- Messages
- 304
Working on the rear to try to button it up... Didn't make as much progress as I hoped for.
Pulled the lowering blocks and chopped them down a bit as the length was too long. Trimmed them down to the length of the axle perch.
Painted up the leaf spring brackets, and installed with a new alignment bolt. Fit a lot better with the shorter blocks.
Then moved on to installing the QA1 shocks, not too bad.
Sway bar links installed, but looked like I would be tight for clearance on the top of the swaybar arms would hit the underside of the body so went to look for the shorter set I made just in case... No idea where they are so not having access to a lathe this time, just ordered a set. Found a really short set of adjusters and popped them on just to see and looks like it will solve the height issue and prevent hitting the arms on the chassis.
Onto the spring bars. The mounts were fabricated for the leaf spring brackets and new mounts that are strongly welded (hopefully) to replace the torn and cracked ones that were on the car. One side went on with a little tappy tap on the bolt and right in, the other side was about 3/8" off on the hole. I had not changed anything since the fabrication on all the rear was done, so have no idea why the second one didn't fit. I even tried to swap the other around and no go. So I figured I would try adjusting the rod end on the one that is short, no go, it leaves only 1/4" of threads so need to order a new extension that cleaverly allow you to change the length. The fabricator had cut both of them to the correct size (or so it seems). So in measuring the bars the difference was about .5" so found the issue. Two new ones inbound for that fix. Will double check before chopping to make sure the other ends of the bar are the same length, but it's not really adjustable.
Then onto the rear brakes and checking of bearings. The axle is a Speedway Engineering Mod-Lite full floating 9". I had made up a brake line for both brakes and the T-Block. Well after I had made that that I had the Panhard bar bracketing added. Oh, yeah, I installed the Panhard bar, now back to it, so with the new panhard bracket stretched right behind the caliper their appears to have plenty of room to get the brake line on... Almost, you can get the line on but not way to tighten it, tried long, short, and some odd wrench, but now way to do it. So had to make an extension with a union fitting to be able to tighten the line BEFORE bolting it to the bracket. Then remade up the line with NiCopp tubing and called it quits.
Made a good amount of progress, waiting for a few parts, finding out the glitches, etc. I would be dishartened except everything on this project goes this way so not really unexpected. Still moving it forward. Many pics ahead!
Enjoy
Sandy
Pulled the lowering blocks and chopped them down a bit as the length was too long. Trimmed them down to the length of the axle perch.
Painted up the leaf spring brackets, and installed with a new alignment bolt. Fit a lot better with the shorter blocks.
Then moved on to installing the QA1 shocks, not too bad.
Sway bar links installed, but looked like I would be tight for clearance on the top of the swaybar arms would hit the underside of the body so went to look for the shorter set I made just in case... No idea where they are so not having access to a lathe this time, just ordered a set. Found a really short set of adjusters and popped them on just to see and looks like it will solve the height issue and prevent hitting the arms on the chassis.
Onto the spring bars. The mounts were fabricated for the leaf spring brackets and new mounts that are strongly welded (hopefully) to replace the torn and cracked ones that were on the car. One side went on with a little tappy tap on the bolt and right in, the other side was about 3/8" off on the hole. I had not changed anything since the fabrication on all the rear was done, so have no idea why the second one didn't fit. I even tried to swap the other around and no go. So I figured I would try adjusting the rod end on the one that is short, no go, it leaves only 1/4" of threads so need to order a new extension that cleaverly allow you to change the length. The fabricator had cut both of them to the correct size (or so it seems). So in measuring the bars the difference was about .5" so found the issue. Two new ones inbound for that fix. Will double check before chopping to make sure the other ends of the bar are the same length, but it's not really adjustable.
Then onto the rear brakes and checking of bearings. The axle is a Speedway Engineering Mod-Lite full floating 9". I had made up a brake line for both brakes and the T-Block. Well after I had made that that I had the Panhard bar bracketing added. Oh, yeah, I installed the Panhard bar, now back to it, so with the new panhard bracket stretched right behind the caliper their appears to have plenty of room to get the brake line on... Almost, you can get the line on but not way to tighten it, tried long, short, and some odd wrench, but now way to do it. So had to make an extension with a union fitting to be able to tighten the line BEFORE bolting it to the bracket. Then remade up the line with NiCopp tubing and called it quits.
Made a good amount of progress, waiting for a few parts, finding out the glitches, etc. I would be dishartened except everything on this project goes this way so not really unexpected. Still moving it forward. Many pics ahead!
Enjoy
Sandy
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