Good morning everyone! I've used this forum as a source of information for years. I'm constantly amazed by the depth of knowledge here, and have used many things that I've read here while working on both my car, and others. I've worked myself into a corner here, and I'm hoping someone can point me in the right direction. I own a 1967 Pontiac Bonneville. 2 door coupe, 5 lug wheels, nothing fancy. No one really sells parts for these cars, and I've been able to make due with purchasing parts for a 1967 Chevrolet Impala. "Close enough" is usually "close enough"... until now. I'm trying to upgrade the front suspension, and have purchased coil over shocks and a disk brake kit. No problems there... it's the control arms that are killing me. I purchased a CPP kit for the Impala, and it's totally wrong. The Impala uses a 'torsion rod" for the leading edge, and a pivot for the rear edge. My Bonney uses pivots for the front AND the back, more like an F body. Does anyone know if there's a kit that fits, or a different year cross over? Most places lump the 65 to 70 B-Bodies together, so why I seem to have the odd man out is killing me. (Damn, I love Pontiacs, but this one is driving me crazy) I've talked to Global West, CPP, QA1 and others.. and no one seems to "understand the words coming out of my mouth". Help me H.A.M.B.. .you are my only hope!
AMES is an all Pontiac resto parts place http://www.amesperf.com Cal Pontiac Resto in SoCal (Santa Ana) http://www.pontiacparts.net Kanter is pretty good too, I used their front suspension kit for my '60 Pontiac Ventura 2-door (good quality and close to OEM/NOS, still going after 10 years). https://www.kanter.com/index.aspx
The '67 Impala is nothing even close to a '67 Pontiac. Pontiacs are similar in those years to a Buick and not much else. Cadillac used a strut bar for the caster like the Chevy. Actually quite hard to improve the OG Pontiac front suspension.
Yeah parts are kinda hard to come by for Pontiac, especially earlier models. Ball joints and such do come up on eBay for decent prices, helps to know the part number too. Moog is one of the better brands for suspension parts and made for Pontiacs.
If you need used, Frank's Pontiac out in 29 Palms (SoCal) is good (I've gotten some needed parts from them). https://www.frankspontiacparts.com
Is there a reason that a regular rebuild of your current A-arms with new bushings and ball joints is not a good idea? Is it a parts issue where you are having trouble getting replacement bushings and ball joints?
All of those parts should be available, nothing special about any of those. I just did a quick eBay search under the car year and make... tons of hits. I buy quite a bit of parts on eBay.
Sorry for the late reply, I've been away from my computer for a while. So, since I'm upgrading my brakes and such, I thought the 'cool' thing to do was to update the suspension, just like the cool kids with the A Body cars. Wow, I've learned so much about suspension in the last 4 days .. I realize that this is an un-needed modification, and will stick to upgrading the bushings and bolts, and will try and stop overthinking/over-complicating things. Thank you all for the responses!
Looks like the lower ball joints have been changed at some point, from the factory they were riveted.
When you bolt in new ball joints, spot weld them also. That's what we did back in the day. It kept them from working loose and hogging out the bolt holes.