Can anyone help me with the struts on a MII front end? I have a chassis engineering bolt in for the '41 and I cannot get the sruts to line up. They want to brackets to be further forward then they are by just a little bit. Are these really tight when installing, meaning do I need to make them work? Posted from the TJJ App for iPhone & iPad
How about a picture or two? I do know of two different struts between Pintos and MustangIIs if we're talking factory stuff.
I am sure that Chassis Engineering uses Pinto components. The strut has a different angle bend in it.
Here are the photos. I know that I would need to tighten the bottom two bolts at the A-arm. Just don't know if I am supposed to "pull" the strut to make it work.
Lift the lower control arm up with the jack until the strut rod and the control arm are parallel, then tighten them up. You are below full droop in this picture.
If they still don't reach after that, and the frame brackets for the strut rods are in the correct location, and orientation, then the strut rods are likely the wrong ones. Any chance that the strut rod brackets are turned around and switched side-for-side? I only ask, 'cause I have some wicked dyslexia, and am often only sure about what is up, or down.
do some google searches. I think the Pinto has less of an angle than the Mustang II struts. The Chassis Engineering catalog specifies this is a Pinto suspension mounting. I am sure you can heat and bend them to make them fit correctly.
After fighting this problem , I ordered strut rod eliminators from Fulltiltstreetrods.Worked for me!(This was on my 34 chevy)
What Egghead said, times two. I did a job that had the MII and didn't like the struts hanging down, so we ordered strut eliminators from Fulltilt and didn't look back. No mess to drag. Just sayin'. '
In my experience, this is not a good long term solution. Ford used strut rods for a reason, because it is better. I've seen a good number of the no strut rod,aftermarket front ends implode the back of the crossmember from the braking forces. They need an additional bracket that ties the back of the lower control arm bolt into the frame rail, instead of just the crossmember. I think the OP must have the wrong strut rods. Whatever the misalignment issue is, it's an easy and worthwile fix.
What metal man said X1800!!! "Strut rod elliminators " are the number one cause "god I don't know why my Mustang II sucks!!! Edit: To ellaborate on this a bit, the problem with "strutless" lower control arms is that the rear of these conversions is very rarely put into double shear. It simply floats there about six inches from the back of the crossmember. Hard to believe, but just driving the car down the road puts a rearward load on this floating rear joint - hitting the brakes, a pot hole, hard braking, a hard turn in an emergency situation will spike that load into the stratusphere with nothing to control it but the back of the crossmember. That soon gives way and peals off from the rest of the crossmember leaving not much of anything structural. This deal can be solved by dropping a pickup point off off the framerail to the back of that lower control arm's rearmost joint, but most don't. And so the "bad" reputation of our excellent front suspensions gets smirched a bit more... I honestly can't for one minute believe that someone who had even the slightest grasp of how a suspension works and basic physics involved could have designed this deal. Rant over!
Oh, and what gimpy's hotrod shop said is the right answer. Jack up the lower control arm to level and it should drop right in. I usually get the strut rod bushing on the arm and the arm on the bracket loosely fastened together, the disconnect the strut rod from the comntrol arm to install your spring, put the whole thing back together. Make any sense?
It is gonna fit -you just are not done installing them..... put your coils in and use a long 5/8" threaded rod [with T end welded on it- bolted at lower shock bolts ad up thru shock holes in towers........[and doubled washers on top] to tighten and compress the coilsprings until the lower arms are level with crossmember's bottom. then you install the strut into the[ frame end first] with rubbers and washers loosely ...... then bolt the end of strut to lower arm last.....it will all fit when evrything is tightened up correctly. by the way you will prob have to cut a turn off the bottom of coils to get a decent ride height...... so leave off the shocks, till you see how it sets fully loaded.
Thanks for all the info. I called Chassis engineering this morning and figured out the issue. CE requires PINTO struts, not MII struts. The pintos are 44deg vs the 52deg of the MII. Looks like I will be getting out the torch to fix them.
I also used these, but did not like them, you will still get forward/backward movement with these, even the salesman at (Fulltilt) said they didnt work that well. I have since went to a tubular lower ( and upper) with a double shear mounts. I would recommend to anyone using the M2 to go with at least a tubular lower. It isn't that expensive and not hard to install. Just my 2 cents. Godspeed MrC.
Should I heat and bend that 1/4" plate or would it be ok to slice/bend/weld it back together? Seems like it would take TON of heat to make it work. Posted from the TJJ App for iPhone & iPad
I believe I would heat & bend them, don't cut & weld those unless you are a very experienced fabricator with knowledge of heat treatment. You will be surprised once you get them good and red hot how easily they bend that six degrees. Let them cool slowly at room temperature.
i dont think i would cheap out on suspension parts. seriously, how much are new strut rods to buy to get the correct ones?
Scary stuff. To paraphrase someone's HAMB sig line, ownership of a tube bender and tig welder doesn't make you a chassis designer.
Ok, so the new struts came in! Definately a HUGE difference. Got all that buttoned up and now on to my issue (dont know why I thought it would be easier to piece it instead a kit). I have a MII rack and an new set of MII bushings. Which isnt correct? the bushings are way to long for the sleeve.
The Jalopy Journal
