The rear in my ‘68 seems to me low with the tires toeing out. The bolts from the trailing arms look to have been replaced and don’t look look longer than they’d be stock. When I did the rear brakes I checked for bearing play and it was all good. The bolts don’t look to have any more threads to tighten the castle nuts up on. Not sure how to go about raising the rear to take out the squat and toeing out issue.
was thinking of adding some thick spacers above the castle nuts (?)
Is that a reasonable solution?

 

your spring bolts are assembled wrong
you are missing the rubber bushing and the other two retainers
should look like this

 

there is 2 inches lost on the bolts with both bushings missing which will be a bit over an inch of rear height. and if you want higher, you can buy a couple of 5/8th nuts from lowes depot and put them last thing before the nuts to get another half inch or so. and then maybe look into shorter bolts. oddball bolt. 9/16th thread. although if you tried grade 5 or 8 1/2 inch bolts to play around and find the correct height they would work. then try fastenal or a truck spring place to see if they have the size-length you want. may hafta drill the cotter pin hole in the bolts.

 

Thank you gentlemen !
Your response and photo is very much appreciated. The photo make the issue mine has obvious.
I’ll be ordering a new spring mount kit from Zip later today. The have the original on back order but the polyurethane set is in stock. Kinda rather stay with the stock setup. Their both pretty cheap to buy though.
These were obviously replaced when the “restoration “ was done. I can add this to the list of things I’ve had to correct on this car. Some things were well done which was probably within their expertise but more than a few things on the car …

 

Wallyfishers absolutely pristine rear photo shows the correct rear sway bar pivoting mount on the driver's side. I can't tell for sure but yours might be the clamping type which is decidedly inferior for a number of reasons.

This is another of those "as long as I am in there" activities, but since you are ordering parts for that area, you might want to change your order to include the correct hardware if you don't have it.

 

The rear sway bar mount in my car is correct for a ‘68. Not sure what you mean by pivot or clamp type but I’m sticking as close to factory as possible with this one. It’s not NCRS concours quality but virtually everything is on its way back to factory correct as I can manage. Just managed a 5 rim set of the one year ‘69 “AG” code rims.
The goal for the time being is to get the car safe and drivable. This issue with it squatting has had the exhaust pipe brace scrape the pavement on a slow dip in the road. That needs to be addressed now. I ordered the mount kit and should get it by the end of the week.
I was out looking at the trailing arms and it looks like I have to remove the sway bar mount to lift the bolts out. Doesn’t look too bad.

 

I guess what I see there is a rusted nut plate. Shouldn't be too hard to recondition it, and yes it will have to come out as the insulator cushion takes up a fair amount of room to install.

 

Hey Lt Mike, I thought I'd add a pic of our '68 (w/F41). Hope this helps. This was before I reinstalled the rear sway bar - the 2nd nut was just something I was playing with at the time before I put in a shorter bolt - but this might help. Also, when you install the washers over/under the rubber, make sure you put the flat side of the washer away from the rubber - rounded side toward the rubber. You'll get it! Best, Paul

 

Is that the 8” bolt I’ve been seeing for sale ?

 

It is. I was able to go back to the shorter one and still got the exact ride height I was looking for as the rubber compresses a bit after being loaded up. Good luck, and have fun doing this stuff!

 

It’s sagging now and the exhaust pipe brace where the pipes come together under the rear scrape on a slow dip in the road. I’m hoping to get it level but not jacked up. If it sits too high I’ll buy the longer bolts with extended threads so one way or another I’ll get it right.

 

Hey Mike, there is always a way. You can also tuck the exhaust up close, like the pic below after I installed the exhaust. The exhaust is very solid when you get them in there. Still a low point. I used to scrape a bit over large bumps when going a bit fast, but since I refurb'd the suspension and put on the new exhaust, I haven't scraped since. Probably just cursed it.

 

lol !
the exhaust was done pretty well on mine and is up close. Somethings were really well done on this and some weren’t. Kinda two people were involved in the restoration, one knew his stuff, the other

 

Ok, got back to it today and pulled it apart on the passenger side, reshaped the trailing arm, wire brushed the rust away and repainted. New parts are in on that side and I replaced the factory bolts for the sway bar linkage with new grade 8.
I had assumed the prior owner or the person(s) who “fully restored” the car had installed the spring link bolt with the rubber bushings… nope, they are there.


believe it, there are rubber bushing sandwiched between the washers like a metal Oreo cookie.



1-1/4” of rubber bushing crushed flat to about 1/8” thick ! They have to be factory original.



here it is compared to the replacement.
I am optimistic that this will eliminate the rear sagging issue and make a noticeable handling improvement.
The bolt that’s replacing the original is exactly the same length.
Had I been a garage mechanic both sides would’ve been done today and I’d be driving the car but I took time to clean rust, repaint, reshape the bent trailing arm box end and made a parts run for new grade 8 bolts. The old ones gave no confidence.
Doing it the best I can because I can’t see any other option.
This really is a pretty simple job though, much easier that the manual made it out to be.