file: fox98.html
collected by: [email protected]
03 Jan 1998
Larry Harris
Ford
> I want to do this conversion instead of a stroker. Can anyone tell me what
> I'll need, toher than the obvious, like oil pan, dist, etc...... I mean
> things that may be specific to the 94-95 models.
Check out my 351 swap page. http://www.primenet.com/~lsh/351swap
This details what I needed for my swap and will also cover your SN-95.
The SN-95 differences are few, I think only the intake, throttle body,
and headers will be different.
Unfortunately my page has not been updated for about a year and has a mile
long list of corrections/additions. This on top of my busy schedule and
poor HTML skills and the fact that I've been driving around a Mustang that
is _still_ not 100% back together from the whole swap/paint/bank account
emptying.
06 Jan 1998
Craig Cline
[email protected]
The Campi's fit great on the Mustang. Better than they did on the Pa=
ntera in fact. I have 265/50x15 BFG Euro TAs on 7's in front and 295=
/50x15 BFG Euro TAs on 8's in back, and they _completely_ fill the wh=
eel wells. I had to massage the rear inner fender panels (i.e., pou=
nd them with a 5 lb sledge hammer) to provide enough clearance for th=
ose big tires, and I could still use about an 1/8" to 1/4" spacer on =
the rear to move the tire out closer to the outside (it still hits th=
e inner fender on some hard turns). The rear outer fender edges are =
also rolled up (just as previously discussed for Panteras) and the fr=
ont fenders are OEM Shelby fiberglass pieces with "rolled" lips.
The fit problem with the Mustang is ball joint clearance on the insid=
e of the front wheel, it can only stand 3.5 to 4.0 of backspacing (0 =
offset on a 7" or 8" wheel) with normal 15" diameter wheels. Larger =
diameter wheels could possibly eliminate this problem. Also the Must=
ang can take about 1" more backspacing in back (if the inner fenders =
are adjusted) without hitting the leaf springs.
These tires are very big for the wheel widths, consequently they roll=
over the rim edge quite a bit (ideal rim width would 1-2" more). Th=
is is not ideal in a real performance handling car, but my Mustang is=
more of a cruiser; the convertible chassis, an automatic trans, and =
a 428 engine to not produce ideal handling characterisitcs. This tir=
e roll over makes the wheel width more of a problem, as wider wheel m=
ight fit if a smaller tire with less roll over were used (as long as =
it does not hit the inner ball joint). =20
19 Jan 1998
[email protected]
Ford
We have a winner!
THank you all for sending your advice as to what I should do about my small
block Mustang that wanted an FE. Vic Yarberry of multiple Cougar fame
advised me to redrill and rotate my brackets. . . which is what I did. THe
brackets are held in by two bolts, and when you take the top one out, the
bracket is free to rotate on the botom one. They ended up rotating inboard
about 30 degrees, but I matched it up by setting the engine in the bay, and
reefing the bottom bolts in. Then I just unbolted the mount from the bracket
and made nice with the drill after moving the pesky engine out of the way.
THe FE looks very much at home in the engine bay. I got my new camshaft in
and the front cover on. Maybey I'll get the rest of it buttoned up tomorrow.
At least enough so I can have my driveshaft fitted.
20 Jan 1998
Tommy Regan
Ford
Haven't introduced myself yet on this list, but my name's Tommy Regan and I
currently own a '96 Cobra (for sale) and an '87 LX 5.0 that I'm turning
onto a Solo II autocrosser. I've been having trouble finding accurate
information about fitting SN-95 front control arms onto the LX. The
problem stems from not having enough threads left in the outer tie rod ends
after fitting the longer arms.
I found some '92 Taurus inner tie rods that are longer than the LX's, but
upon closer inspection, found out that they are metric pitch whereas the LX
rods are standard. Does anyone know a tie rod that'll work for this
application? I really need some good information about this. I'm about at
my wit's end! I'd really like to simply get longer outer tie rod ends, but
have been unsuccessful in my search. Help?!?!
Also, I need to know if there are any special tricks to removing the stock
inner tie rods. I have a rod remover from AutoZone, but it only slides
over about a 1/2" of the nut and I'm afraid of stripping it. Any
suggestions?
21 Jan 1998
"K.M. Sen-Roy"
Ford
Recently, Tommy Regan wrote:
> I found some '92 Taurus inner tie rods that are longer than the LX's, but
> upon closer inspection, found out that they are metric pitch whereas the LX
> rods are standard. Does anyone know a tie rod that'll work for this
> application? I really need some good information about this. I'm about at
> my wit's end! I'd really like to simply get longer outer tie rod ends, but
> have been unsuccessful in my search. Help?!?!
Hmmm... Try SN-95 tie rod ends. I know the thread pitch is
different on those.
26 Jan 1998
Dan Leih
Ford
[email protected]%INTERNET wrote:
> I have heard that Doug Thorley makes a set of "Tri-Y" headers for
> early Mustangs. After a bit of digging, I found an address and got a
> price listing. My question to the list is: Has anyone here actually
> purchased and used, or at least seen some of these parts? While Doug
Hey Gary, a few years ago when i started the '67 project I went looking for
tri-y's. I found and looked at a set of Doug Thorley's in Phoenix. (don't
remember the name of the shop right now.) They were *very nice*. Definitely a
heavy gauge steel with a chrome finish. Nice workmanship, $300+ as i recall.
They were out of my price range on that particular saturday. I ended up buying
a set of black tri-y's made by Pro-Products. Their stuff is always pretty good
quality and Sanderson Ford stocks them. I paid $170 or something. I think you
can get them a lot cheaper if you shop around.
27 Jan 1998
John Edward Miller
Ford
>What width rotor does the Cobra caliper use? I want to use the PBR
>brakes, but I was hoping to go the 1.1" width rotor of the Z51 Vette
>option.
The Cobra caliper is the same as the Z51 'Vette; it works on the 13x1.1
rotors (though the Cobra rotors have a 0.75-in deep hat as opposed to the
1.25-in deep hat of the Z51 rotors.) The Cobra caliper just happens to say
'Cobra' on it, and be painted black (at least as they come from Ford.)
>Also, don't you also need to buy some mounting rings? Or are they
>something you can make?
The 'mounting rings' are the caliper retaining brackets. They bolt to the
hub (or whatever) and the caliper is retained in the bracket by a pin and
snap-ring. Some folks are not convinced that this is a completely secure
design, and I think some of the same folks who run PBR brakes toss their
'mounting rings' every so often.
>I want to replace my 4 piston K/H disks with 2 piston PBR's, so this
>sounds like the way to do it.
To put PBR brakes on your early Mustang you'll need to (a) have some hubs
(b) have some rotors that'll fit the hubs and (c) have a way of bolting the
calipers to the spindles.
First off, Baer Racing has a kit to do the conversion on your car, using
either the 13x1.1 Z51 rotors or the 12x.81 non-Z51 Corvette rotors with
appropriate calipers. I've never seen this Baer kit but from the specs it
looks like a reasonable deal unless you've got a machine shop on hand (or
some decent blackmail shots of the owner of one.) In my case for the Motor
Ship Galaxie I started with a set of '71 Lincoln front discs and had a local
fab shop machine the rotor section off, leaving just a hub; by the time all
the work was done (cutting the rotors off the hubs, cutting the Vette rotors
down to 12.5 inches, boring the backs of the hubs to inset the studs 1/8",
etc.) I'm into them for a few hundred bucks.
http://www.milleredp.com/~jem/galaxie/jan1998.html if you care.
Unless you're planning to run modern-Mustang 30mm-offset wheels, you won't
be able to use the Cobra rotors. The shallow hat section puts the outer
body of the caliper out into the wheel. The Z51 rotor will work - just -
but you'll need to have them redrilled 5x4.5. I just ordered mine that way
from Baer.
If you want to use the 13x1.1 rotors you will need 17-inch wheels. This
isn't entirely true - you may find the odd 16-inch wheel that'll fit - but
most will not. I'm using 16x8 Vintage 45s on the MS Galaxie and they
*would* have cleared the calipers if I'd used a .35-inch spacer behind the
wheel. For a couple of reasons I elected not to do this and instead had the
rotors cut down to 12.5-inch.
Finally, there's that matter of bolting the calipers to the spindles. Let's
see here: hook up ancient but well-cleaned fruit-jar master cylinder to
caliper. Put caliper on rotor. Shim off rotor and clamp caliper on rotor
by applying pressure to master cylinder piston with steering-wheel puller
(hey, it works.) Take measurements. Make bracket templates. Fit bracket
templates, caliper, etc.; repeat process until everything fits. Eventually,
cut brackets from mild steel plate (5/16"?) - blackmail photos of guy with
plasma-cutter helpful here - and if your patterns are any good they'll fit.
Double-check everything; I'm planning to take mine out and beat hell out of
it somewhere away from civilization, then tear it all down and have
everything crack-tested after it's been hot and abused just to make sure I
haven't screwed up somewhere.
I repeat: for Mustangs the Baer kit sounds like a decent deal unless you've
got lots of time. For the rear axle I *will* be using their 9" rearend kit.
If I were planning this all from scratch around big brakes, I'd have gone
for 17-inch wheels and some six-piston AP CP5555 calipers and 13.5-inch
rotors in front.
Maybe you might want to investigate the Porsche 4-piston Brembo-package that
the Impala SS folks are nailing together:
http://www.impala.net/Technical/Brakes/Porsche/HeinzShenck.html
30 Jan 1998
Todd M
Ford
Gary, et all. Here's a few companies that sell what you're looking for and
other related parts. A Pivot Adapter piece allows you to add a pivot to the
5.0L block, and an early clutch fork pivot to late model bellhousing adapter.
These pieces allow you to use the stock vintage mustang clutch linkage w/ a
late model block, bellhousing, and T-5 if you like. They also sell tranny
crossmembers and yokes, and other related EFI/T-5 swap parts
Windsor-Fox Performance Engineering, 760-946-FUEL, P.O. Box 2683 Apple Valley,
Ca 92307.
California Pony Cars, 1906 Quaker Ridge Place, Ontario, Ca 91761 909-923-2804.
Dark Horse Performance is @ (206) 227-7778, fax (206) 277-3893,
[email protected], 16617 S.E. 134 Renton, Wa 98059.
The stuff's out there, good luck.
31 Jan 1998
John Edward Miller
Ford
>I just heard something about european headlight standards and 'e-code'
>headlights, which provide better lighting than 'DOT' lights. Do export
>mustang have different lighting systems? If so, how do they look and
perform?
Opinion: the average American-spec headlight is garbage. Some of the newest
complex-reflector lights are some of the worst: whoever did the lights for
the current Chrysler minivans and Breeze/Cirrus/Stratus ought to be boiled
in oil.
Since the late '60s the standard headlight in most of the rest of the
industrialized world has been based on an H4 (9003) bulb. These have
completely different optics than US-spec headlights, putting a lot more
light down the road instead of right in front of the car. They also have a
very sharp cutoff above the centerline of the light, rising somewhat to the
right side (for left-hand-rule countries e.g. UK, Australia it's the other
way, of course) - as a result they throw less light at oncoming drivers'
eyes. The primary negative: Euro-spec lights vary a lot in the quality of
their weathersealing (poor weathersealing = 1-2 year reflector life.)
I've been pretty fanatical about making sure to ditch the US-spec lights in
favor of Euro-spec lights anywhere and everywhere I could - three Saabs, a
couple VWs, one Falcon, etc. I have a set of quad 5 3/4" round Marchal
H4/H1 lights for the '64 Country Sedan as soon as it goes back together
(found these at a thrift shop for $2 each - they're perfect, clean
reflectors, good lenses, 3 out of the 4 bulbs worked!)
If you own an older car that uses one of the old standard headlight shapes,
you can get plug-in replacements. If you own a European or Japanese car,
you just have to find the lights that were used in the car in the rest of
the right-hand-driving world. Canada allows both Euro-spec and US-spec
lighting so depending on brand Canadian-market cars may have either (most
Euro makes will have Euro-spec lights; US and Japanese makes will have US
spec lights.) Some US-make cars have been sold overseas and so Euro-spec
lights are available through various channels (the Impala SS, Dodge Spirit,
etc. come to mind - can anyone say what lights the Explorers being sold in
Europe use?) If you're driving a US-make car with flush headlights never
sold outside North America you're out of luck.
There's been some work on 'commonizing' headlight requirements; the current
Camry and, I'm told, the current Contour lights are intended to meet the new
worldwide standard.
02 Feb 1998
[email protected] (Tom Test)
Ford
>I just heard something about european headlight standards and 'e-code'
>headlights, which provide better lighting than 'DOT' lights. Do export
>mustang have different lighting systems? If so, how do they look and
perform?
E-code headlights have tight specs on cutoff patterns. The specs allow
no light across the center of the road, and cut off very sharp on top.
They allow spread toward the shoulder, but that is not allowed to go
high either, probably to handle a mix of RH and LH spec cars. It is
real common, with the Chunnel now open, to have a lot of continental
spec cars (and tour busses particularly) running around in the U.K. for
example.
The big difference one notices is that the road is pretty dark right
in front of the car, compared to most US headlights. At first you
wonder if the headlights are on, there is so little light scattering
back from the road, or from things at the side of the road. You really
get this impression when it is dark and rainy and most of the roads are
blacktop, as in Norway or the UK in winter. After a while you get
used to the idea that only what is in front of you will be lit up.
This is not bad, actually, because e-code lighting makes you look
farther down the road. Our pattern of a big spread of light on the
road close to the car tends to draw the driver's attention, so that
we end up driving too close. It is as if our lighting was designed to
help us avoid potholes and road debris, rather than spot pedestrians
and bicyclists. (Hey, maybe we have that right after all ).
US lighting design today seems to be dictated by styling rather than
driving needs. It seems that the brightest lighting we get is on trucks
where styling gets us a really big reflector. The Aerostar, F150
and Ranger put a lot of light way down the road. Put it everywhere
else, too, unfortunately.
It seems that we don't even do the auxilary lighting right. Most of
the so-called "fog lights" in sporty styling packages throw more
light high than do the low-beam headlights.
03 Feb 1998
Teddy Chen
Ford
> Which is where my question comes in. The car will be run in the
> American Sedan(AS) class in the SCCA which means that I have some
> limitations as to what I can run in terms of brakes. I have a limit of
> a 12" rotor with 1.125" thickness and PBR twin piston calipers (aka
> Cobra, Vette, etc.) for the front. Rears are limited by the same specs
> except for the calipers which can be 43mm single piston PBR calipers.
>
> I was hoping to use a stock 93R, 94+ Cobra 13" front brake conversion,
> complete with spindles, hubs, etc, then have the rotors machined down to
> 12". I have spoken with a guy who runs AS and uses this type of setup.
> He says they only needed to swap pads and did nothing else to the front
> spindles, calipers, etc. to accomodate the smaller rotors. Does anyone
> have any ideas on how this would work?
just swap pads? to what? i'd be very interested in this, if he actually
accomplished it just by swapping pads. i don't believe that can be done.
you might be able to come up with a custom pad outline that has 0.5" more
pad radially inwards, so that it'll match up to the smaller rotor, but
if the caliper doesn't move downwards, it won't be squeezing the pads in
the right place. maybe it's just your competitor bullshitting you.
the best way to do this is to slot the caliper mounting ears in the
spindles 0.5" downward (but not radially! the effect should be to move
the caliper radially inward, but that means the caliper mounts aren't
going to be slotted radially). the spindles are forged 4000-series
chromoly steel and are tough mothers with plenty of metal in the area
that you'll be slotting. nevertheless, make sure there's room.
that's all you need to do.
i slotted my caliper mounts 0.25" so i could run 12.5" rotors with
16" CSA Type 35 rims. i also had to machine my Cobra calipers for
clearance, but the vette calipers bolt right up.
> Also I'm restricted to 16" wheels so clearance will be a particularly
> important issue as well. Could I just use the Vette calipers instead of
> the Cobra calipers? Will they just slide right in the Cobra mounting
> hardware and work? Will this give me clearance for 16" wheels?
i think the cobra calipers might work fine with a 12" rotor. but if
not, the corvette calipers from the C4 (not the C5, which has a revised
PBR caliper that's similar to the Cobra's) will fit perfectly. they
use the same pad outline and swap right over. i've said so on the list
a number of times - my car currently has a cobra caliper on the right
and a corvette caliper on the left.
note: make sure you get the corvette Z51 calipers (for a 1.1" rotor),
not the base corvette calipers (for a 0.810" rotor).
> Finally, does anyone know of any companies that make two piece rotor
> assemblies for the M-2300-K kit? I'd like to just be able to unscrew a
> few bolts and replace the rotor when I crack them.
not that i'm aware of. i'd like to find one, too. actually, Baer Racing
probably has them. or you could just get coleman to make you a couple
of hats, and then you can buy coleman 12" rotors. i considered this, but
it's a lot cheaper to just buy new Cobra 13" rotors at $60 a pop (i'm
going back to 13" rotors after i use up my 12.5" rotors - i'll use
a wheel spacer for the 16" rims).
06 Feb 1998
"Pete R.(turbinepower)"
Ford
>> How about an email note? I am personally very curious about how well
>> those double A-arm conversion kits work. I know SuperFord covered them
>> once, but only to say that they were available. But I have not yet seen
>> any before/after tests or any real in-depth on the car analysis of their
>> performance. Since they are complete redesigns, I'd like to find out
>> how well they quantitatively correct things in the stock Mustang's front
>> suspension like the camber curve, bump steer, caster adjustments,
>> kingpin (inclination) angle, ackerman, and stuff like that. So far, the
>> only thing I've read are from the ads, that basically cover everything
>> with the phrase "much improved". I'd like to know just HOW much
>> improved, and whether there are any pitfalls of each design. (Without
>> holding these things in my hand, I can't do the analysis myself.)
>
>both of the kits i'm aware of attach the upper A-arm to the
>frame rail. that means the upper A-arm is awfully short, giving
>you massive camber gain. probably too much. you'd have to run
>stiff springs to keep the suspension from compressing very far.
>
>IMHO, unless the upper and lower A-arms are fairly close in length
>and chassis mounting position, the double A-arm suspensions out there
>aren't going to work as well as they should.
I autocross regularly out here in San Diego, and one of the guys got the
Contex kit. Mind you, he's a really good driver, (and he's the owner of the
Contex Mustang from the SF article) but he's got his lap times down to the
level of the competently driven, stockish 'Vettes. He beats novices in
their 'Vettes all the time. But the modded 'Vettes with good drivers
absolutely kick a**. He now has the Contex rear, and man, all the tail
happiness is gone. It's so amazingly controllable in an oversteer that you
wouldn't believe it.
Trouble is, nobody out here has Griggs, so I have no basis for comparison
there. I'm personally leaning towards Griggs because they are such a known
quantity with impeccable customer service. AND they're a little cheaper!!!
06 Feb 1998
Gary Lane
Ford
At the request of Chuck Fry, I am posting the EO# for the Mor-Flow along
with what I know about its smog legality.
DISCLAIMER: This information is presented as purely my own personal
experience. Your investigative efforts may yield different results. I am in
no way accountable nor responsible for the actual legality of this or any
other product.
The Mor-Flow H-pipe, under CARB EO# D-193-14 *is* legal as a replacement
H-pipe replacing the stock 4 cats with 2, under the following conditions:
1. The pipe must use the CarSound 93338 converters (this number is
stamped on the underside of the cats in plain view) installed in
approximately the same physical location as the stock rear cats.
2. It must be installed on an '86-'93 5.0 litre Ford engine that uses an
"oxidation" cat as the front cat. Earlier and later years use a "pre-cat"
in the front. This was the first time I have heard this distinction made.
Some non-Mustang applications used a pre-cat even during the '86-'93 years,
and those would not be legal. Mor-Flow has an application for the '94 up
Mustangs, and it is covered under a different EO# that I did not get. You
can get your dealer to call Mor-Flow if you have a need.
3. The air injection tube must be attached and the pump functioning
normally.
4. The crossover pipe must be downstream from the cats and in
approximately the stock location.
If you call Mor-Flow as an end user, they might tell you their legal
department has advised them not give out the EO#'s. I talked to them
through my local dealer, who initiated the call.
This is pure speculation on my part, but after talking to CARB and
Mor-Flow, I suspect that the reason Mor-Flow does not want the number given
out is probably because it was (I don't know this for sure) possibly not
issued under their name, but rather under the name of CarSound, the maker
of the cats. Again, I have no direct knowledge of this, it is just an
opinion I have formed.
CARB told me that it is the CarSound 93338 Cat that was approved to replace
the 2 cats (each side) on the '86-'93 Ford 5.0, and they viewed the pipes
as just a connecting adapter. I also know it was Mor-Flow that spearheaded
the effort to get the CARB approval, so I suspect they are just trying (and
rightfully so) to protect their investment. And I do suspect that there
*was* a sizable investment, since CARB also told me that this CarSound cat
was actually TESTED to be used in this manner, and passed, but that the
margin of "passability" was narrower than the stock cats.
In any case, those cats sell for about $130 EACH, so it is virtually
impossible to build it as cheaply as they can sell it to you complete. I
know, I checked on this too. That is why I decided to just buy their pipe
and install it. I can tell you it is a beautiful piece of work. It looks
great, tucks up high very nicely, and fits perfectly - much better than my
stock H-pipe did. It also changed the sound of the car rather dramatically
as compared to my stock H-pipe. There is much less sound (resonances) front
of the mufflers, and for the first time, the main exhaust note I hear is
the one coming from the MUFFLERS!!! What a novel idea! This was quite
an unexpected suprise. I fully expected the sound level to *increase* in
the cabin, not decrease. Needless to say, I am very pleased.
One final note. I am giving everyone all these details, because the people
at CARB are a fickle bunch, and it is not a good idea to have a lot of
performance people calling them with questions. They have actually
threatened to pull their EO# just because of using the word "Performance"
in some of their advertising. You will see it in their current ad (which
was actually a printer error), but not anymore, according to Mor-Flow.
Also, this year, in California, due to the new chassis dyno testing
proceedures, it is expected that a lot more vehicles will fail than in
prior years. That is why I went to this much effort to get at the facts.
18 Feb 1998
Karl Brandt
Ford
> BTW Instead of milling the rack 1/4 ", buy some Aluminum mount bushings
> and mount them with the shoulder towards the front of the car. The
> shoulder on the bushings is ~ 1/4 " and gives the same effect.
>
> This works too, but you can still mill the rack 1/4" and get even *more*
> of that effect.
Actually, you HAVE to install the aluminum bushings as Bob describes.
Otherwise there will be nothing to keep the rack from falling off the
front. Switching to aluminum bushings will move the rack back roughly a
1/4" by eliminating the rear stock rubber bushing but as Chucko points
out, milling the rack moves it that much more.
It's worth mentioning that most off the shelf aluminum rack bushings will
be too long after you've milled the rack. I simply put the bushings in
place while doing the rack milling.
> Karl claims it made a big difference on his '86 Mustang.
That's what the write-up on my web page says but I probably overstated it.
I wrote that right after I milled my rack and claimed that the car
wouldn't understeer any longer. Now that I've had a lot of time to get
used to it, I'll confess that it's not that big an improvement and that my
car still understeers like the pig that it is.
19 Feb 1998
[email protected] (Scott Griffith, ISES-LLC)
Ford
Karl Brandt wrote:
> > Karl claims it made a big difference on his '86 Mustang.
>
> That's what the write-up on my web page says but I probably overstated it.
> I wrote that right after I milled my rack and claimed that the car
> wouldn't understeer any longer. Now that I've had a lot of time to get
> used to it, I'll confess that it's not that big an improvement and that my
> car still understeers like the pig that it is.
The rack relocation is a subtle adjustment for the excessive negative
Ackerman that is built into the front suspension's geometry. You will
feel a minor improvement at turn-in, as the car will point more
precisely. The inside tire will not be "fighting" the outside tire as
much the weight transfers, causing the car to take a different heading
depending upon how much weight has transferred off the inside. It's
not a *dramatic* improvement, but it is a real one.
The bigger benefit is in tire life. If you do a lot of track driving,
where you're cornering at the limit, the negative Ackerman is
responsible for a sizable part of the excessive wear you get on the
edges of the front tires. The unweighted inside front is dragged
sideways across the surface, since it is pointing at a different steer
angle than the outside front. Reducing the negative Ackerman reduces
this steer angle error at speed, and therefore reduces the excessive
tire wear.
> > What I'd like to know is does the same trick apply to the Taurus,
> > another front-steer Ford? Every so often I get frustrated at the
> > understeer in my '88 wagon... :-)
>
> Driving the wagon a bit hard. Aren't we? No doubt we'll bumpsteering it
> soon too.
Between the Ackerman fix and bumpsteer, you *can* make a really major
difference in the way a car feels. Time to drag out the ruler and
graph paper and figure out just what the setup _is_ on the wagon- but
I'll practically guarantee that the thing has horrific negative
Ackerman and bump understeer from hell. Ford (like all the other US
automakers) has always done whatever they could to make oversteer a
near impossibility in their cars, thanks to Ralph Nader and his
least-common-denominator-enforcement ilk. Frankly, I'm surprised that
the legal department still lets them put a steering mechanism in the
car at all...
23 Feb 1998
Larry Harris
Ford
> With these drop mounts perhaps it would be possible to run 302 headers
> since you are dropping the motor the amount it was raised in the first
> place. That would be cool, since I am thinking of going the 351W route
> myself. but I just bought a weiand stealth intake for 302 and bbk long
> tubes for 302 as well.
Check the steering shaft interferience. Things will be way tight on the
passenger side as well, even with the 351 headers that tend to hug the
block tighter. You will likely have transmission tunnel clearance
problems as well. Don't let this stop you from going the 351W route,
though!
I wish I knew about these mounts when I did my swap. I would have liked to
avoid the cowl hood for more of a stealth look. My 86 has no other plastic
hanging off it. With the SN-95 style Cobra intake there might just be enough
clearance for the stock hood, but I'd need to re-do the EGR system.
12 Mar 1998
Brian Kelley
Ford
Wes Tarbox writes:
> Sorry if this is slightly off-topic guys/gals.
Entirely on-topic! Or, I guess we could go back to talking about
rotor turning (if so, please bash my skull with a warped rotor).
> I have a Saleen-replica rear spoiler on my '90 LX.
> Any idea if the downforce of one of these would significantly hurt
> acceleration in a 1/4 drag race? I just got a message from someone
> claiming that by removing the large Saleen wing, alone, they picked
> up 4mph in trap speed. Is this possible?
Absolutely..
> I honestly thought downforce would just keep the car more stable, not
> really slow it down too much...certainly not anything significant, unless of
> course you went really radical and _tried_ to make the car slower.
The downforce could certainly help keep the car more stable coming
through a turn like #1 at TWS... But for drag racing, unless you're
having trouble hooking up at high speeds, I doubt it would be a
benefit.
Here are some tests results from some friends of mine. I posted
them back in 1995:
The downforce generated at the rear hatch was measured for three
different configurations.
The test vehicles were all third generation mustangs. Vehicle 1 = LX,
Vehicle 2= GT, Vehicl 3 = Saleen.
The downforce data was obtained by measuring the downforce generated
at the same spot on the rear hatch (midline and near the latch).
Downforce was measured at 0 mph, 55 mph, 85mph and the data was linearly
extrapolated (this should be conservative) to 100mph.
The data follows:
Vehicle 1 Vehicle 2 Vehicle 3
0 mph 25 27 30
55 mph 30 35 45
80 mph 40 44 85
100mph 48 51 117
> I guess I could try going down to the strip one time without it on
> there, just to do my own informal testing....
That would be the best. Let us know!
27 Mar 1998
[email protected] (Scott Griffith, ISES-LLC)
Ford
On Mar 26, Chuck Fry wrote:
> After I wrote my last diatribe on this thread, I had a look at some
> Energy Suspension bushings and Skod's old Griggs modified K-member, both
> of which are currently sitting in my garage, and slated for installation
> some day on Beastie, my '89 Mustang LX 5.0...
> The bolt holes appear to be bigger than the ID of this axle, but smaller
> than the OD. Worse, the rear "bolt hole" is actually a welded-on nut!
> I guess that was the only way they could install the bolt, since the nut
> sits *above* the flange that bolts to the chassis, in a place that can't
> be reached once the K-member is installed.
Right. With the antidive the I spec'd, the nut sits well up in the
small gap between the subframe horn and the rear K-member mount when
installed. It is intended to be used with the factory control arm
hardware, although you might have to shorten the rear bolt just a tad
to get it to clamp properly without jacking the K-frame forward. It
should not be allowed to run into the subframe horn (for obvious
reasons).
> With the nut already welded on, I have no idea how I'm going to
> positively locate the rear bushing axles. For the others, it seems like
> the best I can do is take a washer with about the same 7/8" OD and pad
> the end of it so there's metal-to-metal contact without squeezing the
> urethane, or maybe ream the other holes oversize and fabricate "hat"
> section washers that will center the axle in the holes and space the
> urethane off the ears.
IMNSHO, the right way to fix your current problem would be to knock
the center slugs out of your Energy Suspension bushings, and _throw
them away_. Then, get some mild steel bar stock, and fabricate new
slugs that are the right length, and are a .005"-.010" slip fit on the
OD of the trunnion bolt's shank.
For some inexplicable reason, both ES and Global West seem to make all
their bushings with center slugs that are about .100" too short. Which
is absolutely *braindead*, because when you then reef on the bolt to
squeeze the lugs on the K-frame in to clamp against the slug, you put
a permanent bending load on the base of the lugs. The closer the fit
of the center slug, the less this parasitic bending load will be.
Ford's production tolerances on the inner sleeve of the production
bushings is pretty loose- but not _that_ loose. And once you crank it
down with a poorly-fitted inner sleeve, the lugs are no longer
parallel, and the bushing is crimped into a permanent state of bind.
No joy.
This is one of many reasons that I emphatically do not like the older
GW "slugless" bushings (where the Delrin inner rides directly on the
bolt with no interposed slug/inner sleeve). With no slug to set the
preload spacing, torquing down the bolt at all just plays _hell_ with
the K-frame lugs, and the assembly is essentially doomed. Either one
of the K-frame lugs will eventually crack (probably the rearmost,
since the braking load is exactly opposite this bending preload,
leading to fully-reversed bending stresses that transition through
zero twice per brake application), or the bolt will crap out, or lose
preload, or the delrin will pound out. Slugless bushings are a crime
against nature, and have no place on a car that will see track duty.
> I didn't have a spare bolt handy to measure, but it's got to be smaller
> than 5/8" or there's no way these bushings could be installed in the
> first place. I'm pretty sure it's a metric size but the shop manual
> doesn't specify.
That hardware is 16mmx2.0, I think.
The Griggs K-members, whether they are a modified stocker or a tubular
fabrication, *all* have the rearmost nut welded in place. They all use
the stock Ford hardware. The Ford chassis group has spec'd good
fasteners for this application. My tubular K-member has the same setup
on the nut, although there is more room for the nut on the fabrication
than on the modified stamping.
The holes in the mount lugs are an acceptably tight fit on the stepped
shank of the stock hardware, at least at the _head_ end of the bolt.
At the thread end, the fit sucks in the stock configuration- but then,
the hole is bearing on threads, which is Not Good either. Griggs
solves that by positively locating the _nut_, which very effectively
*eliminates* fretting wear over the threads at that end.
The Griggs extreme-duty adjustable front arms have machined spacers
that locate a 3/4" Heim on that 16mm bolt, as an example. They remove
the majority of the bending load from the bolt by using a very wide
base on the highly tapered spacers, and by holding tight tolerances on
the length of the "stack" that sets the preload between the lugs.
> There's another option... I bought a HUGE piece of Delrin stock a while
> back, specifically for fabricating A-arm bushings, and promptly left it
> with my friend Andy when he lived a few miles away. Then Andy moved to
> Bumf**k, Nevada, about a 5 hour drive from here, taking the Delrin with
> him.
>
> But Andy has a full machine shop behind the house. And he owes me one
> for working on his race cars over the years. And maybe he didn't use
> all the Delrin for his own projects; last I spoke to him there were
> still a couple of feet left.
>
> I still can't do anything about that pair of welded-on nuts, but I can
> try to design a set of bushings that properly locate the axles in the
> other holes. Hmmm.
Keep the urethane- you paid for it already. Just spend an hour or two
on his lathe and carve new inner slugs that are the right length, the
right ID to pilot well on the trunnion bolt, and the right OD to give
you a one-thumb snug-but-nonbinding fit in the ID of your existing
urethane parts. You want the slug to lay tightly between the lugs, and
keep them parallel *and unbent* when the trunnion bolt is fully torqued
down to lock the slug in place. The precision of that fit minimizes the
bending load in the trunnion bolt, and maximizes its life in that
application.
You cannot achieve the Carroll-Smith-approved, best-case "floating
double shear lug" in this case. The floating lug is great when the
assembly sees only loads that are perpendicular to the trunnion bolt,
like on a damper mount. This case is significantly more complicated.
A damper mount distributes the applied load more or less equally
between its lugs, since the load is perpendicular to the trunnion
bolt. But the rear pickup point on the front control arms takes all
the _braking_ loads in the car, and those loads are primarily
*longitudinal*- they are very nearly parallel to the trunnion bolt's
axis. Bad news. If you floated that lug, you'd have to float the
<<<>>>
trunnion bolt, right through the root of the first thread, since the
weld nut doesn't float with the bolt. *Very* bad.
So, due to packaging considerations, what you have to do is abandon
the theoretical advantage of the floating lug, and make the trailing
edge of the rear pickup one hell of a buttress to take the
longitudinal braking loads and feed them directly into the subframe
horn. The you make the leading edge as rigid as you can to locate the
other end of the bolt radially, and keep it perpendicular to your
buttress. And then, you precision-fit the inner sleeve to keep the
bending loads in the trunnion bolt to a minimum- AND you replace the
damned thing yearly anyway! It's not theoretically perfect. In fact,
it's one hell of a long way from it. But sometimes packaging _is_ a
consideration...
That also points out a basic problem with making little pieces of
Ford's structure more rigid, and then hammering on the structure
harder. When you take the flex out of one part, you are very likely
increasing the loading and stress in some other part that hasn't been
stiffened by an equal amount... It's sometimes not as obvious as one
would like.
28 Mar 1998
Gary Lane
Ford
For those of you who are interested and can make it to Mission Viejo, CA by
Monday, March 30th at 5:00pm, Corey Shaw, Chief Designer and CEO of Contex
Control Technologies, Inc. will be introducing their newest dealer, GRC
Performance by hosting a demonstration seminar at their facility. GRC's
address is:
GRC Performance
23854 Via Fabricante, Ste F-2
Mission Viejo, CA 92691
(714) 457-1875
Owner: Umberto Gizzi
Contex manufactures and markets 3 levels of front and rear suspensions for
the Mustang Fox chassis. The rear is a Shaw-Link (modified watts link),
4-bar trailing link setup with coilovers. The front is a SLA, high arm,
double wishbone design also with coilovers.
Corey is bringing complete demonstration hardware so we can all see for
ourselves just how the designs work. He is also trailering a Fox Mustang
with the complete front & rear system installed, and will be providing
demonstration rides for all who attend.
CONTEX claims their designs will out handle anything on the market today.
I've only seen the pictures, but I can tell you it looks pretty awesome. If
it really works like it looks like it does, the claims may not be far
fetched. GRC asked me to put this on the lists because they want to get as
many people to attend as possible. This way, more varied questions,
considerations and objections can be handled by the designer.
Sorry for the short notice, but I just today found out about this, and the
whole thing was just put together on Friday by Contex & GRC. I hope some of
you can make it. It seems like a rare opportunity to see & touch an
excellent product while being able to quiz the actual designer directly.
Hope to see some of you there.
***Please call GRC on Monday to confirm, as space is limited.***
29 Mar 1998
Gary Lane
Ford
At 01:22 AM 3/29/98 -0800, Eugene Y C Chu wrote:
>>Contex manufactures and markets 3 levels of front and rear suspensions for
>>the Mustang Fox chassis. The rear is a Shaw-Link (modified watts link),
>>4-bar trailing link setup with coilovers. The front is a SLA, high arm,
>>double wishbone design also with coilovers.
>
>ARGH!!! I just returned from Mission Viejo. Why couldn't this demo
>have been this Saturday, or the NEXT Monday? I'm headed out to
>Fairbanks on Monday, and won't be back to MV until next Sunday!
>
>I'm REALLY interested in this, so please take good notes, and post to
>the list. I can till read email.
I intend to do just that. I have a friend with a digital camera, and if I
can get in touch with him before monday, I will have some photos to post as
well, although I don't know if that can be done right away. GRC has a web
site & I'll see about getting them posted there.
>PS: Are these the kits that were decribed in last month's SuperFord?
>(Costing $4000 for the front and $2600 for the rear!!!)
No, that's a different company, Special Vehicle Development (an obvious
attempt to imply some direct affiliation with Ford, I believe) out of
Chelshire, CT. Those parts are race only with hiem joints everywhere.
Contex is based in Idaho Falls, ID. The Contex system is for street AND
track. It uses rubber at all points except the differential attachment
point of the Shaw-Link, which, acording to Corey, was done primarily for
looks as that is the only part of the rear system that can be seen from
outside the car. Corey actually recommends rubber there as well and can be
had on request.
I don't know all that much yet, but Contex does have a front system in that
price range. The ultra high end front system has on-the-fly micrometer
adjustments for castor, camber & toe. There are 2 systems below that one
that utilize the same basic geometry and some of the stock pieces, like the
k-member and lower arm, and cost considerably less, but I'm not sure how
much yet. The complete rear system costs $1995 and that includes the rear
axle truss and your choice of springs & shocks. Not that bad for something
that truly kicks ass, ... if it really does. I should know more by Monday eve.
31 Mar 1998
Teddy Chen
Ford
well, skod, you heard a little bit about this from talking to scott hung,
but:
coincidentally, i had my front suspension apart at the time that this
thread started, and i noticed that i practically had to put all my
weight on the control arm to push it down. didn't bode well for
the bushings in the control arms.
i had noticed before that the sleeves were undersized, when i installed
them, but at the time i didn't think about what that meant. and later
on, i was just plain lazy. so, while i had my front suspension apart
to drill the spindles for the bumpsteering (a different story), i
decided to take a look at the sleeves.
getting them out was tough. i got nowhere using a 4 lb. sledgehammer
to pound them out, and ended up using a vise. even with the sleeves
sticking halfway out, i needed visegrips to rotate the sleeves (and
eventually pull them out).
the sleeves are 0.1" too short, just as skod said. they appear to
be 7/8" tubing, 1/8" wall thickness (so 5/8" ID, 7/8" OD). the bolts
are metric, but are slightly smaller than their nominal 16mm diameter.
16mm would be about 0.630", but the bolts measured 0.624" at their
shoulders, and even narrower at the stepped-down portion. they fit
easily inside the sleeves and the replacement 7/8", 1/8" wall tubing
that i bought today.
it looks like the correct measurements should be 3.27" and 3.09".
i'll be cutting the tubing to 3.3" and 3.1", and filing it to fit
(easier to remove metal than to put it back on, yes?).
in your e-mail, skod, you suggested that the ID should be 0.005-0.010"
larger than the bolt. i'm not sure i understand the reasoning behind
this. perhaps to reduce/eliminate bending loads being applied to the
bolt by the sleeve, but it seems to me that the sleeve would simply
move until it came into contact with the sleeve. also, the bolt has
a stepped-down portion, so that the point of contact is closer to the
ends of the bolt (thereby reducing the moment). the 0.005-0.010"
clearance would certainly make the bushing easier to install.
i also noticed that despite the zerk fittings i installed in the bushings,
the sleeves were dry. the grease that i was putting in was squeezing
out between the bushing and the outer shell. i suspect that the bushing
rotated in the shell, so that the hole in the bushing was no longer aligned
with the zerk fitting. i plan to take the bushings out of the shells
and carve a small groove around the circumference of the bushing, so
that even if the bushing rotates in the shell, the grease will have
a path to the sleeve.
the ID of the bushings (which are currently installed in the control arms)
ranges between 0.830" and 0.850". the sleeves and the new tubing measure
0.875-0.880", which means about 0.030" interference fit. that can't
be helping matters much. i'll be turning down the OD of the new sleeves
or opening up the ID of the poly bushings. scott hung's new bushings
measured 0.880". i suspect that their ID will get smaller once he
installs them in the shells and they get squeezed in.
well, i started thinking that if i'm going to be making new sleeves,
why not make thicker ones? keep the ID the same (for the bolts), but
open up the OD to 1.5" or so, and have a sleeve with a much thicker wall.
that would help to reduce bending loads in the bolt.
or, how about an offset sleeve that would offset the axis of the poly
bushing outboard of the axis of the bolt to increase negative camber?
the thing is, that creates a moment about the bolt, from two sources:
up/down movement of the control arm itself, and application of side
loading in a direction that doesn't pass through the two axes.
the first one should be minimal if you keep the bushings well-lubricated,
but the second one could be major.
scott says you weren't big on the idea of dowelling the bushing to
keep it in place, saying that the dowel would need to be replaced
frequently and the holes would egg out. i'm not sure which holes you
meant.
if you make the sleeve from 4130 chromoly steel, there isn't going to
be any danger of egging out the hole(s) in it. use an AN bolt, weld a
nut to one side of the control arm mount, and weld an AN washer to the other
side of the control arm mount (after drilling the mount to run the bolt
through). that should keep the k-member holes from being egged out.
the AN bolt would be held in double shear, and of course you'd try to
minimize the bending loads in the bolt. the only problem i can see is
whether you'll have enough room between the head of the bolt and the
edge of the new sleeve to put a locating bolt in there. it'd have to
be a pretty small bolt. but you could have several. is the k-member
lug strong enough for that, or would you have to add reinforcing steel
plates to it?
hmm. seems like a lot of work to get maybe half a degree of negative
camber at most. it'd be easier to slot my struts some more.
well, ok. how about building in some antidive? will that make it
worthwhile?
scott said, "come on, teddy. if there were an easy way to do it,
skod would have done it already." but i haven't convinced myself
that it can't be done, yet, although i'm beginning to think that it
probably isn't worth the effort (which is why i already bought tubing
to make replacement sleeves that are identical except for being
slightly longer).
31 Mar 1998
[email protected] (Scott Griffith, ISES-LLC)
Ford
On Mar 31, Teddy Chen wrote:
> in your e-mail, skod, you suggested that the ID should be 0.005-0.010"
> larger than the bolt. i'm not sure i understand the reasoning behind
> this. perhaps to reduce/eliminate bending loads being applied to the
> bolt by the sleeve, but it seems to me that the sleeve would simply
> move until it came into contact with the sleeve. also, the bolt has
> a stepped-down portion, so that the point of contact is closer to the
> ends of the bolt (thereby reducing the moment). the 0.005-0.010"
> clearance would certainly make the bushing easier to install.
Good practice. If you are removing metal from a blob of billet to make a part,
them remove metal with sufficient precision to make the part fit *well*. You
could, of course, drill the damned thing with a 5/8" drill bit in a handheld
drill motor, while two of your buddies hold it on the workbench top with vise-
grips, and it would _work_, after a fashion. However, it will work _better_ if
the fit is very close, so that any fretting that might occur as a result of
unexpected overload, loss of bolt preload, or distortion/deflection of the
assembly will be minimized.
Everyone always seems to think that loads come at suspension parts
from only one direction, and that things will sort of drift until the
loads sort of normalize out as you imply above, and then sort of
become stable, sort of. Unfortunately, this is not at all true. for
example, on my coilover car, the front control arm bushings are under
tension at rest, compression under cornering and braking. The forces
applied are a constantly changing vector. There is no "normal" load,
so if things can migrate at all, they _will_. And they'll keep
migrating over time. This is why Ford puts little teeth on their
bushing cores. They are trying to lock everything up solid in the
face of variable forces of reversing signs, knowing full well that if
things ever move at all, they will inevitably loosen more and more
until failure. Like having the little teeth machine right *through*
the k-frame lug (one particularly amusing failure that I've seen).
Screw that. Make the fits be as precise as you can, and achieve a better
fatigue life as a result. If you're making chips anyway, make it *right*.
> i plan to take the bushings out of the shells
> and carve a small groove around the circumference of the bushing, so
> that even if the bushing rotates in the shell, the grease will have
> a path to the sleeve.
An ID groove will help as well, as will making multiple radial
drillings for the grease to get through, and to provide more reservoir
capacity.
> scott says you weren't big on the idea of dowelling the bushing to
> keep it in place, saying that the dowel would need to be replaced
> frequently and the holes would egg out. i'm not sure which holes you
> meant.
The hole on the K-frame lug that the dowel rides in, unless you can
figure out a way to make things clamp much more rigidly than I could
figure out. Once you go offset with the bushing, you begin to develop
a moment around the trunnion bolt, and that dowel is going to have to
take some significant hammering in shear, and on a very small base
circle as well. The moment is zero if you are applying the load
precisely perpendicular to the minimum/maximum axis of the eccentric.
It is very much nonzero if the load isn't perfectly aligned, and it
*won't be* perfectly aligned under braking- since the suspension will
move. It'd be damned embarassing to have the rear bushing eccentrics
go "snap", and go from max outboard offset to max inboard offset (as
the center core responds to the moment and rotates 180deg) the first
time you really reefed on the brakes. The dowel just slows down that
process, and will slowly grot out the hole it lives in, unless it is
huge in diameter and a reamed fit to boot.
> edge of the new sleeve to put a locating bolt in there. it'd have to
> be a pretty small bolt. but you could have several. is the k-member
> lug strong enough for that, or would you have to add reinforcing steel
> plates to it?
The smaller it is, the worse the resulting load on the k-member lug.
No, it's not up for that in the long haul- not on my car, anyway. And
if you are going to put in a plate to reinforce it, then (ahem!) why
not simply put the hole where you *want* it, and save the trouble of
making and maintaining the eccentric?
> hmm. seems like a lot of work to get maybe half a degree of negative
> camber at most. it'd be easier to slot my struts some more.
>
> well, ok. how about building in some antidive? will that make it
> worthwhile?
Shoot, I'll make it easy for you. I have some bushings to do just that already
designed, from back in about '91. It's one of my least proud efforts. Not
only are they eccentric- they are eccentric in *two dimensions*. The
rotational axis of the centerline of the bushings is not only offset from the
trunnion bolt axes, it is *not parallel* to it. Each bushing would be made in
4 pieces, with a leading and trailing half for each inner and outer, so that
it can be assembled and have properly perpendicular thrust surfaces. Mild
steel inner and outer, with .050 thick Thomson Nyliner radial/thrust bushing
liners and grease passages. The drawings are beautiful, if I do say so myself-
just art objects on the hoof. You can get a theoretical 2.75deg inclination
of the control arm pivot axis for antidive- ooh, baby. Gizmo-gawd sex appeal
like you read about. I wanted those bushings! I lusted after those bushings! I
had to have those bushings! I'd get featured in a magazine article, like for
sure, if only I had those bushings!
Then I thought about it for a little while longer...
Of course, if *any* of the eccentrics became misaligned, the camming
loads due to the offset would have bound up the suspension solid, and
probably creamed the lug right away. One machinist I asked to quote on
them laughed in my face, and the price quotes were pretty laughable as
well. Face it: while it is certainly *doable*, and offers theoretical
advantages as well as undeniable heaps of Gizmo-gawd Sex Appeal, it is
totally impractical when the same result can be had for a lot less
money, and with a lot less maintenance headaches, by simply MOVING THE
DAMNED HOLES on the k-frame.
> scott said, "come on, teddy. if there were an easy way to do it,
> skod would have done it already." but i haven't convinced myself
> that it can't be done, yet, although i'm beginning to think that it
> probably isn't worth the effort (which is why i already bought tubing
<<<>>>
> slightly longer).
I went through the entire exercise including a lot of hours in
Autocad, and finally convinced myself that maybe, just maybe, moving
the holes wasn't such a bad thing after all. Then, since I'd wasted
all my precious offseason wrenching time sitting in front of the
machine drawing impractical art-objects, I called up Griggs and had
*them* do it for me, since having them mod a k-member cost me about
one-fifth of what a set of the bushings would have cost.
But hey, don't let that stop you. It took me about 6 months to come to
believe that it wouldn't work in a cost-effective way. Play out the
string, and get back to me.
31 Mar 1998
Teddy Chen
Ford
> > in your e-mail, skod, you suggested that the ID should be 0.005-0.010"
> > larger than the bolt. i'm not sure i understand the reasoning behind
> > this. perhaps to reduce/eliminate bending loads being applied to the
> > bolt by the sleeve, but it seems to me that the sleeve would simply
> > move until it came into contact with the sleeve. also, the bolt has
> > a stepped-down portion, so that the point of contact is closer to the
> > ends of the bolt (thereby reducing the moment). the 0.005-0.010"
> > clearance would certainly make the bushing easier to install.
just to clarify: my question was "why should the ID be 0.005-0.010 inches
larger than the bolt, rather than being exactly the same size or
even an interference fit?" not, as some people may have thought,
"why can't i make the ID larger than 0.005-0.010 inches larger than
the bolt?"
sorry if that was unclear.
i already tested the bolts with the tubing for the new sleeves, and
they are a nice tight fit. i may get the sleeves reamed out if
necessary.
> And if you are going to put in a plate to reinforce it, then (ahem!) why
> not simply put the hole where you *want* it, and save the trouble of
> making and maintaining the eccentric?
...
> Face it: while it is certainly *doable*, and offers theoretical
> advantages as well as undeniable heaps of Gizmo-gawd Sex Appeal, it is
> totally impractical when the same result can be had for a lot less
> money, and with a lot less maintenance headaches, by simply MOVING THE
> DAMNED HOLES on the k-frame.
...
> But hey, don't let that stop you. It took me about 6 months to come to
> believe that it wouldn't work in a cost-effective way. Play out the
> string, and get back to me.
nope, that's as much string as i have for this one. while it still
appears to be possible to do eccentric or axially misaligned bushings,
it's too much work. easier to just swap for a modified k-member,
and the result will be simpler and more reliable.
the only reason to do this bushing monkey business instead of moving
the holes would be if you were running in a class that allowed you to
run any bushing, but no modifications to the stock k-member (ESP, maybe?).
besides, my favorite machinist is cutting the new sleeves even as we
speak.
hmm. with my whole front suspension sitting in pieces right now,
it occurs to me that all i'd have to do is support the engine,
remove six nuts/bolts, and i could swap the k-member... anybody
got a modified k-member for sale?
31 Mar 1998
[email protected] (Scott Griffith, ISES-LLC)
Ford
On Mar 31, Teddy Chen wrote:
> duh. i left out a big factor: the effect of the vertical loads on
> the control arm from the spring (which sits in the middle of the arm),
> the antiroll bar, and the strut and wheel (which both act through the
> balljoint). all of these act on different parts of the arm and not
> through the axis of the mounting bolt.
It's a really interesting exercise when you start realizing just how bizarre
the loadings really are. It also make you grateful that the chassis guys at
Ford have enough experience to be able to make a nice cheap stamping with a
little radius here and a rolled lip there that can take those loadings _with
aplomb_, and still have a decent service life. It's their ability to do magic
with cheesy sheet metal that makes it possible for punters like us to affor to
be involved in this sport...
I'm in awe of the Ford chassis guys on a daily basis, when I calculate out the
loadings and the amount of beef that you have to put into a simple lug welded
to a tube than you intend to use to replace one of their stampings. The
ability to feed heavy loads into acres of flexible sheet metal, and have it
live, is truly an art- and they have it dialed.
> BTW, skod, mail to you bounces (connection times out).
Curious. There are essentially no timeouts showing in the syslog on
this machine, and your messages are getting through. So the problem
must be in one of the upstream boxes. Don't sweat it- it does get here
eventually, even if it's not in as timely a manner as you'd like. I
remember you having timeout problems before as well. If anyone else
has had a timeout problem in getting mail to me, please respond to me
(privately, NOT to the list) so that I can start trying to figure it
out. I thought I'd solved that problem with the upgrade to sendamil
8.8.8, but apparently not...
08 Apr 1998
[email protected] (Scott Griffith, ISES-LLC)
Ford
On Apr 7, Mike vanMeeteren wrote:
> My car is about finished, but when I was bolting the exhaust in, I
> noticed that my rear brake line is AWFULLY close to the pass pipe (less
> than 1/8th inch). I believe that is because the car used to be a 4
> cylinder, and the brake line is in a different place than a V8 car.
>
> However, if I get a brake line that is an inch or two longer, the hose will
> sit a lot farther away. Now the question, how do I go about getting a line
> that is two inches longer? Skod, any ideas?
Which line? The hard line, or the flex line?
If it's a flex line, the answer is pretty simple: make a
stainless/Teflon one that is the right length, and use its natural
curl to help route it where you want it. If it's the hard line, the
answer is nearly as simple: make one that sits in the right place, or
modify (by rebending/rerouting) the stock one to get it into a better
location. I doubt that you'll find anything off-the-shelf that will
help solve the problem.
I can't visualize what the problem might be, since it has been a while
since I looked at a Fox with stock brake lines. When I made the rear
axle flex hop for Cindy's '89, I don't remember there being any real
proximity problems with the exhaust. I do vaguely remember there being
a farily close exposure for the hard line to the passenger's side flow
tube aft of the second cat (there's one metal bracket there that's in
an awkward place). I think I rebent the line, lopped the bracket off
the tub with my cutoff wheel, and used Adel clamps to secure the
reconfigured line to the tub where I really wanted it. But I slept
since then, so I could be wrong...
On the '86, all traces of the Ford OEM lines have been gone for so
long that I _really_ don't remember what they looked like. That's the
only car I've been looking at for the past while. It's been over a
year since I looked at Cindy's car with malice aforethought.
You do want at lease a couple of inches between brake flex lines and exhaust
plumbing, to be sure. Especially if the line is attached to a sprung
suspension member. Things really move around a great deal back there! Hard
lines can handle being a little bit closer, but even so, I'd keep the minimum
gap to something greater than an inch, and I'd probably use some thermal wrap
if it were less than 3 inches or so in either case.
On my gutted '86 race car, the rear line I fabricated goes straight
down the driveline tunnel (on the interior side), and then through a
bulkhead union right above the old rear seat back hinge mount
reinforcements. But that only works for an emptied-out car with no
rear seats. Before I gutted it, I routed down the tranny tunnel on the
exterior, and mounted a bulkhead union on an angle bracket at the rear
of the tunnel. Make sure that you locate the union somewhere where it
won't be eaten by the rear U-joint in the case of extreme bump travel
(like all the way to the crash stops). Foxes have to be sprung so
softly back there that trips to the crash stops are not that uncommon,
especially if the car is lowered to start with.
You can also buy pre-made stainless/Teflon flex lines, if that has
more appeal than making them yourself. Your call. I buy Bundy tubing
in 20ft rolls, and just make my own hard lines whenever I need to.
Ditto the flex lines. I experiment with the braking systems on all the
cars enough that I make sure that I have inventory to handle anything
that I might think up, without a trip to the parts store...
09 Apr 1998
Tom Stangler
Ford
At 01:18 PM 4/9/98 -0500, Jared Goodman wrote:
>The driver's side seatback in my '91 LX 5.0 is starting to twist to the
>right, so I guess it's time to take it apart and try to fix it.
>My question is how do I take the headrest off so I can remove the
>upholstery? Has anyone done this?
---------------------
having done this several times....
pay a professional $5 to take them off.
however, if you are into mysticism, chanting, and challenges, you too can
give it a try at the Alfred E. Newman School of Enlightenment and Headrest
Removal (AENSEHR). (86 to 93 Model year revision).
what there is now is a long strong piece of aluminum bar going down into the
center of your seat. Down in there it has a "Tab" of some sort that inserts
into a slot on the bar to hold the seat in place. see obligatory ascii
drawing below...
| |
| |< Headrest Bar
| |
| |
| / |
| | | < SeatBack Inter latching Mechanism (SILM)
| | || (aka: Tab)
| | //
| |//
| |
| |
\_____/
side view
So you have to side a flat bar down the front of the headrest and try to
catch the tab and unlatch it. you can't see it. you have to have faith that
it is there, and that it will unlatch after you chanted the proper mantra
during the extraction training drills.
I've used a thin stainless steel cake spatula. I've used a custom ground
thicker aluminum bar-b-q-grill fork. all a royal pain. and we are talking a
good 12 inches or so down there.
in the end, you will be mystified how the engineers designed that fixture.
Ok, are you ready for the written test?
#1: Kitchen utensils can also be used for other activities. Name one.
#2: (complete this sentence) "Mantras are ____________."
#3: do the letters S&M mean anything to you?
EXTRA CREDIT!
#4: Write a 50 word essay on how this activity relates to
"a poke in the eye with a sharp stick". Spelling counts.
Most of all, Have fun.
05 May 1998
"PEDERSEN, RICHARD (JSC-ER)"
Ford
I've built a new brake setup for my car and thought some of you might be
interested in what I've come up with.
I have a '91 LX 5.0 that I use as a street/track car. Of course the stock
brakes are a bit weak for serious track duty. The proper solution is the
Cobra brake kit. However, there was no way I was going to be able to swing
the cost of the brake kit and two new sets of 17" wheels and tires.
I bought a used 4-lug rear disc kit and corresponding SVO front calipers for
cheap. That helped but I was still getting brake fade and killing front
rotors. I was planning on following Skod's route of turning down a stock
rotor to just a hub and mounting a Coleman rotor with a custom hat. That
would have helped with the rotor reliability problem but wouldn't really
have given me any more braking capability.
I decided to see if there was a way I could mount a PBR caliper with a
larger rotor to the Fox spindle. Many months later and after untold hours
of effort, I now have 12.5" Coleman racing rotors with "Cobra" calipers
mounted inside my stock 4-lug 16x7" Pony wheels.
I designed brackets that mount PBR calipers to modified Fox spindles. The
reason SN95 brake setups require the big 17" wheels is because the shallow
rotor offset pushes the caliper out into the taper inside the wheel. I
mounted the caliper with the rotor in the stock Fox offset position. That's
quite a bit inboard and allows a larger rotor without pushing the caliper
into the wheel taper. I'm sure I could have gotten a slightly bigger rotor
inside the stock wheel if I used a standard PBR caliper off the Vette, but I
got the Cobra calipers for cheap.
The bracket I designed is big and heavy. It bolts on to the spindle using
the dust shield holes which have been drilled and tapped for larger bolts.
It's similar to how the Willwood bracket is mounted. It's not nearly as
elegant of a solution as Baer's tiny little tabs that are welded to the Fox
spindle (which apparently work quite well). Unfortunately the Baer caliper
mounts don't have enough meat in them to slot them for different sized
rotors. Your stuck with either 12 or 13" diameters when you buy the setup
and you can't change or upgrade without buying a whole bunch of new parts.
The Vette rotor they use also has a smaller offset than the Fox and you run
into wheel taper problems again.
Besides, what fun is it to pay big money for other peoples parts when you
can build your own for cheaper? :-)
The rotor I'm using is a high quality directional vane racing rotor from
Coleman. It is mounted to a custom Aluminum hat and put over a stock rotor
that has been turned down to be just a hub. The custom parts were based off
of drawings from Skod. I changed the drawings up a bit to better fit the
dimensional requirements of my setup, but the basic design is his.
I'm not one to care much about looks, but the setup does look very trick. I
had the aluminum hats anodized black and they contrast nicely with the NAS
bolts holding the big steel discs on. The 12.5" rotor isn't really that
big, but it looks huge inside the stock wheel. :-)
I'm currently still running the T-bird based rear discs on the car. I was
planning on making new brackets to mount the T-bird caliper on larger
diameter rotor. I changed my mind when a used rear Baer setup with PBR
calipers mounted to Vette rotors showed up for sale. I'm going to wait
until after the next track event in a couple of weeks before I swap over to
the rear Baer stuff.
To go with the new front calipers I used a 1" bore master cylinder from a
'93 Cobra. Of course this required yet another brake line setup, different
from both stock and the SVO unit I had. I'm apparently getting better at
bending and flaring brake lines. Rather than try and make the old stuff
work with different fittings, I just started
from scratch and made new lines. I only had one fitting that required some
extra persuasion to seal. When I installed the SVO MC, I had lots of
problems. I think I only had one fitting that _didn't_ leak. Also in a
big improvement from last time, I only forgot one time to put the fitting on
before flaring the line (Doh!).
On the front I'm using a set of used PF street pads that I picked up. That's
the same pad compound that was on the car before the swap. I did that to
minimize the changes so I could evaluate the new system better. Braking feel
on the street seems to be mostly unchanged, which is what I was shooting for.
Braking capacity at the track should be much improved, however.
I got all my machining done for free and did all the work myself so this
whole setup came out pretty cheap for me. It was certainly _a lot_ less
than a 2300K or Baer kit. I didn't even have to buy new wheels. If I had
to pay someone to do the machining and modify the spindles, etc., the costs
would have escalated in a hurry and passed the costs of the other systems.
The big drawback of my system is obviously the use of the Fox spindle. Not
only does the SN95 spindle have better geometry, it's also a bunch stiffer
and stronger. Skod tried to convince me to use the SN95 spindle.
Unfortunately it would have added a lot of cost to the project and I don't
think I could have made it work with the stock wheels.
I'd really like to thank Skod and all the other regular contributors to
these lists. Without the reams of archive data I have from these lists, I
never would have been able to make this happen.
We'll see how the system works at TWS in a couple of weeks. Standard Ford
production stuff has some pretty big tolerances. I've tightened up a few of
them and it might come back to bite me. More adjusting, grinding, cutting,
shimming, etc. might be required. Only time at the track will tell.
05 May 1998
Teddy Chen
Ford
> I'm about to upgrade my 83 to the sn95 spindles and rotors. I seem to
> remember something about some type of spacer or something that's needed for
> the 13" Cobra upgrade (same spindles). Anyone know anything about it?
you mean the balljoint spacer? the SN95 spindles have a thinner flange
where they attach to the balljoint. the M-2300-K kit comes with a
cylindrical spacer to make up for that. you can make those things
on a lathe.
> Also I'll be upgrading to the SVO master cylinder and an adjustable
> proportion valve (probably a tilton). I've heard this is pretty much
> straight forward on the older foxes. I'll eventually be upgrading the size
> of the discs in front (but not to the Cobras, they won't fit in the rims
> I'll be using). Is there some other recommended master cylinder better than
> the SVO? The car is being built as a CP only car. Any recommendations on
> the brakes in general is appreciated.
the MC you use depends on the calipers that you will be using. what
are you going to use? in general, though, i'd say that unless you're
going to use the SVO 73mm calipers, the 1.125" bore of the SVO MC may
be too much.
don't worry too much about the size of the rotors up front. you can
choose pad compounds and adjust your proportioning to match. decide
what you're going to use for front and rear calipers, how much pedal
effort you want, and choose your MC bore based on that.
05 May 1998
Chris Herzog
Ford
PEDERSEN, RICHARD (JSC-ER) wrote:
> The bracket I designed is big and heavy. It bolts on to the spindle using
> the dust shield holes which have been drilled and tapped for larger bolts.
> It's similar to how the Willwood bracket is mounted. It's not nearly as
> elegant of a solution as Baer's tiny little tabs that are welded to the Fox
> spindle (which apparently work quite well). Unfortunately the Baer caliper
> mounts don't have enough meat in them to slot them for different sized
> rotors. Your stuck with either 12 or 13" diameters when you buy the setup
> and you can't change or upgrade without buying a whole bunch of new parts.
> The Vette rotor they use also has a smaller offset than the Fox and you run
> into wheel taper problems again.
Sounds like you put a package together for not a whole lot of money.
The PBR 12"/13" difference is all in the caliper bracket/rotors/calipers. The
bracket for the 13" setup is "deeper" than the 12" by 1/2". It's designed to
work with the 1.1" rotors and the wider calipers. Of course, by the time you
buy new brackets, rotors, and calipers, the costs have gone up quite a bit but
you don't actually have to change the spindles from 12" to 13" when using the
'vette parts.
05 May 1998
Chris Herzog
Ford
Teddy Chen wrote:
>
> > I'm about to upgrade my 83 to the sn95 spindles and rotors. I seem to
> > remember something about some type of spacer or something that's needed for
> > the 13" Cobra upgrade (same spindles). Anyone know anything about it?
>
> you mean the balljoint spacer? the SN95 spindles have a thinner flange
> where they attach to the balljoint. the M-2300-K kit comes with a
> cylindrical spacer to make up for that. you can make those things
> on a lathe.
~0.300" thickness - ~1.25-1.5" OD - ID to clear the balljoint stud and you're
set. So long as it's flat, you can damn near use a hand drill and a chisel
but a lathe is gonna make life a lot easier.
The dimensions aren't as critical as it being flat. You need it thick enough
so that the ball joint nut doesn't bottom on the ball joint stud before things
get sufficiently tightened. You need to make sure the threads extend below
the top of the spacer you'll make.
14 May 1998
Teddy Chen
Ford
> I've heard that the contex front uppers are a little short, causing an over
> agressive camber curve. True?
they're extremely short, especially if you get the low-cost kit that uses
the stock k-member. in the low-buck version, the upper A-arm runs uphill,
further reducing the already-short suspension travel.
you'd be gaining a massive amount of camber with suspension compression.
can't be good for braking, for one.
you'd have to run stiff springs to keep the camber curve in a reasonable
range, which is already what you have to do with the stock mustang suspension.
not to say that the contex wouldn't be an improvement, but it's far from
ideal. the upper arms really need to be longer, but that's hard to do with
the constraints imposed by the mustang's framerails and engine placement. if
you widened the track, you could run a longer upper A-arm - but then you'd
need fender flares or other bodywork.
> Bill Mitchell's is the best from what I've heard. The other maker is Bart's
> Works. How's this front suspension compair?
is bill mitchell's company called SVD? i've heard that, too. bart's works - i
don't know. the spindle is welded together from mild steel, and i doubt it's
as strong as the 4130 forged spindle that you get from the factory. after
somebody pointed it out, i looked at the picture and there's a bend/kink in it
right in the middle of the load path. that's a potential failure point, right
there. i sure hope they did something to reinforce it, maybe on the inside.
i hear that contex and SVD are the best ones as far as engineering and
quality. but they all suffer from the same fundamental limitation: the upper
arms are too short. i have no idea whether these would be better than the
Griggs front setup. but remember, just because something's more complex
doesn't mean it works better, especially if you have to compromise it.
sometimes it's better to have something that's simple and works well.
you could build a racing version that used much longer upper A-arms and a k-
member that relocates the lower arms further outboard (so that the pivot
points for the upper and lower arms are closer to being in the same vertical
plane). but that'd give you a huge front track, and you'd have to do some body
work.
or move the engine back, and relocate the frame rails so that you can run
a longer upper a-arm.
> A while back Super Ford said they were planning another one of their "Fox
> Trot" suspension shootouts. I hope it's soon.
doesn't matter to me. i have little faith in the magazine tests anyway.
here's what i'd suggest: wait and see what the racers start using.
14 May 1998
Teddy Chen
Ford
> As far as I can tell, the rear requires
> welding some brackets to the axle tube and the front requires some cutting
> of the strut tower to make their camber plates fit.
i think if you run the full rear suspension setup, you also need to add some
brackets to the chassis for the rear coilovers and to hold the bellcranks for
the shaw link (which is essentially a heavily-modified watts link with the
bellcranks relocated to the chassis ends).
> They also have a low
> cost front SLA that uses the factory lower control arm & K member! (which
> requires welding a bracket to the LCA).
the upper control arm runs _uphill_, and it's short to begin with. you ain't
going to get enough suspension travel to run over anything larger than an ant.
> The rear suspension looks really
> trick!
the trusses and bellcranks do look mighty impressive, but it all adds up to
something that's heavier and more complex than a panhard, and it remains to be
seen whether the slight theoretical improvement in suspension geometry is
worth the added weight and parts count.
the shaw link looks interesting, and it'd work well. better than a panhard?
don't know about that.
as for the parallel 4-link, the upper arms are too short. you're going to get
a lot of pinion angle change with suspension movement, and the instant center
is going to be moving all over the place (with resultant changes in antisquat
and antijacking characteristics).
but that's a limitation imposed by the chassis, since you'd have to poke a
hole through the floorpan to get a sufficiently long upper link (or links).
it'd have been more interesting if he'd cut the floorpan, welded a frame
member between the rear shock towers, and attached the upper links to that.
but now it's starting to get more complicated. that's what serious drag
racers do when they install a 4-link. have you noticed that in real 4-links,
the upper links are close to the same length as the lower links? there's a
reason for that.
maybe somebody out there will put one on his race car and prove that this
setup does indeed work better than the Griggs torque arm/panhard.
14 May 1998
Eugene Y C Chu
Ford
Teddy Chen wrote:
>> Bill Mitchell's is the best from what I've heard. The other maker is Bart's
>> Works. How's this front suspension compair?
>
>is bill mitchell's company called SVD? i've heard that, too.
>bart's works - i don't know. the spindle is welded together from mild steel,
>and i doubt it's as strong as the 4130 forged spindle that you get from the factory.
>after somebody pointed it out, i looked at the picture and there's a bend/kink
>in it right in the middle of the load path. that's a potential failure point,
>right there. i sure hope they did something to reinforce it, maybe on the inside.
And this is one concern I have; how strong are these aftermarket parts
compared to the stock pieces. One thing I like about all of them is that they
APPEAR to have trimmer lower control arms, which means that there should be
more room for wider rims at the limits of steering travel. (It's such a drag
sometimes when I have to back and forth two or three times into a parking slot
that a SAAB can just whip into the first time.)
>i hear that contex and SVD are the best ones as far as engineering and quality.
>but they all suffer from the same fundamental limitation: the upper arms are
>too short. i have no idea whether these would be better than the Griggs front
>setup. but remember, just because something's more complex doesn't mean it works
>better, especially if you have to compromise it. sometimes it's better to have
>something that's simple and works well.
What I am philosophically against is forcing components to do multiple
functions, so that they end up doing nothing very well. The Mac-Strut
has to do triple duty as a locator, a pivot, as well as part of the
spring and damper assembly. Plus, it just does not have a very good
compression camber curve. Even with the coil-over modification (turning
it into a real Mac-Strut, instead of the "modified" Mac-Strut that Ford
created) it's STILL a Mac-Strut with all of its deficiencies. And don't
even get me started on the inclination angles...
>you could build a racing version that used much longer upper A-arms and a
>k-member that relocates the lower arms further outboard (so that the pivot points
>for the upper and lower arms are closer to being in the same vertical plane).
>but that'd give you a huge front track, and you'd have to do some body work.
>or move the engine back, and relocate the frame rails so that you can run
>a longer upper a-arm.
I'll have to check out my 69 Mustang tonight to see the lengths of the upper
and lower arms and compare them to the the 87 to see the length of the lower
arm, and how long an upper arm can be. As I recall, the upper arms are also
quite a bit shorter than the lower arms. You can dial in the camber curve by
properly lowering the mounting point of the upper arm.
I like the compactness of the new SLA designs, using coil-overs in between the
control arms (like the Pinto and Mustang II). It gives the potential for
shaving the shock towers to allow more room in the engine compartment.
However, for more intersting modifications, I also consider the design in the
classic Mustangs, where the coil over shock are mounted above the upper
control arm. It leaves room between the arms for things like brake ducts, or
half-shafts for inboard brakes or a front drive train, or both.
>> A while back Super Ford said they were planning another one of their "Fox
>> Trot" suspension shootouts. I hope it's soon.
>
>doesn't matter to me. i have little faith in the magazine tests anyway.
>here's what i'd suggest: wait and see what the racers start using.
Yes, let someone else with more resources than me do the beta testing.
14 May 1998
Gary Lane
Ford
At 04:01 PM 5/14/98 +0000, Larry Harris wrote:
>> This reminds me, a couple months ago, someone wrote about the show and
>> tell that Contex put on in Mision Viejo(?). Did anyone attend? If so,
>> what are your impressions? Was there a test drive? What are the prices
>> of those kits? Do they need cutting and welding to install?
>
>I have been talking to Gary Lane about this. He
>was the one who attended the seminar and I asked him about the status of
>posting the info. He said that he did not have enough interest to warrant
>posting this and that Contex was working on their own web site. It seems
>as though Gary has become a sales rep for them, and he can be used as a
>contact point for information. He gladly sent me a photocopied info
>packet that includes detailed info and will surely do the same for you if
>you send him your e-mail address. I will post this in case he is not
>watching.
I'm watching. It's true, I have agreed to rep the products for Contex.
After the test *drives* I had in a 97 Cobra and an '89 GT, I was quite
impressed - not just with the handling ability of these cars, but with the
incredible street manners as well. I just couldn't believe I was driving a
car that rode and handled like a BMW with the power of the Mustang. Until I
saw Contex, I just didn't think that combination was possible. I know there
have been some concerns voiced on these lists about the rear system being
too complex, and the front upper arms being too short. I can only assure
you that those concerns are unnecessary, as these systems have been
meticulously engineered, and regardless, the proof is truly in the results.
The Contex equipped cars handle like no other car you have ever driven.
However, I'm not quite set up to do a proper job of representing the
products. And, I have therefore deliberately laid low with comments like
these until I was ready. Corey Shaw, owner and chief designer is flying
down from Idaho this weekend to meet with me to formalize the relationship,
and supply me with the necessary training and documentation to properly
address these and other pertinent technical issues. So, I would therefore
ask everyone to give me just a little more time.
In the meantime, however, I am quite happy to supply anyone who is
interested with the same packet of information I sent Larry. After my
meeting with Corey though, I will probably have better "goodies" to offer -
so, stay tuned.
15 May 1998
Larry Harris
Ford
> I've heard of this change in panels between the years. Can someone give
> me the details of what exactly were changed? There is a Mustang
The front lower fender extensions are shorter on the 91-93 cars to give
more room for the 16" wheels/tires. The existing fenders can be modified
to accept these extensions and there was s Super Ford article giving
details (which I can dig up if necessary). When I say shorter, I mean
that there is now more front to rear clearance.
I'm somewhat stuck with the '86, but it is possible to perform
modifications on my existing parts. I'd rather not, because I like the
full inner fenders and factory appearance there. I also have expensive
new paint to mess up in this process.
17 May 1998 00:39:38 -0700 (PDT)
[email protected]
Ford
The rubbing of the spring against the coil-over sleeve is common and
it doesn't hurt anything. It is impossible to keep the spring straight
while it compresses and expands, so it has to rub something. Unless you
radically change your ride height you will never use those threads.
I noticed this on my old (well it WAS four years ago) '94 Mustang, it
had a prototype coil-over Griggs system on it and I was watching for
any strange wear. I never had any problems related to that small amount
of rubbing (no noise either). You should call Griggs Racing and talk
to Jonathan to confirm this.
Don Rositch
Part-time Griggs suspension tester.
27 May 1998
Brian Kelley
Ford
I'm still catching up on old digests..
Corey Shaw, the proprietor of Contex lived about 60 miles from me
until he moved to Idaho a few years ago. He did the foundation for
the cage in my Capri. He does excellent work.
Eugene Y C Chu
14 May 1998
Victor Erwin wrote:
>I've heard that the contex front uppers are a little short, causing an over
>agressive camber curve. True?
>From what I heard, ALL the SLA systems have too short of upper arms.
However, I'd like to see some real-world tests before dismissing any of
them.
>Bill Mitchell's is the best from what I've heard. The other maker is Bart's
>Works. How's this front suspension compair?
Which one is Bill Mitchell's? Is that SVD? I think SVD has a new K
member to go with their kits, and it tends to be the most costly.
>A while back Super Ford said they were planning another one of their "Fox
>Trot" suspension shootouts. I hope it's soon.
That should be interesting. Have ALL these manufacturers show up with
their best at the same track and let them duke it out.
Teddy Chen
14 May 1998
i talked about the spindle in the Barts Works suspension. i should have
talked about the control arms, which have a kink in them (as a couple of
people pointed out to me). these arms are going to be under a lot of stress
from heavy cornering loads and hard braking. having a kink built into a
member that's going to be heavily loaded in compression and bending (and
torsion) isn't such a great idea.
in general, i don't think i'd want to be the first on the block with any of
these suspensions. let somebody else test them against the tirewall.
there are plenty of hardcore racers looking for an edge, so if there's
something good, you can bet they'll find it.
on the other hand, i suppose if you're looking for some burgerstand points for
the trickest-looking parts and you have money to burn, it might not be so bad.
get the parts chromed while you're at it.
Eugene Y C Chu
14 May 1998
Teddy Chen wrote:
>> Bill Mitchell's is the best from what I've heard. The other maker is Bart's
>> Works. How's this front suspension compair?
>
>is bill mitchell's company called SVD? i've heard that, too.
>bart's works - i don't know. the spindle is welded together from mild steel,
>and i doubt it's as strong as the 4130 forged spindle that you get from the fa
ctory.
>after somebody pointed it out, i looked at the picture and there's a bend/kink
>in it right in the middle of the load path. that's a potential failure point,
>right there. i sure hope they did something to reinforce it, maybe on the ins
ide.
And this is one concern I have; how strong are these aftermarket parts
compared to the stock pieces. One thing I like about all of them is that they
APPEAR to have trimmer lower control arms, which means that there should be
more room for wider rims at the limits of steering travel. (It's such a drag
sometimes when I have to back and forth two or three times into a parking slot
that a SAAB can just whip into the first time.)
>i hear that contex and SVD are the best ones as far as engineering and quality
27 May 1998
Brian Kelley
Ford
~r ~/autox/susp.response
D'oh! Sorry about that last post - I was pasting together several
originals and a '.' ended up sending it before I had hardly started
editing..
Corey Shaw, the proprietor of Contex lived about 60 miles from me
until he moved to Idaho a few years ago. He did the foundation for
the cage in my Capri. He does _excellent_ work and is a great
guy to talk to about the Fox chassis. It's too bad he moved away.
Teddy Chen writes:
> > I've heard that the contex front uppers are a little short, causing an over
> > agressive camber curve. True?
>
> they're extremely short, especially if you get the low-cost kit that uses
> the stock k-member. in the low-buck version, the upper A-arm runs uphill,
> further reducing the already-short suspension travel.
Buddie Jasman prototyped and raced a similar setup on his CP Mustang about 6
years ago using circle track type parts. He bolted an adapter to the Fox-III
spindle. The upper control arm was very short. His design was different than
contex. The upper arm anchored on a plate that attached at the frame rail,
just above the upper spring perch on the K-member.
After much testing, Buddie decided that the struts were better for his
application. A suspension engineered for a 7" wide wheel is not
suitable for a 12" wide wheel . It may work okay, but it is a
KLUDGE. Aggressive camber change curves are more tolerable with
narrow tires. They have a much greater negative impact on wide tires.
Kingpin inclination is a major concern and challenge in any late model
Mustang. Scrub radius is also a big concern for wide wheels. Some
people will wave their hands and suggest that the scrub radius isn't
important, but that's BS.
You have to be careful making assumptions about suspension based on the arm
length. It's impossible to compare without a 3D model of the suspension.
Contex is for real, and Shaw knows what he's doing. I would guess the same for
Bill Mitchell, though I am much less familiar with his products. You most
definitely don't want to deal with a copy-cat.
In general, the short arm versions are significantly challenged. I
don't like them. The engineering and insurance to CYA is very
expensive, but the suspensions are grossly over-priced and unproven.
I'd love to try one if the price was right. But given street
pricing, I'll roll my own. The tendency in CP at the moment
is to NOT allow K-member replacement. I dont' agree with it at all,
and it has put a hold on my front suspension development work..
> you'd have to run stiff springs to keep the camber curve in a
> reasonable range, which is already what you have to do with the
> stock mustang suspension.
Radial tires like a lot of negative camber. The bias ply slicks that the CP
guys race on do NOT. I typically run about -.75 degrees. Perhaps Buddie would
have observed different results if he were running radials.
> is bill mitchell's company called SVD? i've heard that, too.
> bart's works - i don't know. the spindle is welded together from
> mild steel, and i doubt it's as strong as the 4130 forged spindle
> that you get from the fac tory.
I don't recall the factory alloy, but I didn't think it was 4130.
I have no problem running a properly fabricated mild steel spindle. But I
expect that significant destructive testing has been performed and that the
design was FEA modeled and optimized. Further, anything I use must be
suitable for a 13x25" front slick. That narrows the field.
The Contex suspension was profiled in one of the mustang rags many
years ago, though it was not called Contex at that time.
Teddy Chen
> i talked about the spindle in the Barts Works suspension. i should
> have talked about the control arms, which have a kink in them (as a
> couple of people pointed out to me). these arms are going to be
> under a lot of stress from heav y cornering loads and hard braking.
> having a kink built into a member that's goi ng to be heavily loaded
> in compression and bending (and torsion) isn't such a grea t idea.
I'm not familiar with the design or what, exactly, you mean by kink.
But it doesn't sound good! The Griggs arms definitely feature a
reinforced bend. But a bend is not a kink.
> in general, i don't think i'd want to be the first on the block with
> any of these suspensions. let somebody else test them against the
> tirewall.
>
> there are plenty of hardcore racers looking for an edge, so if
> there's somethin g good, you can bet they'll find it.
A local guy has run one of Shaw's suspension at Shelby club events for
years. He also runs Corey's "Drisk" brake system. I'm not aware that
he has ever had a suspension problem at the track, and he does
daily drive it. But, um, he is SLOW. I suspect it is more driver
than car. He runs small wheels - 7 or 8".
Teddy Chen
> > As far as I can tell, the rear requires
> > welding some brackets to the axle tube and the front requires some cutting
> > of the strut tower to make their camber plates fit.
>
> i think if you run the full rear suspension setup, you also need to add some
> brackets to the chassis for the rear coilovers and to hold the bellcranks for
> the shaw link (which is essentially a heavily-modified watts link with the
> bellcranks relocated to the chassis ends).
Welding to the axle tube is bad news and should be avoided!
A friend of mine who is a development engineer at Ford is getting to
close marketing his rear suspension for the Mustang. He decided to
develop it after tearing his Griggs torque arm in half on a road
course. I can only speak about it in general terms at the moment to
keep the copy-cats at bay, but his design performs Much better than
the Griggs torque arm. It is extremely well engineered.
The problems of wheel hop under braking are essentially eliminated.
Griggs has been sitting on their ass and not addressing some of the
fundamental problems of their torque arm. Pinion angle is one of them.
My buddy's design has much more optimal (AND adjustable) anti-squat
characteristics, pinion angle adjustment, easier installation, greatly
reduced wheel hop under braking and other goodness that I can't
disclose at this time.
He's releasing a panhard bar and the rear suspension, together or
separately. One of the big benefits of his panhard is improved
exhaust clearance. You can also use his suspension with a Griggs
race duty panhard.
Initial testing and development is complete. They're in the process
of manufacturing 20 additional test units. This suspension is
already certified A Sedan legal.
People who are beta-testing KNOW they're beta testing. This won't be
<<<>>>
sold for Mustangs. The shop helping him with the development work and
doing all of the prototype manufacturing are incredible at doing
proto-fab. Projects I've seen and can mention: designed and
prototyped billet IRL engine blocks, prototype billet Ford NASCAR
restricter plate intakes, endurance EFI intakes for customers I can't
name, new NASCAR suspensions, North American Touring cars - chassis
and suspension, etc..
> as for the parallel 4-link, the upper arms are too short. you're going to
> get a lot of pinion angle change with suspension movement, and the instant cent
> er
> is going to be moving all over the place (with resultant changes in antisquat
> and antijacking characteristics).
My buddy's design has BETTER THAN STOCK pinion angle control through
the entire range of travel.
Larry Harris writes:
> > in general, i don't think i'd want to be the first on the block with any
> > of these suspensions. let somebody else test them against the tirewall.
>
> This is largely what keeps me from laying out the cash now. I have not
> been able to find anyone who has run these to talk to. There are
> obviously drawbacks in any system or most people would be running it.
Cost is a major factor!
15 Jun 1998
Chris Herzog
Ford
Robert Whitley wrote:
>
> At 01:04 PM 6/13/98 -0700, Eugene Chu wrote:
>
> >mentioned replacing the grease in the hub bearings with Mobil 1 for
> >better durability. Looking at that bearing, I get the impression that
> >it is pressed together, and not easily disassmbled for regreasing. Now
>
> About that M2300K hub. Teddy Chen has done what was suggested above and
> could offer advice on how to do it. So far I've avoided replacing the
> grease and don't believe it is necessary. I've run my car for nearly 40K
> miles including at least 1 dozen track weekends on the same spindles without
> touching them. I'm my opinion the critical things to pay attention to are
> the 260 ft-lb torque down of the SN-95 hub and a perceptible lack of
> roughness in the bearing assembly. So, I'd suggest properly torquing the
Both of those are important to the long life of the SN-95 hub.
If you want to open it up, here's the sequence I've used (credit to Scott
Griffith for most of this):
1) Down in the bore, you'll see the clip that holds the inside and
outside inner races together (there are no outer races - they are
machined directly into the hub). You will need a small, sharp, angled
pick to pickup one end of the clip and a small screwdriver to hold the
other end of the clip to prevent it from rotating.
2) You need to pick up the clip out of it's groove - either direction
is fine. Once you got one end going, it'll come out pretty easy.
3) Be sure to read all of these instructions before you try this
4) If you followed step 3, you'll be fully prepared for the fact that
whatever race is on the bottom (depending on the orientation of your
hub when you're working on it) will fall out - be sure to catch it
so you don't ruin it when it bounces on the garage floor.
If you missed step 3, you might be heading off to your Ford dealer to
buy a new hub.
5) When you remove the inside race, you'll see the seal that seals the
hub. This seal is not available as a part so be very careful (see
step 3 again).
Using a small screwdriver, _very_ carefully pry the seal out a _very_
small amount at a time. The steel core is _very_ fragile - if you
bend it a significant amount, you just bought a new hub. Move around
the seal and work it out slowly and evenly.
6) Once the seal is out, the inside bearing assembly will come right out.
This is as far as I disassemble the hubs. You can clean and repack
from this point. Follow the reverse steps to reassemble.
Be very careful when reinstalling the seal - tap only on the steel part of the
seal and just seat it until it's just below the surface. Make a note of the
depth before you go ape removing it (see step 3 again).
Don't go nuts packing in the grease - too much grease and you won't be
able to get the races close enough to reinstall the retaining clip.
When reinstalling the hub, you don't need to put any grease under the
cap, it's soley to cover the hub.
If you get a nice bearing cap removal tool (liek the one Snap-on sells), it will
make removing the hub caps without damaging them _much_ easier.
That's about all there is to it - the first one is a pain in the ass but once
you've done it, it's no biggie...
Again, thanks to Scott for figuring this whole thing out in the first place and
posting it a couple of years ago.
22 Jun 1998
Teddy Chen
Ford
> Teddy wrote:
>
> ... some descriptions of bump-steer problems and fixes ...
>
> I don't have Fred Puhn's book handy, but is the idea to get NO bump
> steer, or a curve that provide toe-in on compression vs toe-out on
> compression? It seems to me that unless the tie rods and the lower
> control arm are parallel to each other and have the same distance
> between pivots, there will always be some amount of bump steer. I sort
> of remember what you wrote on this before, but I had trouble visualizing
> it until I actually started doing this myself. What home made setup did
> you use to correct your bump steer?
the goal is to get to the null in the bumpsteer curve, such that the
change in toe is minimized in the range that your suspension moves.
as you say, you'll always have some bumpsteer, but you can definitely
make a big improvement in bumpsteer by changing the distance between
the tie rod end and steering arm.
correcting the bumpsteer on my car resulted in about 0.010" total toe
change on the driver's side from 3" of bump to 1.5" of droop (which is
nearly full droop for my car), with a 0.375" spacer. on the passenger's
side, it's 0.020" total toe change for the same range, with a 0.25" spacer.
i have essentially no measurable toe change for the first 2" of bump,
which is the part i'm most interested in. before i did this properly, i
had as much as 0.5" of toe change over the range of travel. my car
was going toe-out in bump, which meant that i was way beyond the null
in the bumpsteer curve. FYI: my car is an '87 with SN95 spindles and
eibach competition springs. i had been using offset bushings in the
steering rack on the assumption that i needed them to fix the bumpsteer
curve, as most cars do. but i found they were making my bumpsteer _worse_.
i had to go back to non-offset bushings. in fact, a slight amount of offset
in the other direction (to move the rack slightly downward) would have
helped. i considered simply turning the offset bushings the other way
to offset the rack downward, but it would have been too much.
i would have taken a little metal off the 0.25" spacer to reduce total toe
change even more, but the rod end sits awfully close to the steering arm, and
i don't want it to bind up on the steering arm. loading a rod end in bending
is a very bad thing to do, and breaking the rod end would be a guaranteed trip
to the tire wall. so that's as far as i'm willing to go. it's not ideal, but
it's good enough for now. the problem is that for my car, the null occurs
when the tie rod end and steering arm are in nearly the same plane. if i had
my way, i'd be running the '96+ spindles (which have straight steering arms),
and running the tie rod end _above_ the steering arm - in effect, a negative
spacer stack.
that brings me to another point: when you are done doing all this, check
to make sure that for every combination of suspension movement and steering
input, there is no bind or interference. you _really_ don't want to
break any parts in your steering.
as for setup and measuring, take a look at
http://www-leland.stanford.edu/~kbrandt/howto.html#tie_rods
also check out Mathis's Mustang Performance Handbook 2.
they describe the process well, and they've got pictures (which are
worth thousands of words).
basically, you can either use two dial indicators mounted on each end
of a rod on a stand, or you can use a single dial indicator and use
the tip of the stand mounted on a pivoting surface (like the lid of
an ammo box). the track will change as the suspension moves, and you
want to avoid reading the track change. with the 2-indicator setup,
you read the difference between the front and rear indicators. this
is the simplest way to go if you have two dial indicators. with the
second setup, the lid moves in and out as the track changes, so that
the single dial indicator reads only toe changes.
first, determine the position of the spindles at ride height (preferably
with the driver on board). then you'll need to take the springs out and
reassemble the suspension without the springs. use a floor jack to move
the suspension up and down through its cycle while you measure the
toe change. you simply change spacers and iterate until you get the
bumpsteer as small as you can.
as far as hardware, the easiest way is to buy the setup from Griggs or
Baer. you won't save much money, if any, by doing it on your own (even
if you get machining for free). but by doing it ourselves, karl and i
got steel tie rod sleeves, which is what we wanted, even though i'm
sure the aluminum sleeves in the Griggs and Baer kits are strong enough.
you'll also need to drill and ream the steering arms of your spindles to take
an AN10 bolt. however, you could try using tapered Pinto studs made by AFCO,
which is what i did for my first try at bumpsteering the car. if you're lucky
and your required spacer stack falls into the range allowed by the Pinto
studs, you can use them and save yourself the hassle of reaming the spindles.
mine didn't work out that way, unfortunately, so i now have a couple of Pinto
studs taking up space on the shelf. the spacers are simply metal tubing cut
up into rings of varying thicknesses. if you make them yourself, make sure
the spacers are cut square and that the sides are parallel to each other, or
you'll get some weird results. or you can just buy the spacers from Coleman,
but the catch is that they'll come in multiples of 1/8", and your ideal spacer
thickness will most likely not be an exact multiple of 1/8". but it'll
probably be close enough.
this post isn't intended to be a complete description, and it'll make
more sense if you check out karl's webpage and the Mathis book.
21 Jul 1998
"Keven D. Coates"
Ford
While I've been catching up on all the 347 stroker comments and so forth,
the 460 in a mustang came up.
I just got back from Pennsylvania where I rode in my wife's cousin's
husband's brother's (whew!) 460 mustang that was featured in this months
super ford mag (under the reader's rides section only). Wow, that was a
nice car.
It is a bone stock looking '89 or so white GT with stock wheels and a
fiberglass hood (that almost looks stock, only the kind with the slightly
raised center section. It looks completely normal until you look at the
side numbering (and notice the roll bar). Instead of 5.0 it says 7.5!
He took me to a relatively straight section of road and aimed it down the
center line. Lots of wheel spin (they don't have that part down yet,
running M&H DOT slicks now) torque aplenty, shift to second about 40
(modified c6 tranny) spin out again, still thrusting wildly, shift to third
about 70, and we nearly went sideways. I've never been in a car that could
spin out at 70 mph!
I talked to my friend (I'll spare the relation denotation!) and he explained
how they did it. It _looks_ stock, but a lot of work went into it.
He explained that the car has a 460 with I'm not sure what mods. It goes
12.20 in the quarter mile, although with less wheel spin I'm sure it will
beat that. He's got mandrel bent, welded 3" dual exhaust through 3 chamber
flowmasters tucked under the car, dual 1/2" fuel lines (nitrous to be added
soon), custom fitted and built subframe connectors, full roll bar with
hinged door tubes, c6 tranny, 9" rear in the stock 8.8" location, and that's
about all I remember.
It looks like Ford put that engine in there, but he said they actually had
to build an engine cradle to lower the engine down into the car where it
should be. He had to move the master cylinder about 1" to the right also.
He said most of the 460 kits adapt to the stock motor mounts. This puts the
460 way up high and at an awful angle. This causes several problems.
First, the air cleaner is way up high and needs a huge hood. Second, and
worst, this forces people to use an electric fan, or be forced to run a 12"
mechanical fan (because the water pump is so high), and overheating is a
constant problem. Third, the angle causes driveshaft problems. He fixed
these problems by building the engine cradle to lower it down.
He drives it all over. It gets 14-15 mpg and doesn't overheat! Being a
460, he can make all that horsepower with total reliability.
I just thought some of you might find this story interesting.
27 Jul 1998
"Robert A. King"
Ford
Well, I told you I needed them fast!
Local place (Lone Star,) had the Motorsport M-5300-C springs in stock and
for a relatively decent price ($160) so I took a long lunch and got 'em.
Observations:
Stock springs have 9 coils. These have 8. These are gloss black, with no
markings that I could see. Paperwork indicated that they are for "1979-86
MUSTANG/CAPRI". How often to they update the paperwork?!?
Data from the instructions"
CODE Rate (lb/in) Load (lb) Service P/N
---- ------------ --------- -----------
SAD 650 1461 E4Bz-5310-A
MIB 200-300V 587 E5SZ-5560-A
Also, apparently the rears are the same as stock springs for an '85-86 GT.
Were these changed in '87?
I would have preferred getting the Griggs setup, but that'll have to wait
for a complete rehash of the suspension...
12 Aug 1998
Teddy Chen
Ford
> While we're on this subject, I'm building an '85 Capri track-only car. I'm
> planning on buying an SN95 Cobra brake setup, including complete rear axle,
> from a salvage yard, but I'm not sure what year setup to use. Is it possible
> to use a '96 up k-member (with a motor mount change), rack, a-arms and
> spindles to get the geometry advantages, or will it be more trouble than
> it's worth? The spindle included with the 2300K kit is a 94-95 part, but the
> '96 up spindles have better geometry, right? I keep hearing conflicting
> stories about what will work and what won't.
i don't know about the '96+ k-members, which as you appear to know,
were changed for the 4.6 liter modular motors. i don't know if ford
did anything to improve the geometry. but there's also the larger
question of whether that thing will bolt to your fox car anyway.
the '96+ spindles don't have "better" geometry, just different.
the steering arm is straight instead having an upward bend like the
'94-'95 spindles. whether the '96+ spindle works better depends very
much on your application and what kind of spacing you need to run
in order to get to the null in the bumpsteer curve. in other
words, you won't know until you measure it.
to be safe, i'd prefer to go with a '94-'95 setup. it'll be a
lot less work. and use the k-member you already have, or modify
it (either have Griggs do it, or you can try doing it yourself
using the instructions in Mathis).
03 Sep 1998
Russ Solomon
Ford
this reply was posted with the authors' permission.
>Russ,
> The Contex Suspension is a different animal. I would say the
>other systems don't match up. Contex approach to the suspension is a
>completely different one. To completely understand Coreys way of
>thinking go to his website (not fininshed yet) and read his
>explanations about strut type suspensions. I am an installer and
>after installing all these different suspensions the Contex is the >way
to go. Contex is far superior. Installation is fair a little >more than
a griggs setup. Parts extremely strong and maintenance is >easy just
lube the zerk fittings. With Coreys system is second to >none. With
Contex your in a different world. You will win races. >Go head and
post to your mailing list. I'm installing Contex
>IRS and Mach 4 Ultrasport on my 1986 SVO I think after having hands >on
experience his systems are incredible.
>Philip
>GRC Performance
>"performance through innovation"
>> phil wrote:
>>
>> >Russ,
>> > I am an authorized dealer for Contex, Griggs, Kenny Brown.
After
>> >installing all of these components I found the Contex to be far
>> >superior. I had a 97 Cobra which I installed a GrandSport rear and
an
>> >Ultrasport front. The car was all stock except for the suspension.
>I
>> had a professional autocrosser drive a 93 LX Supercharged GR-40 car
>and
>> his track time was 97 with the stock Contex Cobra he came in at >94
and
>> the Cobra had street tires. The Griggs supercharged car had >race
tires
>> and is a lighter car. The numbers tell the story. If you >would
like
>> to talk to the my client the owner of the Cobra. I will >contact him
to
>> get his E-mail for you. Do you live in California. >I'm having a
car
>> show at Santa Margarita Ford in Southern California >and I will have
>> Contex cars for display. Sunday September 13 @
>> >10am.
>>
>> sorry about the short note earlier, i was in a hurry. you make a
couple
>> of statements above that intrigue me. ok, the first one is that you
are
>> a dealer for griggs, contex, and kenny brown. we have basically three
>> schools of theory here. one(kb) is the basic school, where we use
many
>> of the original components of the vehicle. two (griggs) where the
>> originals are deleted and replaced with new pieces that attempt to
>> compensate for the shortcomings. and three (contex) where we throw
out
>> the origial suspension, and change everything.
>>
>> ok, here is the question: being a dealer (and i presume installer) of
>> these three, and assuming that the griggs system is considered by
many
>> to be a huge improvement (in more than one way), how would you rank
>> contex? would they be a) far superior, b)equal, or, c)negligible?
>>
>> allow me to quantify before you answer.
>> value to performance(bang for the buck), quality of parts, ease of
>> installation, ease of maintenance, durability, and most of all, will
>> they help make my car kick all ass?
>>
>> let me know. it is hard to judge when you can only look at pictures
on a
>> web page, and read some text. it would be nice if i were able to go
and
>> check cars that have been set up by all of them, but that is nigh on
to
>> impossible from a practical standpoint.
>>
>> yes, please get the cobra owners' email, as i would like to discuss
this
>> with him as well.
>>
>> thanks for taking the time to respond to my email, and if you don't
>> mind, i would like to post the response to the mailing list.
>>
>> let me know.
>>
>> russ solomon
03 Sep 1998
Russ Solomon
Ford
>snip<
>...but what is the cost?
>
>Andrea Frank
>91 Whipplecharged GR40 GT convertible
>86 GT convertible
... and andrea asks the million-dollar-question!
front kit prices for 79-93 mustangs start at $2995, without coil-overs.
rears for same years start at $1369.94, also without coil-overs. stack
another 500 bux on for those(guessing here, and we're looking at close
to 5 grand. this is an aXXload of money. i didn't pay that for the car
that i would be putting it on!
now, they offer the sport sla kit for considerably less. here is the
parts list for that:
CONTEX Sport SLA Kit $599.95
CONTEX Grand-Sport Tubular Lower Control Arm Kit $399.95
CONTEX Grand-Sport End-Link Kit $159.95
CONTEX Sport Crossmember $399.95
A-1 Racing 2.5" Adjustable Spring Seats, Pair $90.00
Eibach 2.5" x (choice 375lbs to 550lbs) Springs, Pair $90.00
Carrara Chrome HyperCharged Shocks, Pair $218.00
Total $1957.80
Less System Purchase Discount $120.00
Special Package Price $1837.80
this, with the rear kit($1369.94) would come to a total of: $3207.74
add to the cost the coil-overs, (about 300 another guess)and you have a
total of : $3507.74.
same price range as the griggs set-up. the only prices that i didn't get
off the web page were the cost of the coil-overs. these could be more or
less. if you look at the web page, you could save even more by not using
the coil-overs, just the shocks, re-using the stock front x-member, and
lower control arms. these deletions would take about
$1319.85 straight off of the top. you would still need the shocks w/out
the springs, and you could skip the spring perches. add back on the
system purchase discount, and then you are less than the griggs set-up.
now, after reading the literature, i can surmise that not using all of
the parts will not show the full benefit of the system, hence the
comprimise, but, you will now have a sla front suspension(probably won't
see the benefit of the ackerman changes to the full extent), *and* a
rear set-up that does not bind, and is positively located, but not
constrained to the poor roll characteristics of the stock upper control
arms.
06 Oct 1998
Eugene Y C Chu
Ford
This is a quetion for those of you who have had to service the front hub
or spindle on your 1994 and up Mustangs or those with the Cobra brake
kit. The dust cap on these hubs are a bit larger than the old Pinto
style hubs, and the new ones have a rubber coating on them. My old
method of grabbing them with a big pair of Channel Lock pliers don't
work anymore. So, how do you remove these caps without destroying them?
Also, does anyone know the size and thread pitch of the spindle that
that big nut threads onto? I'd go in to measure it if I could get the
dust cap off without destroying it.
27 Oct 1998
Eugene Y C Chu
Ford
Yes! I've been running E-code lights on my 87 Mustang GT for about a
week now; since I've installed it. I just got the pictures posted on my
brother's web site. No, it is not a drop-in replacement; it required
some cutting of parts and fabrication of some pieces. The web site has
the details: http://www.highlandsun.com/eugene/lights.html.
But basically, I butchered into the stock headlight buckets some
brackets that now holds a standard 200 mm rectangular head lamp. I
bought the E-code version of these made by Bosch, and now I can finally
see well enough to drive safely at night. (Interestingly, even though
the lights are E-code, and have the European patterns, they also have
the letters DOT cast into the lens.) Enjoy.
fangle
13 Nov 1998
"Christopher Slaw"
> How true. I suppose our next thread will be how to put an IRS into a
> Mustang.
> > When the final drive housing is attached to the chassis then all
> >of this discussion is moot as the torque reactions do not ever get to the
> >springs. Car rides and handles better too!
The IRS "module" for the '99 Cobra is produced in-toto at Bentler, a Ford
supplier, and shipped to Ford, who bolts the complete unit into the '99 Cobra
in place of the standard solid rear axle. Factory Fangle!
01 Jan 1998
[email protected]
Ford
Eric Riggert wrote:
> Anybody know a cross reference for the '65/'66 4-piston Kelsey-Hayes
> brakes Ford put on the '65/'66 Mustang GT's (and other Mustangs with
> the Disc Brake option during those years).
This is what I found in the interchange book
Caliper Assembly 65-66 Mustang only
r.h.- C5ZZ2B120C
l.h.- C5ZZ2B121C
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