Spring check up

big2bird said:
mrvette said:
I always ASSumed rust would do them in first, then I see posts of the lower A arm supports breaking free....:surrender::twitch: makes me paranoid, as having that rack in there, and all these rough roads...:eek:
Click to expand...

Red Cherry once hit a speed bump at 70 MPH. (Late and dark). He TORE the lower mount clean off.:twitch:
Click to expand...

Speed bumps should be outlawed, they even have them in shopping centers around here, centers I will not shop at because of it....

:smash::thumbs:
 
mrvette said:
big2bird said:
mrvette said:
I always ASSumed rust would do them in first, then I see posts of the lower A arm supports breaking free....:surrender::twitch: makes me paranoid, as having that rack in there, and all these rough roads...:eek:
Click to expand...

Red Cherry once hit a speed bump at 70 MPH. (Late and dark). He TORE the lower mount clean off.:twitch:
Click to expand...

Speed bumps should be outlawed, they even have them in shopping centers around here, centers I will not shop at because of it....

:smash::thumbs:
Click to expand...
I think you found the one nice thing about living in the north. We don't have nearly as many speed bumps up here.
 
mrvette said:
15 years ago I went 360 VBP plastic spring, and 460 coild in front, 1.25? front bar and 3/4? VBP rear, KYB shocks....here about 5 years ago I took the bars down to nothing in back and only ~3/4-7/8 in front, then put a stock rear bar back on, leaving the thin front bar....put on some Bilsteins shortly after...smoothed out these potholes here on this sand bar pretty good...my street was repaved for some odd reason, but the rest of this hood is really suffering BAD..very strange how they do things....

at any rate, I added a front brace bar in there too, and that's how the car is now....I have a thicker front sway bar but find no reason to change it out...

I am wondering about you comment on that brace making up for some loss in sway bar thickness, interesting comment....

also, can you describe what Vettzuki has done to his car?? or get him on here??

:smash::clap:
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I have the VBP Dual Mount Mono Spring in back set to 420lbs (highest), stock front sway bar, VBP 550 lowering coil springs in front and Bilstein Heavy Duty Shcoks all around. The Dual Mount in back serves as a sway bar. It rides moderately hard, but not super hard, driving around on ok roads is fine, but really bad roads would upset the suspension, not enough compliance. My ride quality is probably saved by the fact I'm only running 17" tires, so I still have a couple inches of sidewall in the tires for compliance. I also replaced all the suspension bushings with Poly and have metal spherical bushings in the trailing arms. All together it handles pretty well.

As I recall from a conversation with Dick Guldstrand once, the tower brace doesn't really do much for handling compared to a thicker sway bar or 8 point cage.
 
Well, I have a thin front bar, 9/16? 'stock' rear bar, and with that cross support, I find the handling is fine, but the car rode much harder with the heavy sway bars on it, which is why they are OFF there now...as we know speed bumps don't do much with sway bars, but that cross support definitely made the car more 'balanced' with my setup...no affect on 'ride' that I could notice...

PIA to work on the f/end with it there though...:pprrtt::shocking::bomb:
 
big2bird said:
One loose jamb nut, VBandP rear radius rod.
Click to expand...

My opinion is that this is why you should have strut rods with heim joints.
Also, just consider. As the trailing arm moves up and down, there's a lot of torque stress on the bushing. I've told that there has been occurrences where the torque stress didn't loosen the jam nut, but did cause the weld to fail. The weld is the one that welds the circular busing housing to the strut rod. (Yes, I know that if done correctly, this weld joint would never fail.)

I have a set of VBP smart struts, but have never used them. Instead I've bought Tom's Differential's strut rod bracket and heim joint strut rods for my 68 and 70.
 
68/70Vette said:
big2bird said:
One loose jamb nut, VBandP rear radius rod.
Click to expand...

My opinion is that this is why you should have strut rods with heim joints.
Also, just consider. As the trailing arm moves up and down, there's a lot of torque stress on the bushing. I've told that there has been occurrences where the torque stress didn't loosen the jam nut, but did cause the weld to fail. The weld is the one that welds the circular busing housing to the strut rod. (Yes, I know that if done correctly, this weld joint would never fail.)

I have a set of VBP smart struts, but have never used them. Instead I've bought Tom's Differential's strut rod bracket and heim joint strut rods for my 68 and 70.
Click to expand...

Turtlevette had one snap. I would never use poly there again.
I agree, the rubber or Heims joints seem to be the ticket on that application. Maybe I'll get to that this summer.
 
big2bird said:
68/70Vette said:
big2bird said:
One loose jamb nut, VBandP rear radius rod.
Click to expand...

My opinion is that this is why you should have strut rods with heim joints.
Also, just consider. As the trailing arm moves up and down, there's a lot of torque stress on the bushing. I've told that there has been occurrences where the torque stress didn't loosen the jam nut, but did cause the weld to fail. The weld is the one that welds the circular busing housing to the strut rod. (Yes, I know that if done correctly, this weld joint would never fail.)

I have a set of VBP smart struts, but have never used them. Instead I've bought Tom's Differential's strut rod bracket and heim joint strut rods for my 68 and 70.
Click to expand...

Turtlevette had one snap. I would never use poly there again.
I agree, the rubber or Heims joints seem to be the ticket on that application. Maybe I'll get to that this summer.
Click to expand...

Didn't Turtlevette's strut rod have some rust issues where it snapped?

Oh yeah a quick search and wow I remember that thread.
http://www.vettemod.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1491&highlight=strut+rod&page=5
 
Last edited:
big2bird said:
Did you get them from Guldstrand, or buy the components?
Click to expand...

Also VBP.

http://www.vbandp.com/detail.aspx?ID=528

You can get links to each of the components by following the link my sig about my Vette.

At present the only DG stuff I have is HS spherical bearings installed by his shop, wheel bearings setup by his shop (same time) and a pinion mount not yet installed.

I occasionally salivate over his 5-link.
 
Here is a link to all the parts from Speedway for around 100 bucks.
These are the good heims also with the separate seals.
Just have to make or get spacers. I made these out of ss.
Work great

http://www.vettemod.com/forum/showpost.php?p=9910&postcount=28

LowerStrut.jpg
 
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