Guys, after years of trusty service. I am considering selling the C3

I just don't drive it at all any more.
Last year I put on 400 miles. That's it.

Ni want to track it on an upcoming BMW HPDE day but... I dunno. Looking for inspiration.

 

just attented GT Tracks days at Road America last Monday and Tuesday, HPDE and what a great time. first session on Tuesday, passed 6 cars until I caught up with and overtook a C6. goal # 1 next is a Z. they made me run with the top up this year, felt like there was a parachute attached over 120 and couldn't get much over 135. last year over 145 on the front stretch. the new wheels and slicks realy helped with braking and cornering .lap times down 10 secs. p/s pump failures realy cut into the amount of track time, but almost have that problem resolved and ready for a SCCA event at the Milwaukee this Wednesday. Corvettes are made to be driven, even if you decide to sell your C3, do yourself a favor and go eventing 1 last time. I'm the only C3 at these events, but there is a rrumor that next year there will be a 68 BBC that I'll be able to pass. go out and pass some BMWs it's fun. Terry

 

Kind of early in the morning for a wet dream there Sluggo!

 

I was reading up on this thread since I had some time off for Turkey day, and I was curious to hear what people are up to.

I plan on doing some upgrades this winter to prepare for some events next year, and it is great to see what others are doing for ideas/inspiration.

Current plan:
1. Body is off the car so I plan on seam welding the frame and reinforcing the weak areas
2. There is also some rust in the frame that I need to repair
3. Trying to decide if the 6piston aluminum brake from Wilwood is an actual upgrade from my current brakes. (VP&P SS O-ring pistons with the thermal insulator with sets of Hawk Blue and HP plus pads)
4. Hydroboost
5. Rollbar
6. Trying to decide if I want to install an LS motor in the car
7. Ordered adjustable spring perches to adjust front ride height.
8. Not to mention the items on the body that I need to fix

I already have adjustable upper control arms, Bilstein shocks, larger front bar (can't remember size off hand)and no rear bar, VB&P tie rods, bump steer adjuster, 500# front springs, Adjustable rear composite spring, adjustable heim joint rear camber rods, BFG Rivals (275/35-18 front 295/35-18 rear) on CCW classics.

I have mostly done track days and autocross events, but I would like to do a couple of HPDE events next year.

I did not drive the car at all last year. I was pretty busy with work, and we have been fielding a car in the 24hrs of Lemons which requires much more time and money than I was expecting, although it was a blast. I am going to take a break from that and try to get back to the vette.

Here is a pic from the motorstate challenge a couple of years ago.

And now:

 

Won't a larger front bar without a rear bar create more oversteer?

 

The car is pretty well balanced with this set up. I think the changes I made to the rear end suspension geometry helped this out a lot. The car was almost undriveable if you had any kind of steering input and hard braking before the changes.

 

No, adding a bigger front bar will shift the balance to understeer. Adding a rear bar or imcreasing the size of the rear bar will add oversteer.

 

mpettus, if I had the body off my car I think I'd add the Guldstrand rear toe adjusters.

 

I am considering these, they seem pretty pricey though.

I have a set of the offset trailing arms from Van Steel. I am also looking at removing the poly bushings and welding in a heim joint or Johnny Joint.

I am kind of struggling with all the money I have put (or will put) into this thing. I could have easily bought a newer model with probably more performance.

But what would be the fun in that

 

I was thinking about the Guldstrand toe adjusters this weekend - and how to make my own. My thinking is that there needs to be a left and right hand thread to keep the assembly from loosening up during suspension movement. There would still be the 7/16 through bolt to hold everything together.

I sketched up what I was thinking on ChalkboardCAD. I think the expensive part is getting the left hand thread bolts. Any comments/suggestions?

 

Not sure about the left/right hand threaded components. My understanding is that the Guldstrand assembly uses the center bolt to tighten everything up once the toe is set (just like when using shims instead of threaded adjusters). It's difficult to tell from the picture on the website whether the adjusters are right and left handed.

 

I have both a Guldstrand multilink and a Greenwood/Apex multlink so I crapped the idea of putting these on the car. But I was liking the Global West type set up. I have seen others with a c-clip to hold the spherical in place. Then I would try to adopt to the toe adjusters! I do not like the Guldstrand Spherical bearings for a number of reasons. I will see if I can find a pic of the set up I am recommending!

Here is the Global West set up. The other I couldn't find the picture! But actually the Global west pieces might work better with toe adjusters!



PS with these you don't need the fancy dancy gun drilled bolts with the Zerk on the end from Guldstrand! Those features are what makes them expensive!!!! The Toe Adjusters!

 

My PM is proverbially full! So I gave up on it!

A number of years ago, I met a guy in your display at Carlisles I think in 2007. We talked how I chopped the ends off of my Van Steel offset trailing arms and put ends on that would take the Guldstrand sphericals or the stock bushings, or stock sized poly, etc. We also discussed Tom's Differential stuff and a number of other things about products in general. I actually saw that that conversation led to your change to your rear trailing arms and your carrying the Tom's components. My compliments on taking a customers feedback!!!!!!! It's rare that a Company is interested in a single guys engineering prospective!!!!! I didn't realize you guys were active participants on the forum and I bet that will lead to more great offerings to your customers!

 

you can make your own toe adjusters out of four short 7/8-14 bolts and 7/8-14 nuts (all RH thread), for actual bushings I would go with the Global West deal, he sells the bearing kit separately from the t-arms in the $150 range, I don`t care for the Guldstrand t-arm bushings, on my car they wore and became loose.. I raced my car (below) for 11 years in 36 vintage races and never once needed to adjust the rear toe at the track, I have spherical joints from Herb Adams (basically the same as the GW deal) and factory style trailing arm shims. my second car had the toe adjuster nuts welded into the frame and with some help (thanks Phil) determined the configuration of the 7/8 toe adjuster screws (aka 7/8-14 bolts).

 

I agree, the Guldstrand units when I ran those would work loose. Thus I ended up lock wiring everything which was a pain in the A$$! The spherical bearings were a poor design and you just had a mess back there constantly trying to keep grease in them (thus grease would be everywhere on everything!). Thus the reason for the gun drilled and zerk fittings on those toe adjusters (so you could add to the mess!). Also if anyone really wants to run those units, I believe there were too type of toe adjusters that he sold, one meant to mate to the sphericals and one that wasn't for sphericals. But I would avoid those!!!!!!

I do believe Herb Adams did this type of bearing setup or similar first and the Global West guy who puts a lot of great thought into his products also like Adams came up with the same need also independently. Yes I have seen and have pictures of some pretty creative toe adjustment set up over the years! Parts don't have to come from special vendors and some stuff from the garage could be adopted for a lot of things! I do like those stepped units, and could be done on a lathe machine. The only caution is that I don't know the diameter of his Arms vice the stock units. As I mentioned in my compliment to Van Steel above, their units required you to run a unique sized bushing and then they fixed that. Thus that would be the first question to ask pertaining to the diameter of those stepped bushings. I also like how they allow the full rotation of the spherical bearing with the final nose step being the inner side of the bearing surface!!!!! Also I bet the length is meant to capture and hold the spherical, so length is important also and a stock pair of arms could be built to factory tolerance and not precision, so you could get slob if the length and bearing width aren't matching on a stock set up arms. Thus be prepared to get the grinder out or the welder and the grinder!! But Pretty trick!!!! Yes it just allows a little bit more of fractional rotation for the tire grip, but every little special thing done, helps!!!!!!

Hell I had an electronic tach in an empty Campbells Soup can for awhile. They had a good selection of cans. Just carried the tach into the supermarket!!!!! Picked a soup I liked and had dinner with my project also! And I even left the label on it!

 

the major difference between the GW spherical kit and the Herb Adams kit is that GW holds the bearings into the tube with circle clips, the Herb Adams kit uses two small pieces of tubing that get silicon bronze welded into place..

 

So, is the separate GW spherical kit a PITA to mate with stock TA's (assuming I've read into things correctly), or is it designed to be a pretty straight forward install?

 

As to whether this setup is universal for the stock trailing arms also or unique sized for just their arms. As far as their arms, I have looked at a set and they are the highest strength, but I didn't measure anything and the quality is high (Pretty units), but I don't think he has the offset. His Delrin setups fit the stock a-arms so my money would be on betting that he sized his stuff for general Corvette usage. They have a smart product line! But checking for a person considering a buy, I would do my own double check. Someone just call them!

I am going to insult our beloved Corvettes, but was easy for me personally to look at the factory trailing arms and say how ugly they are and lacking and they are laying under a work bench!!!!!!! Also a bunch of other stuff on Corvettes should be put under the work bench or in the back of the garage!!!!!!!! Please don't get all sentimental people- I personally prefer nicely engineered pieces!!!!!! Thus anyone contemplating a purchase of stuff like we are talking about probably has come to the same conclusion!!!!!!

Here is why I can't give all of the answers. I haven't decided whether the Guldstrand (pretty) is going under my 1964 or 1968 or the Apex/Greenwood (ugly) is going under the 1964 or 1968! Also on these designs, I think we owe Tom Ryding (Chevrolet Engineering) an apology, because I know he was the one that designed the Apex unit but I think the magazines and some of us gave that credit to Bob Riley!!!!!!!!!! Thus at this point, I don't know if Riley or Ryding was responsible for the Guldstrand unit!!!!!! PS I also have to grind off the DG's because I don't put parts on the car with that type of thing!!! I hate advertising crap on my parts!!!!!!

 

OK let me get this straight....those Global West rear trailing arms with the spherical bearing in them are "on sale" for $680? I have seen the misery of the installation of a set of Global West front control arm bushings (Del Al Lum or whatever they call them.) Those parts were miserable POS stuff to install! I went with SPC upper arms and a set of self made Delrin lower solid bushings for my build after seeing the installation process of that "kit".

For my 72 LT-1 I think I'll just pull my Greenwood 5 link out of storage and start checking about installation of that rather than spend $700 on those parts. For my vintage race car, I'll get some spherical bearings spend a few hours on the lathe and make my own front bearings/adjusters. Maybe Ill make a few extras to sell so I can build my "vintage 63 Chevy 327 with the DEI Nascar crank and Carillo rods".

Derek your DG stuff is really PRETTY now your going to make me get into my stuff for a photo shoot when the wife wants her Xmass stuff out. I'll shoot some photos of my Greenwood 5 bar set-up...Riley was supossed to be involved with that set-up.

 

I did up a set of a-arms myself with the del-ums and I thought everything that was recommended was a smart thing. But on the 1964 I used them for a short while (and not because there was any problems), because I also stepped up to the unlimitedly adjustable SPC's, but mine were bought when they were under the name of pole position! Yes those are the best units for the front upper a-arms, thus I have my settings marked and change from street to track and back with minimal wrenching!!!!

On the Delum's those are slated to go onto my 1968 now, which I plan to leave as a street car. Thus on using the stock a-arms, you weld plates over the open ends and reinforce the sway bar welds and I did a few more things. Then I powder coated them. Then I shaved off the powder coating and fitted the aluminum bushings and the delrin pieces. I like the crossshaft stud upgrade (eliminating the bolts) and the recommendation of cotter pinning the nuts to keep those from backing out. I have seen a lot of loose bolts on stock a-arms from it working itself loose. The delrin works like a bearing and the rotation is smooth. Yes PITA, but I thought worth it. I have hooker sides and I had to shield from the header heat the rear bushing on the Global West setup, which is actually a good thing period unless you are running good old fashion solids like I had originally with the concentric drillings for adjustment. I still have a set up arms with the solids that are all welded and gusseted (boxed). I think the welding is all easy for anyone with some skills, what is a pain is the making it all pretty, because I didn't have a tig! I hate cutting and grinding because I am an impatient type and have had the grinders jump back and ride up my arm tearing flesh or had the cutting disks nag and fly in into the face shield etc.

The SPC's don't necessarily have any superior rotation, but the adjustability and the clearance to bring the shock through is the attraction.

Back to the SPC's eventually I do want to cut out the spring bucket and create a top shock mount thru the SPC. And run nice wiggly heims tops on the Koni double adjustables coiloversAlso there are too versions of the SPC-- Street and Race. .