I am trying to get my thoughts together on the best performing straight axle front suspension. Any suggestions? i was thinking some type of spring over would be the strongest.
The important thing here is Spring and shock's. Ford did keep on lenghten the tranverse front and rear springs, until 42-48 that have the longest springs. So maybe you should try to incorporate those spring.
whats the big deal?? transverse leaf pete and jakes shocks 4 bar or wishbones or hair pins?? no wishbones or pins on a tube axle. Set the caster at 7 degrees toe it in 1/8.. go for it. If everything is new or at least tight it should handle well. I also use a stabilizer on my 32 and i never drove this one without one so i dunno if it helped or not but the price was right so i put it on. oh ya vega box and pan hard rod also Dave
Leave the wishbone intact like Henry designed it. Install a roll stabilizer and a panhard bar. Suspend with adjustable torsion bars. Use adjustable (rate and valving) shocks. Make sure that everything is fitted properly.
From my experience some of the best handling beam axle front ends have split wish bones or hair pins. I would ditch the buggy spring in favor of a pair of coil overs, my preference would be Bilstiens but a high quality adjustable like a Koni would work very well. And I would add an anti-roll bar, something adjustable would be desireable. You should not ignore your wheel and tire selection, A neutral to positive offset wheel would keep the scrub radius down and give you less kickback under hard cornering. Obviously a performance tire would be desired.