Westfield Megabusa Build Diary

14 Jan 2008
Driveshaft outer confusion

Back over Christmas we discovered that our nearside stubshaft didn't fit through the hub, and Westfield got another one to us a week after New Year. Unfortunately they had send us another offside instead. When I contested this with them they told us they had sent us a nearside! Hhhhhhmmmmm.......

After a bit of talking and checking, we worked out that the manual was wrong. The SEi manual states that the nearside has a white nut with a reverse thread, but it is infact the offside that should have this driveshaft, as the nuts must be tightened in the opposite direction to the wheel rotation! Makes sense now.

So Westfield did in fact send the stub shaft that I asked for (nearside), and I had asked for the wrong one, but this is only because their manual is wrong. At the time of writing, page 66 of the SEi construction manual is wrong. The nearside driveshaft outer (stub shaft) has a conventional thread and is fastened with a green nut. The offside has a reverse thread and is fastened with a white nut.

This still doesn't help my situation though. I still have two conventional threaded stubshafts, and on top of this I have to swap the stubshaft I have fitted on the offside to the nearside, which means removing the brakes and the drive shaft. Westfield parts are extremely good though and sorted it out very quickly once they realised what the problem was, and the correct one will be with me this week.

Laurence