So what method did you use to drop your Shoebox Ford? Pros/cons? Links to another post that covers this, but I can't seam to find?
4" blocks, home dearched springs, 6" drop in back... but im running 16" rims/tires 4" drop in front w/cut springs- Anyone have pics of a Z'd Frame on a shoe? I want to do this, on my chopped shoe and that rag top- i want the rockers to scrape all the time, i wana roll up roadkill like boogers down the road hahahaha if im low enough when I visit kanada I wont have to worry about hitting moose either- Tuck
Front is subframed ('70s Camaro) with a 4" step at the firewall, rear is 3" de-arched springs with 1" blocks. 215R78-15s all around. Ride and handling are excellent. Since this picture was taken, the front settled another inch or so and dragged too often to suit me, so I spaced it back up by 3/4". The car is lower than is obvious in the picture, because the front wheel wells were raised 2". The clip was more trouble than it was worth, though. If I were doing it again I'd use dropped (or flipped) spindles and cut a coil.
Don't heat a spring to "dearch' them! They must be worked cold. Take the spring pack apart,carefully,by using two big C clamps. Flatten them out a little at a time by using a press,or big hammer,grease,and reassemble them.Not too hard,just takes time and muscle. sparky
[ QUOTE ] Don't heat a spring to "dearch' them! They must be worked cold. [/ QUOTE ] Got it! Thanks there Sparky.
[ QUOTE ] 4"blocks in the rear. Flipped spindles,and cut coils in the fromt. 4" drop all around... [/ QUOTE ] Jalopy 43, how did you set up for proper camber when you flipped the spindles? Reason I ask is, I flipped the spindles on my 50 sedan when I was a kid and ended up with the tops of the wheels way in toward the center. I'm guessing you made a spacer to get the upper A-arm out a bit. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Most times we ran one to one and a half coils cut in our shoeboxes with one coil being the preferred one. I cut two coils once, but there was almost no suspension travel left. I tried a pair of dropped A-arms on the car once. Those combined with one coil cut got the car so low you couldn't roll a tennis ball under the front crossmember. The A-arm drop was accomplished by welding a pair of tabs on the outer end of each A-arm. The tabs had been drilled and tapped for the spindle bolt prior to welding as well as being reinforced with a transverse piece of steel. Camber came out pretty much ok, but a shops alignment table probably would have shown it to be out a bit. I always thought this was a good way to do it and an improvement would be to make spacers to raise the upper A-arm up to match the dropped lower A-arm and that would bring the alignment etc. back to stock. If I did it again I wouldn't drop the A-arm so far. Seems like the drop on the pair of A-arms I had was 4" and may have been 5" And like you'd think, since the front crossmember didn't have much clearance and there was more suspension travel available than clearance, the front crossmember would hit the pavement on some intersections. Only drove it that way for a couple of days. I could see that it was in no way practical for an every day car . . . not to mention that once dad saw it....
LOL!! C-9! That's low! To put the camber within reasonable tolerances,I had to heat and bend the long part of the upright(that gets flipped to the bottom),about 1/2" inboard torards the car. I left the stock steering arms,so they are on quite an upward angle. I get toe-in with some of the bad bumps,but is not too bad, the roads in TN are pretty smooth. I have a long gravel driveway, and sometimes leave the house with a "load' of gravel in/on the front x-member,and lower a arms(don't follow too close for a few miles) Thanks for asking! Sparky
I flipped the spindle supports on mine, cut the front coils [thought to be old oldsmobile springs] 2 loops and used 4" blocks out back. I used a sbc engine and you could bounce up and down on the front bumper till the crossmember hit the ground. I hadda "C" the rear frame rails to clear the axle tubes and "C" the crossmember to clear the driveshaft. Also had to raise the center hump in the floor to clear tranny and driveshaft because I sat my engine/tranny a little high to clear the stock ford drag link..even after heating and bending the pitman arm and both steering arms... After working with my frontend guy and oblonging a upper control arm mount hole and heating and bending my spindle uprights back into alignment, I got the alignment to come into specs but the car drove like homemade shit! NOthing could be found wrong with the frontend. I swapped the Goodyear double eagle bias plys out for a set of new 14"radial tires on Americans and bolted in a HUGE, 70's fat trans-am front stabilizer bar for a ride that was superlative if not a tiny bit stiff. The heated and bent steering arms made for a much quicker, corvette-like steering too. It ended up being a very pleasant car to drive.
[ QUOTE ] A big crane should produce enough height to provide a very spectacular drop. Chris [/ QUOTE ] God damn thats funny....
Tuck, Thats a real cool looking business coup you've got there ! What 16" inch rims are you runnin !??? Spare tire rims or what !??? / Sven
my 49 came with sixteens from the factory, they are fourty nine year only. I think rocky coined them the salesmen sixteen's... said they came on the cheap cars- mine had a standard 3 speed and 3.73 gear rear- I have two sets and put one set on the fifty, but im gonna go to fifteen inch chrome reverse- They also made a set of 18" for the fortynine mail carrier cars because of the bad roads back in the day- heres a pic of my sixteens painted up with "chrome sides" beauty rings.
Tuck I need a set of 16's!! I can't find 'em anywhere...Wanna put 'em on my 49 coupe....Wanna sell a set?
yeah i think so- the set i have on the clubcoupe pic, i need to get the old school chrome reverse first. Paso said he bought some from somewhere... I need to PM him and get em ordered. Tuck
i was gunna ask the same question till i read this... well at least two people have learnt sumpthin...
here's mine...bagged,dropped spindles,stepped rear with 4 link. save yerself some work and buy this one
I want a shoebox bad, I just don't have the time for a project right now... If I did, I'd be barking at Brewsir or McPhail for sure...
4 inch blocks and saggy old leaves cut coils and a 283 mounted high to clear the steering, had to cut/raise the tunnle to clear. http://groups.msn.com/_Secure/0WwAeA!cZSO4pkk93c3vl!yqxGZo6MjvBbP1RTumXpKcrW7xvx5znppWIkihuNQg!Gf2ZlbnXuU4eIz0AaQdHkqMDbBGlhxBTQ*ocVfaZelGYzohxy14RgRtezmNjVkxzVZRDF5HHMsQ/reartwo.JPG?dc=4675457809416147599 http://groups.msn.com/_Secure/0WwAVA88Zbea3hMcvO0WwCx1El**aeEPdrZ6jXf4Wj1DRBZ01vMahmuh99S0orxZWAxL4!Omth6EsmekA1tl0g3v0*pZYyVGkOqSoze2MVELC39kifVN2bsgPt9C1106*E8JQnr91VLg/rearone.JPG?dc=4675457809389630153
[ QUOTE ] Tuck I need a set of 16's!! I can't find 'em anywhere...Wanna put 'em on my 49 coupe....Wanna sell a set? [/ QUOTE ] Probably have a set you can have, just pay shipping or wait for the roundup. Craig
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