50 ford--good advice please

[lefturn]

I have taken on to help a friend with his 50 ford sedan. Want to put on better front suspension. what works best? mustang 2? vollaie clip? novaclip? or do i do a complete frame swap with what ??
Have any of you fellas done this to a 50 ford?
good advice please------ray

[Hard On Parts]

What is the motorvation?

[magnet]

whats wrong with the stock front suspension?

Personally i would go get a bushing kit some shocks and maybe some new shorter springs to bring it down a bit... ball joints too.. blast and paint it all and viola.. rides like a dream.

[bobbleed]

Those old Fords work great as is. I don't understand all this frame swap, clipping, gayness?

[hankcash]

Stock is good...but
If your itchin' to blow some dough, get the dropped spindle kit from Jamco or Fatman fabrications....
Or, just send me some cash....
HC

[fordnutz]

Clips ride good and give you a better steering box. The 80 type Malibu is a good one. My son has a Mustang front end under his coupe and it doesn't ride as nice as stock or a malibu clip. The early Nova rear steer ones work well too. Check the track on the Malibu first. The Nova drum ones aren't too wide. It all depends whether you are going for a nice steering and handling updated car or a period piece. Dropped spindles and rebuild stuff for a shoebox isn't cheap here in the great white north. Spend a little or spend a lot, your choice. Opinions may vary. Nutz

[lefturn]

He wants a good handing and steering car. power steering and brakes.
what years of nova had rear stear?
what g.m had narrowest tracking?
I think a gm clip will do . Need to know now which one .......ray

[swazzie]

Why doncha chop up a chopped up corvette frame and put that under it?

[lefturn]

thats a smart reply.I asked for good advise.
Has anyone used a 78-86 monte carlo subframe? It has a 58.5 front track. Its narrower than nova and camaro.

[Rocky]

Everybody has a different idea. I can only base mine on previous experience. My son decided to have a buddy clip his '50 ford coupe with a 3" narrowed front steer camaro. Aside from welding the two halves back together crooked with shitty welds, it worked out ok after I re-welded the welds and gussetted them and the alignment shop installed offset upper control arn shafts to bring it into alignment.
The only headers that would fit with the narrowed clip were block hugger headers which is ok. Radiator has yet to be delt with.
At the same time, I was building my '49 coupe and I used the stock pieces but I rubbed on them a bit to get the car as low as I wanted it.....flipped the spindles, cut the coils, bent the steering arms, restructured the bump stops, massaged the upper control arm mounting points to bring it back into alignment and substituted a 1.25" Z-28 camaro stabilizer bar.
Any way you do it will cause you some work and expense and after driving a nicely rebuilt stock 50 ford yesterday, won't ride as nice as a stocker.
In all fairness, I liked the way my cut-up 49 drove better than a stocker but some would say it was a little too "stiff"...

[swazzie]

[ QUOTE ]
thats a smart reply.I asked for good advise.


[/ QUOTE ]

Look! I was merely suggesting this .If the cars gettin chopped up for handling and comforts sake and time and effort isn,t an issue ( which it appears that it is not ) why not just get a corvette chassis and cut for the body what dimensions you need? Ya want power steering? handling? ease of finding parts and the ability to work on it? Might as well do the whole shiteree since there isn't much point in rehashing the whole front end and then draggin the ass of that thing around after it. Or , is there? GOOD LUCK! swaZZie

[50Fraud]

I have a front-steer Camaro in mine, narrowed 3" and stepped 4". It works really well, but was a lot of work: recess in firewall for distributor, raised driveshaft/transmission tunnel, modified core support and inner fenders. There's no room for off-the-shelf headers because the upper A-arms are so close to the heads.

If I had it to do over again, I wouldn't. I'd use Fatman spindles and cut a coil.

[speedaddict]

rear steer= 87-93 cavalier for power r&p
Use the fatman and jamco stuff for the suspension.

[Rocky]

Speed, do you have first-hand experience with that rack on a rear steer clip? I got one [70 nova] I wanna use under my pontiac coupe and the rack makes sense if it works...