro Tech's are constructed like the Avo's [so no help to you] and has a 12mm gap to the tyre, running 1.5' camber.

Bob.

Hi Bob
Not sure what camber i'm running. Haven't checked any wheel alignment settings since i've had the car.
Been meaning to do it for last few months but not got round to it. It doesn't look excessive by eye, for what its worth.
I'm now thinking about 10mm spacers to be on the safe side, but will need to change the wheel studs to allow this. Anyone know what the wheel stud size are (M12 x 1.5 and standard length???).

Have you jacked the car up and manipulated the wheel up/down (without the spring on!) to its max travel to see if the clearance changes? I would put the minimum thickness spacers that you think you can get away with - test how much looks ok using washers etc. between wheel n hub first.

I was thinking of getting Protechs at some point but this has put me right off.

SAS

Thats a good idea. I'll give it a try. Thanks.

I've ordered 5mm spacers & see what they're like when fitted. Might be able to go to 7mm - i'll see. Any more than that (eg. 10mm) & i'm sure i'll need to change the studs as well.

The problem with the new Protec coilovers has arisen because of the different type of wheels that have been used over the years.
When RDM designed the new suspension it was designed for the MG TF wheels which had a much smaller offset than the original
GTM wheels. Hence the GTM wheels will not fit on the RDM suspension.
This problem is now carried over to the new Protec shocks. I have Team Dynamic wheels which are J7x16 and have 205 wide tyres.
and I believe are similar to the MG TF wheels. When measuring the inside of the wheel from the rim to the boss face my dimension
is 127mm or 5" (giving an offset of 25.4mm or 1") This gives me a clearance between my tyre and the new Protec shock of 14.5mm.
I asked Bob Snooks to measure his (original GTM) wheels and his dimension from the rim to the boss face was 147mm.
20 mm greater than mine. This means that if he tried to fit these shocks his tyre to shock clearance would be MINUS 5.5mm A big interference.
I would therefore suggest that anyone thinking of fitting the new rear Protec shocks should measure their wheels and a dimension
of greater than say 130mm, means that they my not have sufficient clearance.
Protec are now aware of this problem and are considering a design change to overcome it.

Measured my wheels today & the rim to boss face is 140mm. This fits with your measurements Don, as i have about 1mm clearence betweem shock & tyre.
Fitted the 5mm spacers which i received today. Not yet sure if its OK like this,as i didn't have time to check properly before it got dark. Probably have to wait til the week-end now.

Next to do is the fronts. Hope they fit without too much bother

Fitted the fronts today without any problems.

Then done Sidewinders suggestion of removing the spring on the rear shock & moving the wheel up and down to check if the clearence varies. It goes from 6mm clearence at normal height, to about 10mm when fully extended & down to about 2mm when compressed. Not sure if i'm happy with this - think i'd still prefer a bit more to be on the safe side!

Then went for a little run in it to try them out. What a difference, the ride is soooo much better. Most of the clunks & bangs that i used to get from the rear suspension are now gone. Couldn't really try the handling out as it was mostly wet/ muddy/slippery & think i'll need to experiment/set the damping. Started with only a few clicks of damping on each shock & think it definitely needs more.

Overall i'm very pleased with the swap from Avo's to Protech. Think the rear clearence problem is to do with the different wheels i have fitted & nothing to do with Protech's design. Even with this small set-back its still very much worth it.

Nice. What length/rate springs did you get from Protech?

Before adding any more spacers, maybe factor in how far up the susp can travel before eg. the spring is fully compressed etc. Then see if the gap at that point is ok.

Oh and can you measure the diameter of the fat (problem) part of the protech shock please? This will give me an idea if they'd be ok for me.

SAS

I ordered 8" 225lb for the fronts & 10" 300lb for the backs. Seems to be the general recommendation at the moment...

I'll measure the base of the shocks when i get a moment (youngest daughters birthday today so been a bit busy... )