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So I finally got the car up on some ramps. I took a few preliminary pictures, as I plan to take more after removing the spare tire tub. I will upload those in a moment, along with a picture of the tire date code, which appears to state that the tires were manufactured in 2000. (They have 10,000 miles on them.)
Yes, those tires are a death warrant and need to go.
Those look like the OEM spring bolts and should measure about 61/2" in length.
Could just be the camera angle but it looks like the rear spring is sagging and if so, probably the issue with you car sitting so low. How many leafs are in there?
Six years is a good wag, but there is not a shortage of people out there that will disagree with that number and say it is much higher.... I guess it boils down to what you think safe really is when driving at a higher speed and how good is your luck.
The spring may be worn out as well, combined with the tire size smaller than 255x60x15, the car will sit lower. I think for a stock tire the Goodyear Eagle GT is a great tire, but they are rather pricey. Good luck with your C3 and congrats on the purchase.
Thanks. Totally understood on the need to replace the tires. When I get home later today, I plan on getting back under there to see if I can get some better shots, count the leafs, etc.
Six years is a good wag, but there is not a shortage of people out there that will disagree with that number and say it is much higher.... I guess it boils down to what you think safe really is when driving at a higher speed and how good is your luck.
The spring may be worn out as well, combined with the tire size smaller than 255x60x15, the car will sit lower. I think for a stock tire the Goodyear Eagle GT is a great tire, but they are rather pricey. Good luck with your C3 and congrats on the purchase.
Hi zrx,
The spring does look like it has begun to 'sag'.
If you look back at the photo I posted of a pretty typical spring I believe you can see that it still has a small amount of arch in it.
Your spring appears to have started to curve up at it's ends.
This could very well be part of the decreased road clearance your seeing.
Regards,
Alan
There will likely be a wide range of suggested remedies for this.
As you know, my goal when I got home from work was to remove the spare tire carrier so I could take some better pictures; well that didn't happen. Got the spare tire itself removed which might very well be the original spare, a Seiberling. Amazingly, it is still inflated (50 year old air?? That would be incredible...) I looked the company up online and found this on Wikipedia:
"In the mid-1960s, Seiberling launched the SuperWideSport series, a bias-belted tire aimed to the Muscle Car market, booming at the time. The tire featured a whitewall on one side and a redline on the other, also common on the tire market at the time. The tire achieved relatively good sales being that Seiberling's Akron rivals had released good products to compete, including Goodyear's Polyglas, Firestone's Wide-Oval, Uniroyal's Tiger Paw and BF Goodrich's Radial T/A. The tire success did not go unnoticed and by the early-1970s the Big Three had some Seiberlings as original equipment fitted on their cars."
That was really cool to read...and to see that name on my tire. I'm sure many of you are familiar with Seiberling Tires, however until today, I had never heard of them.
Because of the position of my exhaust, it's very difficult to access the carrier bolt on the driver's side (I didn't even look at the passenger side yet). I got an open end wrench on the clamping nut at the top, and even tried turning the bolt itself, on the "flat" parts of the end. No luck and no movement. Talked to DUB about it and he had some great advice, but with my exhaust positioned the way it is, it's still going to be tough.
It's hard to tell but I count eight or nine leafs in there. The spring has sagged and it appears it has no arc left to it. Good news is that rear springs are plentlyfull out there and there are numerous options for you either to replace the original or go to a composite single leaf spring. It all depends on if you want your corvette to be all original or not and how you plan to use your car.
There are several threads on this forum discussing rear springs and suspension.
I went through Van Steel who has everything from stock, to composite, to complete coil over and all out racing suspension upgrades.
VBP is another vendor who is widely used by forum members.
Send us more photos and keep us updated.
Finally got the lower tire carrier assembly removed. Wow--that was not easy. Sprayed PB Blaster on the upper and lower nuts and let it sit overnight. If this car had rust back there, I would have been in big trouble, I'm sure. Pics to follow.
My car sits at 26.5" in the rear with a 26.1" diameter tire. The halfshafts are level at this ride height. I have 6" of ground clearance at the frame rails and tons of clearance with the sidepipes. Running the pipes under the rear spring mount is why you've got no clearance. It might work fine on a stock ride height car, but at your current lowered height it's too tight there.
You can see an easy inch of extra clearance just by replacing the squashed spring bushings. half inch mark on top of bolts where they used to sit higher. and would it be too Bubbaesque to fab a 1 inch spacer and add it under the spring end? even as a temp remedy until he decides what to do with-about the spring? Cuz as it is, the car is adjusting the ground clearance itself by flattening the exhaust pipes...
Last edited by derekderek; 03-10-2018 at 02:45 PM.
These are 6-1/4 inch with urethane bushings. stock length i thought was 6.5. this ad sez 6.25 IS stock length. and the urethane won't squish as far as rubber... https://www.ebay.com/itm/1963-1982-C...oAAOSwrx5UYZwX On the other hand, is there any diff between these bolts and any other grade 8 bolt?
Last edited by derekderek; 03-10-2018 at 03:10 PM.
03-08-2018, 11:17 PM
Update
I guess it boils down to what you think safe really is when driving at a higher speed and how good is your luck. 
