knuckle kingpin shims

Ok, I give... what purpose do they serve? Gotta be a reason for them or they wouldn't be there. But I'm not seeing it... anyone know? I've got two on one on the right side, one on one on the left side, and none on the other two. What's the deal here?

 

yup. I got a whole pack I can send you, Brian. Along with the wheel bearing seals. Duke didn't want them with speedy. There yours if you send me an addy

 

Ok, baby-step me through this one, I'm new to this stuff...

Preload? *quizzical look*

 

http://earlycj5.com/forums/showthread.php?t=20059&highlight=king+pin+shims

 

Didn't you just get out of engineering school????

Its simple, you put it back together with obviously more shims than you need, torque the bolts down, check the tension on the knuckle with a fish scale attached to the tierod hole, you remove shims until it takes "X" amount of force on the fish scale to move the knuckle. Can't remember the amount of tension. The older axles used shims under both top and bottom caps on the khnuckle, the later models only used them on the top.

 

Ok, that makes sense. Danke.