Flattened Pipe
Thread Starter
Melting Slicks
Joined: Sep 2004
Posts: 2,412
Likes: 3
Flattened Pipe
I recently lowered my car even more and put on a smaller diameter tire. That plus my 3" mandrel bent pipes did not give me much ground clearance. Every 30 seconds driving around the exhaust would scrape the ground if there was an inconsistency in the road causing the suspension to compress.
Anyways I took my car back to the Muffler Man (Placentia, CA) and he replaced sections of my round pipe with flattened 3" pipes, they flow the same but give me another 1 1/2" of ground clearance.
Before
After
Anyways I took my car back to the Muffler Man (Placentia, CA) and he replaced sections of my round pipe with flattened 3" pipes, they flow the same but give me another 1 1/2" of ground clearance.
Before
After
Melting Slicks
Joined: Nov 2001
Posts: 2,659
Likes: 7
From: Katy (Houston) TX
CI 7-8 Veteran
I hope you don't do any hard launches with that setup. Your half shaft angles are way too high which is a major cause of so many of the rear end troubles you see here on the C3 forum. When your car is under a hard load, like launching, you want the half shafts parallel to the ground so the u-joints have no angle in them.
Great idea on the pipes though!
Great idea on the pipes though!
Thread Starter
Melting Slicks
Joined: Sep 2004
Posts: 2,412
Likes: 3
Tshort, from your avatar I'll assume you know what you're talking about. When I do finally get it to the track, I'll tighten the spring bolts and jack the car up 2 inches. 
Thanks for the warning.
Thanks for the warning.
Melting Slicks
Joined: Nov 2001
Posts: 2,659
Likes: 7
From: Katy (Houston) TX
CI 7-8 Veteran
No problem.
On mine, I still have all stock rear components except for solid u-joints and a 360lb glass spring. Although I haven't shocked the rear end too hard with my new motor, I beat the heck out of it with my old 383 and it's all held up fine. I'm talking 5000rpm clutch dumps with drag radials being pushed by a 450hp smallblock. The new motor is a little healthier, 600hp, but I won't treat the rear end quite as harsh w/out some upgrades. The trick is keeping the half shafts level with the ground when the rear end squats. I've accomplished this by adding larger bumpers to limit the total travel and stiff shocks. I've seen many of vettes here tear up u-joints and half shafts with stouter setups and less horsepower but the geometry wasn't right.
I wouldn't worry about it much on the street with street tires but on a prepared track, even with good street tires, you're risking things with that geometry.
Good luck.
On mine, I still have all stock rear components except for solid u-joints and a 360lb glass spring. Although I haven't shocked the rear end too hard with my new motor, I beat the heck out of it with my old 383 and it's all held up fine. I'm talking 5000rpm clutch dumps with drag radials being pushed by a 450hp smallblock. The new motor is a little healthier, 600hp, but I won't treat the rear end quite as harsh w/out some upgrades. The trick is keeping the half shafts level with the ground when the rear end squats. I've accomplished this by adding larger bumpers to limit the total travel and stiff shocks. I've seen many of vettes here tear up u-joints and half shafts with stouter setups and less horsepower but the geometry wasn't right.
I wouldn't worry about it much on the street with street tires but on a prepared track, even with good street tires, you're risking things with that geometry.
Good luck.
