Eagles International Forum

I was looking at the pictures that Wayne posted of his 1994 Eagle 15 and came across something that may be of concern.

After viewing the pictures that showed the drive axle torsion bars, I noticed that the keyways were welded on the top and the bottom of the housings. This can cause the housings to split. This was detected back in the early 80's when Eagle started having multiple failures due to split housings. Without notifying Eagle, the vendor made this change. The keyways should be welded on the sides. For some reason having them welded on the top and the bottom causes different stress loads on the inner spring. The problem did not always present itself. It mainly occurred from people not maintaining their suspension adjustment or carrying a loaded bus for extended trips and over poorly maintained roads. These keyways hold the inner spring in place. The inner spring assembly is made up of a steel tube which your fixing arms attach to, heavy duty rubber is bonded to that tube and then there are two steel half shell casings which are bonded to the outer part of the rubber. The half shell casings create a channel for the keyways in the housing so that when the spring assembly is pressed into the housing it will not turn. This allows the rubber to be wound up and gives you your smooth ride. So basically, your keyways are what keeps your coach up and therefore have a lot of stress on them.

If you are looking at buying an Eagle Coach, remember to inspect the housings on the drive axle, especially since your motorhomes are esentially loaded all of the time. I am not saying that if they have the welded keyways on the top and bottom that they will fail, but certainly they have a greater chance of failure.

Dan

Dan, I know from experence you do not grind the welds down mine were welded on the sides and a guy ground them down to do a repair big Big mistake on his part and mine for letting him do it.was good for Jefferson good luck

Clifford hi,did the thing split after it was ground on?,what kind of repair was being attempted that required grinding ? .I wanna Know so mine don't ever get a grinder to it

For those of us who are looking to purchase an Eagle, could you repost the photo in this thread. Also, pointing to the problem area would be of great help. My learning curve is steep and very enjoyable now. Thanks

Right on I second the motion

Wayne,

Can you post your picture that is on Project Eagle's of the drive torsion bar with pointers to the keyways on this thread?

Dan

Dan

Jim has been posting my pictures he is teaching me we will get that picture posted some how

I think this is the photo we are talking about:



I just looked at mine and the splines are on the top ('85 model 10).

Dan, it sounds like this was a significant issue and one that might be safety related. Did Eagle issue a recall and/or notify DOT?

Is there a fix for this situation? How about a two piece machined collar than would bolt around the housing at each end?

Jim