Has any body here lowered a 4o ford coupe by just using mono leaf springs and shackels? If you have, will you let me know the results and if it worked out or the problems you encountered? Thank you!
On my coupe, I used Chassis Engineering's parallel leaf spring kit, which utilizes 2 or 3 leafs, can't remember right now. I also utilized a pair of 2" lowering blocks. A Granada rear end is a bolt in, and the pinion angle will work without modification. On the front, I used tubular upper and lower A arms, 6 cylinder Mustang II coil springs, Progressive Automotive cross member, and a 2" dropped spindle. It sits and rides exceptionally well and has "the look". I would also recommend, at least a rear sway bar, it makes all the difference in the world in the way the car corners. John
Received your PM. Here it is. Who told ya' I could be useful? They tell tall tales !! I was given your name as one who could answer my question.I thinking of lowring my coupe by using only mono leaf springs front and rear,no dropped axle and no parrel leafs in back.Do you have any suggestions on this or know of any problems with doing this. Thank you Bob I'll share with you ,and those others that are interested, in what I've done with these old Fords. Good timing, "cause I'm in the middle of doing a lowering job on my '38 Ford 4-dr convertible. A year or two ago I wrote a technical reply about this subject on one of the Early Ford V8 sites, here's the web site address: http://groups.msn.com/FordFlathead1932to1953/general.msnw. Well, the web site owner selected my technical response to be an article listed in the Early Ford V8 Tech Site. There's a wealth of info there. Here's that site address: http://www.btc-bci.com/~billben/flathead.htm Now, use this to go straight to what I wrote: http://www.btc-bci.com/~billben/dropaxle.htm I also wrote a tech article on rims and tires. You won't like everything I wrote, because I don't like short cuts. But you can lower the '40 a fair amount without taking out a second mortgage on your house or putting your wife or girl friend up for sale. I never mentioned long shackles, and won't, because my experience with them has been toward a marginally unsafe condition. I put a mono-leaf on the rear of my '39 Ford 2-door and so far, I'm not very impressed. I need to take time to fine tune it or take it out. I think it'll be the latter. I have never run a mono-leaf front. Based upon my results with the rear, I probably never will. There's just so much ya' can do with the spring before ya' run into problems. To me, the correct stance on a fat fendered Ford is with a 4" difference between front and rear. I run 165R15 front and 235/75R15 rear tires. Measuring from the floor to the highest point of the wheel well opening, the front should be 24" and the rear 28". I've had these old Fords done a variety of different ways. The worst one I ever had was a '40 Standard Coupe that was a bastard recipient of a Mustang II graft. Cross (X) this PoS system off my want list. The redesigned Mustang II's are probably better, but I still have never driven one that I like better than a straight axle. Not one has given me the steering feel, feed back and overall front/rear homogeneous (balanced) feeling I can get with a straight front axle. Most common problem is the steering becomes too quick or twichy, causing a squirrelly condition. This can happen when you combine a quicker ratio R&P steering and change to a smaller diameter steering wheel. Normally, this provides higher than normal steering efforts and quick reacting steering. Add power steering that's not tuned for the car and you have a real basket case. Here ya' go the other way and get real low steering efforts and a lack of steering feel (there should be a linear increase in steering effort as steering wheel angle input is increased). This condition creates a car that's very difficult to drive and feel relaxed doing it. Sometimes things are better left unchanged. Remember, when ya' change one end of the car, a change to the other is probably required. Frequently, I can cure front/rear balance problems by just adjusting air pressures with a front/rear pressure bias split. Other times it might require adding sway bars, heavier springs, alignment adjustments, etc.. Many here will argue with my comments, but I am (was, I'm retired now) a trained subjective evaluation vehicle test driver with ten years experience. Since I've been a HAMB member, I've never seen any technical posts by anyone with a similar background. There's not too many of us around. If there is another here, I'd like their feedback. Oh yeah, some of the above mentioned stuff is just a mere tickle of what I used to test/evaluate. .
IF you do it like Frank says it will look like this ... or close. This one is about 23" front and 27" rear This 40 coupe belongs to HAMBER ... krusty40
Saw and talked to krusty40 at Charlotte. He likes the '40 he got from ya. Good looking ride. He specializes in doing hot rod wiring.
that was Me Frank - telling the tall tales I will argue with your comments just on general principle - hand me another keystone please
here is my 39 sedan i lowered.it has stock style drivetrain. call me and i can give you the lo down on what i did. -danny 281 376-5932 bruce's rod shop
I know you put this up awhile ago and may not have caf anymore. But any chance you remember the tyer sizes? Sent from my SM-T805Y using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
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