Front End Rebuild
Front end rebuild articles are about as common as Camaros in Hot Rod Magazine, so I'm not going to go over one here. Just some of the stuff I ran in to when I did this job for the second time on Elvira. The last one was done about 80,000 miles ago, using all TRW parts from Northern Auto Parts mail order catalog. Mixed results. Generally unhappy, but hey, it got me through most of 80,000 miles. For a brief recap, Elvira's front suspension consists of '74 Dart upper & lower control arms, spindles, calipers and K-member, '79 Chrysler 300 11.75" brake rotors, slider caliper adapters from a '79-'80 Dodge St. Regis cop car, 1" ADDCO / JC Whitney sway bar, polyurethane end link bushings, and a pair of 0.890" (old D-C factory big block size) torsion bars.
The plan: all new hard parts, polyurethane bushings, 0.920" torsion bars, and polyurethane sway bar bushings and end links. This is all being done to prepare for the new rear springs and a new rear axle from a 67 B-body so that I can run 17x8" '95 Mustang Cobra wheels and 245/45 or 245/40's on all four corners...
I found:
Lower ball joints were crap at about 60,000 miles, which is unacceptable...
Lower control arm bushings were also junk, probably at the 60,000 mile marker too, maybe earlier. I also suspect a broken LCA stud mount in the K-member...
Upper control arm bushings and ball joints were OK for the mileage, however, I did find out that there are at least two different types of ball joints out there. One of them is definitely the one to choose if you're going for max wheels and tires on your Mopar. Click here to see the difference.
With this performance, I can't really recommend the TRW parts to someone who will really be driving their car. They just seem to wear too quickly. Live and learn.
The hard parts I'm going back with are all from McQuay Norris via Auto Zone. They seem to be decent quality, but I thought that about the TRW parts, too. At least these have a life-time warranty. All of the polyurethane bushings are from Energy Suspension via Jegs. The plan was to use poly upper bushings and sway bar bushings (cool GREASABLE ones!), and use rubber bushings on the lower control arms. I like rubber lowers, since they actually add some spring rate to the torsion bars. Plans changed when I had a hard time finding a shop that could/would press out the old lower bushings. Instead, I torched out the old rubber bushing material, cleaned up the shells, and went with the poly lowers, too. I figured that I was going to upgrade the torsion bars to 0.920" anyway, so I wouldn't be suffering much from lost spring rate. Will the poly bushings squeak? Who knows. Is there anything I can do about it if they do? Doubt it. I'll find out soon and let y'all know.
Other projects associated with this one are:
K-member swap, with engine IN the car...
TTI Header install, with K-member OUT of the car...
3" TTI Exhaust system install...
I wanted to install the 340, too, but that will have to wait until after the new year. Crap.
In the mean time, check out the few items that are more interesting, at least to me, than a regular front end rebuild...
This is the JC Whitney 1" sway bar kit. Still looks great after 6 years and 70,000 miles on the road. The only upgrade I'm making here is to the polyurethane bushings. I already have poly end link bushings installed, although they're not shown here.
Here are the greasable bushings. You can see the grooves cut in the inside of the bushing, and the zerk fitting on top. Note how the zerk fits in to the top of the bushing. Also note the cool zerk caps. You can buy those in bulk through the Eastwood Company.
These upper ball joints are what will save your day when it comes to upsizing your wheels. Clearance is critical here, and the UBJ is typically what limits front wheel size. The TRW UBJ has a dome on top, which I can only suspect is for increased grease capacity. Then add the 90^ zerk fitting for easy lube, and you loose about an inch of clearance over the UBJ. This arrangement BARELY cleared the '95 Mustang Cobra wheels I wanted to use. In fact, there was less than 1/8" clearance, so I suspect that in certain situations, the wheel would have hit the UBJ. The McQuay-Norris UBJ looks like it will solve this problem nicely. And, it has a life time waranty through Auto Zone.
STRANGENESS...
Driver side. I don't think this is normal. It's a gap between the poly LCA bushing and the shoulder on the LCA stud. Normally, the rubber bushing is pressed on tight against the shoulder, the rubber holds the steel of the bushing shells together and the LCA is then positively located. Well, the poly bushings aren't bonded to anything. In fact, they are lubricated with a thick grease, and are designed to slide. As such, they provide no resistance to any force that would try to move them fore or aft on the LCA stud. The gap above is what I found when I bolted the LCA's back on the car. With the torsion bars under slight preload, the gap opened up to about 1/4". I still have to check on the gap now that the weight is back on the entire system.
Passenger side. Same story. To be continued...
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Updated 12-24-01