A Riviera Update

A Riviera really isn’t proper until it has a stance. Before a liberal drop, these cars have a somewhat stodgy profile. But as soon as you get the center of gravity where it belongs, the sharked front end and hippy rear quarters start to shout at you in ways you never thought possible before hand. This transformation has always made me wonder about the first guy to lower a first-gen Riviera. Did he have any idea what he was in for?

Regardless, I got mine sitting appropriately this past weekend using 3″ dropped springs at each corner. All things considered, it was a pretty straight forward job. I did a little research before hand and started by breaking loose the lower ball joints to liberate the front springs. Only after did it become readily apparent that I should have attacked this job from the top ball joints rather than the bottom. There was some clearance issues with the backing plates that could have been totally avoided if only I had been warned. But a little creativity (that’s what we call that, right Kev?) got me around the issue and the front-end was buttoned up in no time.

The rear-end was even less pretentious. My attorney came over and quite literally cut my work time in half. After no more than a couple of hours, we were lowering the car off the jack stands to see what we had.

Here’s what we saw:

By most accounts, Rivieras should sit dead level front-to-back and this one does at this point. I’m a little concerned that the front will settle more than the rear, resulting in a forward rake, but I’ll deal with that when/if it comes.

As for the future, this car has a bright one. Stay tuned.