Technical 1939 Ford too low in front. spring spacers question

Johnale, right or wrong, your 40 sure looks NICE. Only change I'd make to that stance is a slightly larger tire in the back. I hope my 40 tudor sits like that when it's done. I would suffer through a few chin s****es for the coolness of a stance like that.

 

Is this picture from before you 're-packed' the posies spring? It looks right on to me.

 

looks right to me too

 

This is after the repacked spring


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Here's a few other shots.


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Your coupe has "the look". My sedan has 4 1/2" clearance at the chin which is too little for some approaches. I will replace the reversed-eye main leaf with the original leaf and should be good.

 

If you notice, guys usually don't run rims that wide on the front. The norm is 4" to 5 1/2". You must have a rather wide tire to need/want an 8" rim.

 

I don't know about S.C., but the access/exits in many towns in Texas are dipped enough to really raise Hell with a super low '40. The '40 HAS to have a slight rake because Edsel designed it that way, but, as my old Grandpa used to say, "too much of a good thing is bad, boy". Having "the look" is no good if you can't display it, and bottoming out is no fun and destructive. Yes, HRP, there is such a thing as toooo low. Now, let's go cruising.

 

This is exactly how I want my '40 2dr to sit. Looks fine and should drive fine.........IMHO.

 

i bought a new 29" standard eye spring from speedway, 1 3/4" wide, 6 leaves. I took 3 of the longest leaves out of the first spring and added them to the Speedwway spring for a total of 9 leaves. i had to use my portapower to spread the spring a little to get the shackle in. The car was 23" high at the top lip of the fender with the first spring and 1 1/4" of spacers on top of the spring. Now with the new 9 leaf spring and no spacwrs, it is at 23" . i knew I had to get rid of the spacers and needed a stifer spring and it all fits and works like it should. With the first spring, it rode like a '53 Buick , now it rides like a '79 Z28 Camero. Thanks for all the help, no fool like an old fool, huh?

 

sounds like you are there--may settle 1/2 to 3/4 after a while

 

Post up some pictures of the whole car and the stance.

 

A stock 40 spring is 2" wide, you have a spring for an earlier year if its 1 3/4" wide.

 

Here is mine straight after dropping the front end...CE axle,Posies revered eye spring.I shortened the stock wishbone by just under an inch and set the perch centres for the new axle, fitted tube shocks and rebent the stock sway bar( just the ends, not the torsion bar section) to fit the new set up...the wheels are stock 40 's.

I backed it off the drive and the chin s****ed the kerb and on full lock the tyres just caught the fenders.I put it back in the garage and fitted a 1" steel spacer...this lifted the car just enough to cure the problems and still looks good and low.The spacer has a bolt running through it and the spring pack so it is one unit in effect.....I noticed the comments about using a spacer..although not what I wanted, it has got me out of a fix, what problem am I missing?

Here is a shot of with the spacer and one without...doesn't look like much, but it did the trick.

The top pic is with a new set of Coker Radials 5.50x16".





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Wow Reefer, your '40 coupe looks great! My coupe now has 5" front clearance, is 22" high at the front fender lip and 26" at the rear fender lip. I tried to take a picture to get you and idea of the stance, but too cold to take out side right now. I think one inch of spacers above the spring are fine, and I learned along time ago to re-tighten the u-bolts after a few miles. The car now has 4" lowering blocks, I may go to 2" before spring arrives in the Great White Midwest!

 

Looks good. I'm running a 500/525 16 on the front of mine, so I'm going to have more ground clearance because of a taller tire..

 

Birdman, did you put double the usual amount of leaves in that spring? They usually stairstep instead of sit equal length on top of each other.

 

i used to leaves from the first spring. I did not think at that time to shorten the leaves to the stairstep . i may have to do that in the future.

 

Thanks for the offer. i decided to buy a spring from speedway and added leaves from the first spring to the new one. It now sits at 5" clearance and the spring is noo longer pushed flat. I did not drive it yet, but just by putting my weight(220#) on the fender does not move the car much. are you going to Lincoln swap meet this weekend?

 

I switched to a posies from a CE.... here are the results...

It's difficult to tell from this pic, because I can't get a good shot of it in the garage, but the posies spring dropped it a good 1 1/2"... I bounced up and down on the frame and got almost another 1/4" of drop. It looks really good now, has a nice rake back to front, and seems to have enough of suspension travel. I'll get a better pic this weekend.


Here is a comparison of a Ch***is engineering spring and a Posies. CE on top. The CE spring actually has one less leaf than the Posies. The biggest difference is the thickness of the leaves themselves. The CE spring has thicker, more heavy duty leaves, and more arc. <a