96GS#007

My front suspension is off the car for new ball joints and new Global West del-a-lum bushings.

For you guys that have machined the factory aluminum spacers to get more camber...How much did you machine them and have you had any issues with the rear spacer cracking (it's pretty thin already)?

Thanks!

zr1mike

They're steel so that may be more work for you. The rear ones get thinned down to the point where the straight sides no longer exist, don't go any further. I put a new stock rear spacer in the front on the left side, went with the original front and no shim on the right. These cars aren't perfectly symetrical. Doing your own alignment? If not, bring some stock rears and stock fronts with you for the front. The Global bushings are a great idea, you probably loose at least 1/4 deg. when the stock rubber flexes.

astock165

I have a related question about those spacers: what is the purpose of the shape of those parts. I do my own alignments and have often wondered that.

Why not just take them out and use shims between the frame horn and the upper control arm? Is there something on the back side of the control arm I'm not seeing? I've never had the arm off the car myself.

zr1mike

They're concave on the side facing the arm. The arm is spherical where it conacts and seats into the spacer.

larryfs

my guy removed the spaces, sanded the convex off the control arm, and used shims. I wasn't happy that he did that, but the shims havn't fallen out yet.

96GS#007

Thanks for the help. You're right steel....duh.....I was thinking about the a-arms while I was typing.

Regarding symetrical...you got that right! I have no shims on the left and ~3/16" worth on the right. I think mine is one of the closer ones. Not bad I guess when one considers that the frame is late 1970s/early 1980s technology.

zr1mike

That spherical part of the cross shaft and the correspondening concave surface of the spacer are there for a good reason. It provides a seat for locating the shaft whern the surfaces aren't parallel. Sanding it off and forcing it up against the perch when it's not parallel it a great way to improperly stress the shaft. Aluminum isn't that ductile. Steel shafts can handle much more. There's a lot of loading during a 1 g turn. I know you didn't do this yourself, I just don't want to see anyone copie this without thinking. You can't go much closer anyway as the cross shaft gets close to the frame perch.

larryfs

it is not forced against the perch. there are shims between it, rather than using the factory spacer, which was too thick.