Hey guys, quick question. The suspension on my 55 Chief is coming up on needing a rebuild. In the meantime, I'm going to lower the car a couple inches before new tires and a suspension rebuild this summer. I have a couple quick questions. Whats ideal on this car without other modification, a 2" or 3" drop? I'm not running huge tires at the moment, so I'm kinda worried about ground clearance, and I saw some other posts about guys having the driveshaft rub on the floorpan. For the front, just gonna pull the coils and cut 1 1/2 turns or so out. For the rear, lowering blocks. I was just planning on getting cheap $30 aluminum blocks from Autozone. This will not be a long term setup, so I don't want to spend a ton of money right now. Again, 2 or 3"? Here they are: http://www.autozone.com/autozone/ca...id=235867&_requestid=236107&_requestid=238476 Also, will the generic U-bolts in the Autozone kit fit the Pontiac axle? I'm not sure of the axle tube width. Thanks for any info you guys have, appreciate it. Evan
Ive got 2 inch 2-10 blocks on the back of my wagon the U-bolts worked fine. We cut the snubbers in front down by half & cut 2 coils out on front. I dont have any problems...
Cool thanks Pontiacres. Maybe i'll just go 2" to be safe. Any idea on the axle width? I shouldve measured it before I headed to work today, but forgot. I want to make sure these generic u-bolts will fit.
I never measured it, just ordered the Blocks from NAPA..they worked fine though. here is another thread that might help. http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=447950
Heres a picture of how she currently sits: more pics http://picasaweb.google.com/egrist/WorldOfRodsPhotosWithTheStarChiefs#
I did 2" blocks on my 57 and left the front alone for a slight tail dragger look, which is what I like
There was recently a good post about Aerostar coils used to lower shoebox Fords. I'd like to find a similiar option for the Pontiac. Barring that, I'll order a set from the company noted in the link posted by Pontiac Ranch as my springs are shot.
Be very careful. My friend's gone through 2 sets of replacement front coils on his 57 and it rides like a rock. He has to tighten all kinds of shit on his front end after each long drive, and he tossed the originals
Thanks. I would have thought that springs designed to do a particular job would be better than cutting. I have to go new springs one way or the other.
Hey bro, a buddy of mine just lowered my car just over 2 inches, what a world of difference. We made loweing blocks out of heavy wall tubing, used a local spring shop for the U-bolts (square top) and cut about a coil and 1/2 out of the front. It has not changed the quality of the ride, and the front end seems a little tighter, not as much play. I would say if you are on a budget this is definitley the way to go!!!!
Awesome thanks guys. I'm just gonna pick up the generic blocks/bolts at Autozone and make em work. Cut coils in front. I'll post up pics tomorrow!
If you think the car is a little too soft in the front, then cut the coils. But if you like the way it rides right now you're better off putting a spacer between the lower a-arm and the spring cup. A 1-inch spacer will give you about 3 inches drop in ride height and there is no effect at all on the ride because the springs and shocks stay exactly the same. This sounds more complicated than it is - you can probably find photos on the web or here on the HAMB, but the short version is that you grind out the rivets that hold the spring mount plate to the bottom of the a-arm, insert a section of 1" square tubing along the front and rear, and bolt it all back together with grade-8 bolts and self-locking nuts. Night Prowlers sells a kit to do it, but it's exactly what I just described except with aluminum bar spacers instead of square tubing. www.thenightprowlers.com Just do the front rivets first, then the rear rivets, on each plate. Otherwise good luck getting the spring back in place! (With the front rivets gone you can get the front spacer in and bolted up. THEN you grind out the back rivets and do the back spacer.) I can tell you from personal experience that this gives you a 3" drop, better handling, and the exact same ride you have now. You will probably have to trim your bump stops, but you'd have to do that with cut coils, too.
I had made up some 1/2" spacers where the control arm shafts bolt to the frame instead of seperating the control arm. But it pushed the control arm out some. Although when I converted over to the 58 Pontiac ball joint front end and 63 spindles it was an automatic 2" drop because of the taller spindle centerline on the knuckle. Now I went a differant route and installed much taller springs and ordered some upper ball joint spacers that they sell for a 55 chevy for the gasser look with having to overcome the 2" drop. We'll see how that goes... The 55 Pontiac springs I took out were 16 3/4" freestanding height with a .630 wire size and an I.D. of about 3.650. The closest spec I could find for spring rate was a 58 pontiac and that was 325 lbs with a load rate of about 2200 lbs. Maybe find something 1" shorter with a softer spring rate would do the same deal instead of reusing 55 year old coil springs. I have a napa catalog I copied some pages off for a bunch of spring specs. there were a few close that should work.
I had 3" drop springs made for the front of my car, look in the yellow pages under springs and there will be some one in your area that can make some up for you, just start making some calls. I put 3 inch blocks in the back from Speedway and they came with new u-bolts. The back of my car still looks high though. Two reason for this is the rear springs were re-arched before I bought the car, and the body was off for 11 years or so. It has settled some since the body is back on and I expect some more settling to occur. I notch cut the one of the rear body supports just because it was easy to do with the body off and I did not want to deal with it later. When you lower the rear your factory/stock rear shocks will be too short with 2 or 3 inch blocks. I scoured the Monroe catalog to find the correct length shocks, had to make the top hole a little bigger but at least it has the correct shocks. Lowering the rear will also put the lower shock mount below the scrub line, just some FYI. Here's some photos... Oh, mine's a 57 but shold be VERY similar... [/IMG] Notch cut ^^ [/IMG] How it sits right now, no glass, no interior, no bumpers ^^ PM me if you want me to rustle up that shock #. O'Reilly stocked it in their warehouse.
Here's a couple pics guys, lowered it 2" in the back. The $30 Autozone block & u-bolt kit worked perfectly, fit the springs exactly. Heading up to Good Guys in Del Mar this afternoon. I'll get some better side shots and post them with the before pics.
Looks good out back, so what are you going to do up front? leave it? cut a spring or have a set custom built?
I'm actually going the opposite on mine! My '56 Pontiac has 2" blocks out back and I can't get in and out of my driveway without scraping. Also there's some rust missing under my floor that is mysteriously lined up with my driveshaft......hmmmm..... The brake lines on the rear end get mighty close to the exhaust too. So I'm switching out my 2" blocks for 1". Do those spring clamps work at all to lower the front end? They're bracket looking things with a bolt at either end to draw the coils together. Johnny
I put 3" blocks in mine and cut the springs in the front. I then had to cut the floor out above the driveshaft because it started rubbing. Was loads of fun. There are some pics in my album.
Heres a couple more side shots, not great though. Sorry I'll take some good ones tomorrow and post a before/after.
That looks pretty sharp! How's the ride quality? So the U-bolts that came in the Autozone blocks fit ok? Mine seem a little narrow, but it might be that I can't put them where they belong with the current u-bolts installed. Any chance you took any pictures of anything under there? I'm trying to figure out if my spring shackles are OK. They look kind of not right to me, but I've never seen another set of 'em!
swap the front spindels left to right and you will get about 2 inch lower in front and still have stock supension ride,
I'm interested to know about this aswell. I have a 50 Chev that I'm looking to relax a couple inches, and that would be a great way to do it in the front. I'm going with 2" blocks in the rear too.
I'm no expert, so perhaps someone who is more knowledgeable than I am can refer to the pictures from my 55 Pontiac shop manual to see if this is true? Sorry for the crappy pics, but the schematics in the manual should be to scale.
Yeah, you could say he knows what he is talking about.... http://www.flickr.com/photos/kustom55/sets/72157604709437359/
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