Just wanted to give a little update, I've made some decisions!

First off, I replaced my core support and spent the time getting the body back in place so I now have the correct clearance to get the sway bar back in! If you haven't seen it, here's the thread on that:

https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...placement.html


Next, I ended up deciding to scratch the idea for the Weld wheels... I just couldn't justify $850 PER wheel, not counting a couple hundred each for tires I have decided to go with 18" wheels to open up my tire options, but I think I'm just going to stick with the AR TTII's like I have currently. I'm going to look at some other options, but that's most likely what I'll go with. I'm planning 18x9 in the front and 18x10 in the rear.

With the money I'll save on the wheels I decided to do the coilovers in the front. I like the idea of the adjustability of the handling/ride comfort and right height. I went with VanSteel's front coilover kit that includes the QA1 coilovers (550lb springs), tubular A-arms, and a new 1 1/8" sway bar.

While I was at it, I also ordered some Wilwood D8-4 calipers for the front to replace my VBandP o-ring style calipers that had started to leak after only 4yrs. I got the calipers from VanSteel as well.

Dan at VanSteel was great, I had a ton of questions and he answered them all. I'm pumped to install this stuff and get her out for a test drive! I'll update with install pics and reviews when the stuff gets here!

 

I just put in a coilover setup on all 4 corners on mine just recently. I weny with single adj. qa1's. Handles very nice, ride seems better, i actually raised it up 1" too. I went with 550s on the front and 500s on there rear per their recommendation.


I think you'll enjoy them. Install was pretty straight forward. Only problem i had was fitting my spreader bar, which I'd not on them. I have a vbp spreader bar so it took some cutting up and rewelding to make work.

 

Decided to get a jump on the install and tear down the stock suspension today.




Couldn't get the driver side upper arm out past my fans, so I had to tap out the stud. That gave me enough room, then I used a couple of aluminum spacers to drive it back in.



I'm on a time crunch (moving in 1 month), but I kind of want to take my spindles to get blasted and powder coated. Or I could at least clean em quick myself and shoot them with some paint.... They're just so grimey! I replaced the bearings 5-10yrs ago, they still seem good and tight, but I was thinking I should tear down the hub, really clean everything, paint the spindle and then reassemble it all. Any thoughts? I just am limited on time, I have to get the car back on the ground so I can pack and move my garage!


​​​​​​
Drivers side ready for coilovers




​​​​​Passenger side ready




Found a good bend in my Steeroids tie rod bracket

 

Update:

I decided to paint the spindle, hub and steering knuckle even though I'm limited on time.... I couldn't bring myself to putting 40yrs of grime back on the car. I replaced the bearings 5-10yrs ago and didn't want to mess with them, so I was going to try to pain the spindle without taking everything apart, but I decided it wouldn't have come out good, so I did it the right way and took everything apart. I'll set it up with new bearings when I put it all back together.













I also reached out to Speed Direct about the tie rod bracket. I talked to Tim and he was a huge help. I ended up ordering a replacement bracket, and new tie rod ends so I know I'm starting with everything fresh and straight. I bought the Steeroids kit 10yrs ago used but still pretty new. I also asked about the play in the wheel from the movement in the bracket and he mentioned they have some sort of bushing/spacer that mounts between the rack and bracket to limit that movement, so I got that as well. I'm excited to get that all back together with the new coilovers and 18's with some good tires and see how much better the handling is!!!

 

Quick update for anyone who is going to come across this thread in the future.

Parts got delivered yesterday, but I was on a 24hr shift so I wasn't home to open them right away! Haha Then today I had to sit through an 8hr virtual birthing class with the wife ​​​​​​.

I had a half hour at the end of the day to get out to the garage and tear into the boxes... Christmas morning for adults!

So far I'm happy with my choice to go with Vansteel. Customer service has been great and the quality of the parts look top notch!!




I didn't have much time, but I got the lowers bolted up quick. Install is definitely a breeze, if you can use basic hand tools you should definitely be able to do this.



I ran into an issue on the passenger side, the cross bar didn't want to sit flush on the frame. I pulled it off and found it was some random weld spot ... The guy on the assembly line in St Louis had a shaky hand




Nothing a quick date with a grinder and a hot of spray paint couldn't fix



Bolted up fine after. One other install tip I came across... The factory bolt that goes through the frame and lower control arm cross bar was too long on the driver's side to get out passed the PS pump. Luckily the kit comes with all new grade 8 hardware, so you can just cut the factory bolt so it's short enough to get out. The new bolt is slightly shorter and smaller diameter, so it easily slips in passed the pump. Not a huge deal if not, you'd just have to loosen the pump up and move it out of the way, but cutting it saves a step.






I have a coworkers Jeep I need to do a lift and brakes on tomorrow, but after I'm hoping I have time to get back to my car. I'll update with the progress

 

Very nice.
I’ve got the same Van Steel kit ready for my 73 and I’ve been thrilled with their customer service.
It is even better you are not having any install issues.

 

Wow. We're in shockingly similar places.

I've got a 79 and I ordered my QA1 550lbs coil overs today.
I've got a Steeroids rack and although no visible bend in the bracket, some flaking paint there, so I'd say it's done at least SOME bending...

I painted up my stock knuckles and got them nice looking again (I went with black, like your silver better).
I went with the Wilwood Dynalite 12.19" calipers the the aluminum hub and 4 caliper front brakes, but am staying with the shock sway bar with new bushings and endlinks. Stuck with the stock radiator shroud but Champion 3 core radiator. Had the stock a-arms rebuilt by VanSteel with poly bushings and moog ball joints, though.

I've got a TPI-style front throttle body intake on my engine and I was actually just starting to think about LOWERING the radiator / support to provide a bit more room for an over-the-radiator support CAI solution, but I realize now that that's just probably not possible and it's already close with the stock sway bar...

I pulled the vacuum canisters as I've got Richard454's newest version of the electric headlight motors that are supposed to show up today, and I finally broke the aluminum AC line going into my condensor moving it back and forth so much while painting the engine bay, so I'll never have more room to install the headlight motors, I figure'd I'd just do it now...

Glad to see someone going in a similar direction who knows more of what they're doing so I can blatantly steal from you and learn from your mistakes. ;-)


Adam

 

Sounds like you're on the way to a great setup!

Yeah I definitely wouldn't lower the support. I actually cut a big notch in my old support and ran a cold air intake for a while. I built it modifying a ram-air style C5 intake from Vararam and some 4" duct. It worked great, but you couldn't open the hood all the way... you could open it to about a 60* angle which was plenty, but I had to use a prop to keep it open. I started having vapor lock issues in the summer, so I got rid of it and went back to an open element. If you're set on doing a cold air intake I'll see if I can find some pictures of the setup.

You'll love having electric headlight actuators....soooo much better than the factory vacuum, plus so much cleaner looking!

Glad my thread will help. If you have any questions feel free to ask!


On to my update. I had some more time to get out to the garage today between jobs. I got the upper and lower arms in and torqued down, the coilovers installed, and the sway bar mounted up. Fixing my core support gave me the clearance needed to easily get the sway bar in the car, even this larger than stock bar. However, it just barely makes contact with the lower radiator neck. I think it would be fine to leave, but for my own piece of mind I'm going to get some 1/4" aluminum stock and make some spacers to add a little breathing room.

The only issue I ran into today was stripping out a nyloc nut supplied with the kit. The nut was for the top stud on the coilover. It is the thin style and only has a couple of threads before the nyloc portion. It installed fine, but before I got it to the 50 lb/ft torque spec is stripped. I called Vansteel to see why they used the thin nut, I was going to get a standard one, but I figured there must be a reason they used that. They said the thin nut is to allow maximum thread engagement on the coilover stud. So, instead of going with a standard size nut, I went to the hardware store and got the same thin nyloc nut but in stainless steel. Installed them and torqued to spec without issue

Just waiting on parts to finish up. Tomorrow I'm on my 24hr shift, and like usual parts will be getting delivered (they always do when I'm stuck at work!). I've got the new wheel bearings/backing plates/wheel studs etc coming tomorrow, so Wednesday I can get the spindles and hubs reinstalled. Also coming tomorrow is my new Steeroids tie rod bracket, tie rod ends, and bushing for the rack to stop the excess bracket movement, so I will hopefully get that all installed Wednesday too. After that all I need is the new Wilwood calipers which will be coming Thursday, then the car will be back on the ground! The only other thing I need to do is settle on a wheel size and get them ordered. I'm definitely sticking with the Torq Thrust II's but in 18's... just trying to decide what width for the front.

Anyways, on to the pics. I've included a couple install notes, but everything is more or less exactly what Vansteel says. Their instructions are great.

Upper arms in. A great added bonus is the passenger side upper arm has a TON of extra clearance from the trans cooler fitting on the radiator. The factory A-arm was always really close, and after raising the radiator back to it's proper position it was even closer. I was hoping the Vansteel arms might gain some clearance, but I was pumped to see how much they did!





Here's the trans cooler fitting with the stock arm. They were just about touching.



Upper and lower arms bolted down. Vansteel wasn't joking about moving the upper balljoints back! I'm looking forward to the added caster these arms will provide!




Vansteel's instructions mention you may have to grind the threads down on the bolt going through the clevis on top of the coilover (the horizontal bolt in the picture). On my car both had to be ground down to fit, the threaded sections were just barely catching on the frame pocket.




Here's the nut that stripped out while tightening by hand below the torque spec. You can see it pulled the threads and nylon right out of it. A stainless steel version solved the issue.




Coilovers installed




Here's the clearance (or lack there of) of the sway bar. Like I said, I think itd be ok, the bar still rotates, but I'll feel better adding a 1/4" spacer.





The complete package looking good!



Stay tuned!

 

Lookin good.

Man, i thought it was just me over tightening stuff as usual. I stripped out a lock nut for the upper coilover (shock) mount too. I ended up double nutting it and ordered a 10pk off amazon. Local places didn't have a short one. Seemed like on mine i could've fit a regular sized lock nut on it and it'd have enough threads for the nut and nylon part to fully engage.

 

I do over tighten a lot lol. But, this was to their spec, and I know how to properly use a torque wrench haha.

 

I just did the same install. I had the same nut strip also. Ace Hardware to the rescue.

I set my upper arm shims up as recommended. When I went to the alignment shop, it was at 9.0* caster on both sides. These arms DEFINITELY add caster. We actually dialed it back just a little to get it and the Camber balanced out.

 

Update time!

Finished up the coilovers and spindles today. Waiting on the new Wilwood calipers coming tomorrow, and then a couple more things from Speeddirect. I had originally ordered the rack "slide" (to hopefully help with the play in the tie rod bracket), new tie rod bracket, 4 new ends, and 1 new tie rod "pin". That stuff came in yesterday, and looking at it I realized the new pin is a revised version (mine is a pretty old kit). The new pin has spacers to adjust bump steer. So, I ordered another pin so I can replace both outer tie rod pins. I also ordered a spreader bar

Here's the rack "slide". This is supposed to be installed between the rack and tie rod bracket and help limit the up/down movement of the tie rod bracket.






Today I put the spindles back together, all cleaned and painted up with their new backing plates, they look brand new!





Installed the bare spindles onto the arms. I lowered the spring tension (ride height) on the coilovers as low as they'd go which made it real easy to hook up the upper balljoint. No more compressing the coil spring!!


After torquing down the balljoints I went back and recompressed the spring. I have no idea where to set the initial ride height, so I just went a little less than half. I set both coilovers so they have 8 threads showing below the collars. Adjustment is very easy!!



On the hubs I installed new studs, races and then set the bearings up. After packing and installing the bearings I set them up by going hand tight with the spindle nut while spinning the hub. Once it's hand tight I give it about a half a turn with a wrench, not much, but enough to put a little pressure on the bearings to seat everything. I then back the nut off to loose, then hand tight while spinning again. This time as I get to hand tight I align it with the cotter pin hole to get no play but also no preload/drag. I got lucky and the cotter pins lined up easily with the nut where I wanted it.

Installing the new wheel studs. Used a spacer I had kicking around from doing a rear drum to disc conversion on a buddies '79 Z28.



Installed the new races. I use the old races to get the new ones started, they are the perfect size and drive them in nice and straight. Obviously you can only go so far with the old ones before having to switch to a socket though, otherwise you'll end up installing the new race AND the old race haha.






After packing and installing the inner bearing, I install the seal the same way using the old race.





All installed and ready for some new calipers!




From here I'll install the new calipers when they get here tomorrow and then get the car back on the ground! Once the rest of the Steeroids stuff gets here I can install and adjust that. I need the suspension to settle a little so I can adjust the tie rod angles for bump steer and set the sway bar end link lengths, both of which have to be done with the car on the ground. I may also just wait and bring it up to my shop because I can adjust all that with it on the alignment rack (on it's tires but in the air) After that I'll line it up, and the last step will be installing the spreader bar. Then I'm done. I have to be out of my house in 3 weeks!!!

 

Really nice work!

 

Thanks!

So, the core support repair, a-arm/coilover install, and Wilwood caliper install are all done. The last thing I have to do is finish up rehabbing my Steeroids kit.

New Wilwood D8 calipers to replace my front VBandP sleeved and Oring stock calipers that started leaking after 4yrs. I'm done with dealing with the unreliability of the stock calipers!






I got some 1/8" aluminum flat stock and made up some spacers for the sway bar. The 1/8" spacing netted me about 3/32" gap between the radiator neck and sway bar. Not much, but it's better than them making contact. I don't think they will really move independent of each other so this should be enough of a gap to prevent contact, but I'll monitor for signs of rubbing. I could have done a 1/4" spacer, but I want to leave the sway bar as close to the frame as its supposed to be.






For the steeroids, like I mentioned above, I ordered all new inner and outer tie rod ends, new outer pins, and new tie rod bracket (mine was bent). I started the install, but of course the last end I went to change (driver outer tie rod end) was frozen in the sleeve. I had PB blasted everything ahead of time but this wasn't moving. Tried heating with a torch with minimal help. Finally got it out, but the threads of the sleeve are junk, so I'm dead in the water until Monday when I can order a new sleeve

The purpose of replacing everything in the steeroids was two fold. 1, I bought the kit 10yrs ago second hand and was told it was low mileage, but didn't know for sure, so I wanted to get all the ends replaced so I'm starting with something I know is safe. Also, I've had a little slop in the steering wheel and wheels for a while now. When you shake the wheels you could see the tie rod bracket moving up and down, so Speeddirect recommended a rack slide to help limit this. This goes between the rack and tie rod bracket, but I haven't installed it yet because I'm going to need to get some longer bolts. This should resolve that movement when shaking the wheels/tires, but while the tire rod bracket was disconnected I shook the steering wheel and still felt the dead spot right when first moving the wheel. I took my time and inspected closer and found what looks like play in the intermediate shaft support bearing and possibly the ujoints. Supposedly the support bearing has some adjustment to it, so I'm going to try tightening it up, but I'm thinking it needs to be replaced. I'm going to start there. I'm really hoping the u-joints don't need to be replaced because they list at like $740!!!

Here's the movement in the support bearing... This is exactly what I'm feeling in the wheel



I'm really hoping to get this figured out and the Steeroids handling like it should.

 

What brake pads did you choose for the new wilwoods?

 

I was using EBC red stuff brake pads before, but the calipers came with Wilwoods own pads so I figured I'd give them a shot. No sense in blowing more money, I'm sure these will be fine.

 

Nice project and thanks for the update!

 

So, I found something else I think is contributing to the at in the wheel. The lower steering column bearing looks like it has a good amount of play. The bearing is pretty tight to the column, but the bearing itself seems to have a good amount of play in it.

Here's a couple videos, what do you guys think?




For those that have messed with these bearings before, is this enough play to cause a dead spot in the wheel? It seems like it might be the culprit, or a combination of that and play in the steeroids support bearing.

 

Hold onto your old pads. I threw in the wildwoods and they brake well, but man they put out some dust. I'd have to clean the wheels (mainly fronts) about every other outing. And that's just regular street driving. Got tired of cleaning there wheels so i put there old ceramic pads back on when i did the coilovers.

Coilovers look good!

 

Thanks for the heads up. The red stuff dust real bad too, so if anything I'd probably try something else.