Suspension help?
Thread Starter
Heel & Toe
Joined: Jul 2007
Posts: 19
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Suspension help?
On two occasions, I have bumped my oil pan on speed bumps and have caused problems. One time, the oil pickup tack weld broke and the pick up fell off, which lead to "spun bearings". The second time, it caused a small crack in the bottom of the oil pan.
As you could imagine, this is getting old. My car was originally a 427/390 car. Now I have a pretty high horsepower 454, and the front springs, shocks, and suspension are just weak.
I have been planning to rebuild my suspension to try to get my ride height back up, and I plan to use one of Dragvette's 4 point suspensions on the rear. My fear is that when I put the new front coil springs in to get the front up, and the 4pt rear suspension which I think is going to bring the axles straight and cause the rear height to drop and make the car look like it is in hard acceleration while sitting still.
Does anyone have any suggestions? The only thing that I can think to do, is to make a spacer to mount between the rearend housing and the frame to get the body up, and allow the 4pt suspension to keep the axles straight. Has anyone ever tried this? Is this too crazy of an idea?
As you could imagine, this is getting old. My car was originally a 427/390 car. Now I have a pretty high horsepower 454, and the front springs, shocks, and suspension are just weak.
I have been planning to rebuild my suspension to try to get my ride height back up, and I plan to use one of Dragvette's 4 point suspensions on the rear. My fear is that when I put the new front coil springs in to get the front up, and the 4pt rear suspension which I think is going to bring the axles straight and cause the rear height to drop and make the car look like it is in hard acceleration while sitting still.
Does anyone have any suggestions? The only thing that I can think to do, is to make a spacer to mount between the rearend housing and the frame to get the body up, and allow the 4pt suspension to keep the axles straight. Has anyone ever tried this? Is this too crazy of an idea?
Team Owner
Joined: Aug 1999
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SPARTAN
CI 3-4-5-6-8-9-10 Vet
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If you're using a stock-style rear spring, there should be plenty adjustment to bring the rear ride height to where it needs to be. As suggested, maybe a new rear spring is in order while you're doing all of the other work.
Le Mans Master
Joined: Apr 2007
Posts: 7,353
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From: Graceland in a Not Correctly Restored Stingray
Is drag racing your overriding priority? If not, eliminating camber gain (that's when the outside tire leans in relative to the chassis when your car rolls during cornering to keep it from going into positive camber relative to the road surface) is a handling no-no. Didn't want to leave it to assumption that you're aware that drag racing suspension geometry is good for one thing - going straight - before you go down that path.
Also, moving the diff down is almost always the opposite from what is usually needed, as you want to try and avoid having the diff ends of the half-shafts traveling below their outer stub axle ends 1) to reduce the likelihood of rear toe steer moving into toe-out under cornering loads, and 2) so as to not add risk to bottoming and breaking the U's if/when the car squats excessively during launch.
TSW
Also, moving the diff down is almost always the opposite from what is usually needed, as you want to try and avoid having the diff ends of the half-shafts traveling below their outer stub axle ends 1) to reduce the likelihood of rear toe steer moving into toe-out under cornering loads, and 2) so as to not add risk to bottoming and breaking the U's if/when the car squats excessively during launch.
TSW
Race Director
Joined: Dec 1999
Posts: 19,610
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From: Forked River NJ
I had the Dragvette on mine and removed it this past year. For the street you do not want the Dragvette kit. It does wha tit says it will do on the drag strip and if that is your main object get it. If the street is where you are going to spend your time don't do it.
