Anti-roll bar link tightness?

It's called "buying a torque wrench".

there is usually a spacer inside, you tighten the nut till it is tight on the spacer

Thanks MrC. Nice to have someone who knows what their talking about. Cheers.

I haven't seen those with a spacer, either OE or pattern parts. I did my daughter's astra a couple of weeks ago and there was definitely no spacer. The method you used is the same as I do it, it usually means 2 or 3 threads sticking through the nut.

Steve

I assume the spacer is the hollow tube that fits in the middle. Here's a pic I found on fleabay.

My Mazda has a plastic (IIRC) spacer, but the specified way to tighten it in the service manual is 'until 25mm of thread protrudes'

When I bought it (Ebay...) both links were gone. As in... gone. No longer on the car. The anti-roll bar was just hanging loose, both ends.

It felt ever so much better after I spent twenty minutes replacing them...

Ish, it's the nylock that stops it coming undone & the spacer that sets the compression, so torques even less relevant to the desired result than normal.

Nah, you don't need that. Surely there's a British Standard 'grunt' rating? - I reckon a semi-grunt would do the job.

Ah, a different item. That IIRC was the same for early astras, but my daughters one has a ball joint one end and bushes t'other. The tube was to set the distance between the two ends, it still didn't stop under or over-tightening and squashing the bushes.

Steve

I think these cars were knocked together from all the old astra leftovers. I dug out an old astra 1984 - 1991 haynes manual and the illustration shows that you measure the distance between the top bush plates and adjust the cushion setting to 38mm (or 1.5" in old money). I'll have another check laters but I think it's nearer to f*ck it than damn it. For a fiver I might even splash out on one for t'other side to even things up.

Did the other side today but it was a bastard to remove. The hollow sliding tube corrodes to the pin and won't budge so the only way to remove is to gouge out the bottom rubber bush to gain access to the bottom of the pin and saw through it.

I remember having a similar problem doing the void bushes on a Mk II Escort. I spent ages hacksawing, digging and bashing at a rubber bush with a corroded steel tube through the middle.

Then my neighbour just walked over with a blowtorch and without a word just blasted it.

Job done, 6.3 seconds. Grrr.

I managed to hacksaw through half the bolt before getting a sweat on, then a sideways swipe of a lump hammer did the trick.