2020-era engine mounts - still too hard?

[greenbeam]

Hi all,
I've recently gotten around to replacing the cracked and sagging engine mounts with new ones that I acquired a few years back and never fitted. The vibrations through the car are terrible. Searching this forum has produced similar comments from people in 2015 -2017 about the mounts being very hard, but nothing recent.

Has anyone bought new mounts recently and found them too hard, or are the mounts available now softer?

This is for a series3 1592 in case that makes any difference.
Cheers,
Paul.

 

[65beam]

The Sunbeam mounts are specific to these cars and weren't used on other marques. Parts suppliers have to have a minimum number of pieces to have parts made at a reasonable cost. There aren't that many folks buying mounts so what you have could very well still be in the system. The question is whether different suppliers here in the states use the same supplier.

 

[greenbeam]

Yes, I guess that's another way to approach the topic.

These mounts came from the UK I think. I had someone visiting the UK bring them back to Oz for me.
Messages from 2015-17 era mention mounts from SS and VB being very hard too, but ones from the Netherlands being softer, so two sources, or perhaps some old stock in NL back then.

So just after intel as to whether anyone has bought some recently and found them softer.
Cheers,
Paul.

 

[alpine_64]

The NL ones were rootes post vintage spares.. They possibly had their own supplier as they do have several parts made for them

 

[moonstone SIV]

Paul,

Stock from Speedy Spares in the last 12 months was useless...way too hard. They are usually (Speedy), very good but I got the standard "we've sold hundreds with no complaints...." They may be coming from RPS but once again no one will clarify their sources so you can make an informed choice before being stuck with useless repro items. Incredibly frustrating...

 

[65beam]

Maybe the mounts are designed to soften up after enough oil has saturated into them. After all the engines were designed to leak oil.

 

[Bill Blue]

Has anyone investigated making motor mounts? McMaster-Carr has a good selection of rubber compounds and durometers to look at. I most likely am talking through my anal pore as I cannot recall anything about the construction of the mounts. But my natural inclination is whenever I cannot find what I want, I make it.

Bill

 

[Tom H]

The Alpine motor mounts are pretty simple. I suspect you could find appropriate rubber to use and just salvage the original plates. But I don't know how you would bond the rubber to the steel, like the original Metalastik. Here's a link to the present UK company that includes Metalastik. But I don't see any answers here:
https://www.trelleborg.com/en/anti-...cts--and--solutions/anti--vibration--products

Tom

 

[Bill Blue]

I know it is not the same, but super glue will hold rubber rubber onto itself or steel with a death grip. Just clean the parts with acteone, apply glue and assemble. Very difficult to separate when in shear.

Bill

 

[Barry]

Achieving good metal-to-rubber adhesion has been difficult for a long time. The engineering problem is the huge difference in modulus between metal (very stiff = high modulus) and rubber (very flexible = low modulus). For anyone who is interested in a better understanding of the basics of rubber-to-metal adhesion, this link has some very good information:

https://www.lord.com/products-and-s...bonding/adhesion-science-rubber-metal-bonding
​

The link is commercial (Parker / Lord / Chemlok), but most of the information is generic and is "brand" agnostic.

 

[65beam]

Now I know why I've saved all those old engine mounts! Better than new stuff.