King pin shims

It looks as if it's possible to shim up king pins without dismantling the hub, but is it ? Anybody know?

yer take the wheel off undo 4 bolts pop out king pin put shim in and replace all that was removed

Did this the other week.

Exactly as markyp2000 says.

Needed to remove the brake caliper to get to the bolts. If I recall correctly, the bolts need tightening to 18lbft on the torque wrench. I used some blue Hylomar on the Kingpin to create a gasket when putting it back together.

The shims worked a treat. Thanks BigJimny shop!

iv never put shims in mine but where do thay go top or bottom

could be either or both, depends where the play is.

The jimny doesn't normally need shims: the machining was done well enough that the bearings preload within tolerances when you just bolt the kingpins into new bearings.

If play develops, it is because water has got into the swivel housing, and the bottom bearing has rusted and worn, the top bearing tends to wear lines where the rollers are in the straight ahead position too.

Changing the bearings is fairly easy, and the way to go. (Unless you are selling and need an MOT pass, then you whip the calliper off and pull the top pin, and put shim washers around the pin: the pin is stepped to press on the inner bearing race, the shims move the step down. This is the opposite of landrover, where the shims have 4 holes in and lift the pin to reduce preload)

There is nothing in the manual about preload, but one way to get more preload, and reduce wheel shimmy with good bearings is to use soft copper shim washers, like in the olden days, these give a bit more preload without the hassle of continually changing the shims and checking the force to turn the swivel housing.