So this is a guesstimate.. because my wheels have not come in yet.. but I have spindle centered off the ground around ride height with a imaginary 28" tire. And there is no engine weight in the chassis yet. The very most front part of rocker is 18" off the ground and rear part of the rocker is 13.5" off the ground at ride height. I would like the front to come down about 3".. so with BBC engine weight and maybe removing a leaf I'm hoping to accomplish that.. The diy engine mount kit should be here the 21st and I'm going to get engine tacked in the frame with 1/4" metal bar bolted to front engine plate mounting holes probably tomorrow. It will have a rear engine plate between trans bell housing and engine.
The way I have it now.. and nothing is permanent, just tacked so I can roll it. They would not be able to reverse themselves.
No weight axle is just hanging in the spring. But kinda see what you're saying and I'll will pay close attention to that when I start adding weight of rotors, calipers and steering. But those springs are Very stiff.
Found these for $39 damaged box deal. They will be here Sunday. I think I will have some aluminum bushings made for them instead of the rubber / polyurethane or whatever they are.. hopefully they are not junk.
If the springs are that stiff, you may not get to much movement out of that. Your in the ball park, it probably just needs to go forward on the frame side a bit more. But again, hard to tell without some weight in it. I also think I would reach out to some of the Southeast Gasser guys on here. They obviously have played with setting up their cars, I am sure at least a couple would lend some suggestions to you for proper front axle/ suspension set up. Might want to hit them up maybe before you get to far into this. I'm sorry my experience lays basically in rear suspension. BTW, Killer build. I love it!
Really appreciate all the feedback and words of wisdom.. I will definitely try reaching out to some of Southeast Gassers.. I believe Quain Stott is a Hamb Member. Thank you.
Working on the front engine plate / torque arms. They are not finished, still need to box tube end at engine side mount. I used scrap roll cage and 1/4" plate. The arms will be obviously shorter when I know how much to cut off. The 1/4" 3X3" square plate will be welded to the opposing tube end and bolted to the frame. The rear engine plate will be the fire wall with transmission and engine sandwiching the fire wall. So I'll have front, mid & rear engine mount. I'm trying to achieve optimal torque transfer. The engine paint started cracking and flaking off so I blew off all the loose cracked paint with compressed air.. and the valve covers also need to be repainted correct color.. so just gonna Scotch Brite everything and wipe it down with mineral spirits and repaint.
If I remove a front leaf spring to bring car down a little, which leaf do I try and remove? It's a six pack spring.
With my dad and I sitting on front of the frame, we can Not bounce it.. It's really stiff so what spring or springs out of the pack should I try removing? Or should I wait till engine is in it? It's a BBC with aluminum heads and intake. These are pictures of it sitting in its own weight.
BBC with aluminum heads and intake isn't much heavier than a SBC. I'd leave the springs alone until it's on the ground with engine/trans at least. Then bounce it and see how it compresses. Likely need 2 leafs removed. Im down to only two leaf springs on my Speedway spring packs in the front of my Austin, and it's still plenty firm enough!
Have you got an old engine laying around? Put some thick plywood across the chassis rails and sit it on for a rough guesstimate of weight with a block of timber under the axle ends. You will soon see if springs are too stiff.
Very nice Hotrod . Are you running a big block or small block? I'll probably wait and set engine / transmission in it to be safe but probably will end up removing 1-3 leaf's.. really appreciate the help. At what degree are your shackles at on the Austin?
I wish I did. I just have the short block SBC I'm building for my son. I think my dad and I together way more than that, we were 400+ lbs on the front and it didn't budge. I thought about setting the BBC on timbers laying across the frame, but engine mounts should be here either tomorrow or Sunday.. I'm just being impatient lol. Shackle angle is at 69° now in its own weight.. I just have rear spring hangers tacked in but really hope I don't have to move them. Thanks everyone really appreciate all the help..
So I was thinking .. I know scary.. lol. Has anyone tried running boomerang shackles in the front. I know in the off-road world and going back to my rock crawler days with leaf sprung Jeeps used them for more articulation and to avoid shackle from inverting and bending a soft flexible leaf spring. Reason I ask is that it seems it would work very well on a Gasser. You can run a softer spring so on a hard launch you can get more front end rise before front wheels leave the ground during weight transfer. Because I know on a rock crawler the whole point is to keep all tires connected to the ground softer spring equals more droop more articulation.. What are y'all's thoughts? I under stand the stance of the gasser is for weight transfer but you get very little rise out of the front before front wheels come off the ground with stiff springs.
My Austin is an iron head SBC. 4 bolt main 355 now, as the old 327 spun a rod and destroyed the crank years ago. The most effective leafs to remove are the longest. But I prefer to keep the first longest after the main leaf, so the springs aren't trying to bend the main leaf hanging out as a single unsupported. The shortest do the least, and removing them wont have as much effect on the stiffness. Because of how cramped my engine bay is, #1 cylinder sits right over the axle centerline. I wanted it back as far as I could reasonably go, but I'm looking out the rear side windows when I drive now, and going further back wasn't good for my driving position. I've never used the dogleg shackles you pictured, but I would toss those wimpy little Speedway shackles. I had the same that came with the tube axle I put in my Austin, and they just looked to wimpy. And the even smaller 3/8" threaded ends didn't make me feel very confident either. So I made up new shackles from 3/8" x 1.25" flat bar, and used full sized bolts in them. I see a lot of those little shackles in use, so they're probably OK, but I didn't like them myself. I have my kingpin angle at 10 degrees, so my car wants to go straight if it ever got out of shape at the drags. With only a 89" wheelbase, I figured it will correct itself if I let go of the wheels. It tracks very straight at any speed, but I do feel resistance when backing up, and cranking the wheels hard against the stops. So I just don't do so.
Yeah I was wanting 10-12° positive caster, that's what I read all the drag cars were set at for the reason of getting squirrelly on the track, car wants to correct itself. I too do not trust the whimpy looking shackles and bolts. Did you drill out the bushings to except larger diameter bolts? Really appreciate all the help.
No, the hole is large enough, but for whatever reason they stepped it down for threaded ends. If I recall ccorrectly the ends are 3/8" and bolts are 1/2" shank. So I just used 1/2" bolts to get that larger thread size. I prefer 1/2" fine, with nylock nuts so you don't over tighten the shackles and bind the springs.
The bolts are like that so you don't over tighten the shackle and create bind. There is virtually no stress on that nut and thread the bolt is in shear to the shackle not tension. Also they usually have a castle nut and take a cotter pin. The factory used this system for years. Pat
These Speedway shackles do not have a cotter pin. And every shackle nut has some side force against it when you have lateral force while turning, or if you hit something a an angle that puts side force on your tires, and springs. Factory shackles do have a similar system, but have much heavier shackles than these little things. I'm not saying they'll break, I'm just not trusting them for my builds. I'd rather over build, than chance it. And nylock nuts do the same thing as a shoulder bolt, but don't have the sharp step that can be a weak point.
How the hell have I missed this thread?!? Dude, I am getting a heavy Anglerfish vibe from this little badass! Cool as hell! You keep that shit up!
If it was mine I’d put the axle on top of the springs to drop it down to a more realistic height, leave the springs alone until you can put most of the front end weight on it, then remove a leaf or two and verify your shackle angle.
Since I'm not a 'big' fan of the moonshot look..........I would put the axle on TOP of the springs....remove ALL but the main leaf and the long one above it and see how much 'less' stiff it is. Are you sure the spring mounts aren't too close together, making the springs bow too much? With no shocks on it.........you should be able to bounce it big time, especially with both y'all on the front!! I really like the car BTW! 6sally6
I took 1 leaf out, the smallest one and seemed to make a lot of difference in stiffness and brought it down some. I tried taking 2 out and it was too much. They are 490lb spring rate, each spring. And as far as I can tell they are not binding, shackles move freely. I think the BBC will bring it down 1". I also found some YJ Jeep factory front shackles I had in my scrap brackets box.. may try those with some 1/2" bolts.. not sure though. I will set the engine in the frame hopefully sometime this week. The engine mounts came without the frame brackets, so I just made some out of scrap brackets I had.
The 1" square tubing circled in purple is 3/16 wall and will be welded in for support, I just have the bolt holding it together. The hole circled in blue will be filled in with weld then smoothed. The piece of scrap I found that was the same gauge had a hole that couldn't be utilized.
When you say realistic height, what would that be? I like the high boy look but not extreme. I think I can achieve the right stance without looking street freak, without axle on top of the springs. I'm building an A/A or B/A class Hotrod. Although I know a lot of the Altered's were low, a lot were high boys. It will be one of the late 50's early 60's looking Altered's. Morris, Crosley, English Ford's like e100 and Austin's were thrown into the A/A B/A or C/A classes back then because of wheel base.. Anglia although a short wheel base, was given a hall pass by NHRA into Gasser classes from what I read and understand but also had a 2" increase in wheel base to 91". The Morris is around 92.5" wheel base. From what I read even moving the steering box threw you in Altered class. The Morris will probably only run on fuel due to high compression and will eventually be mechanically injected and or supercharged when I can afford it. Right now it will be carburetorated with a 1050cfm dominator which I know is not period correct but all I have right now. It could easily be period correct with a dual quad tunnel ram. I use to own an Edelbrock TR1 dual quad shoebox intake, it even had the patent pending on it, but I sold it. I'm also running a 2spd Powerglide which I have read would designate it as an A/AA. Manual transmission Altered was designated A/AM from what I read. Also in an altered you sit in front of rear axle, competition coupe typically you sit behind rear axle. But even back then classification was confusing.
When I say, "I read something" or "read an article" this is where my information is coming from. And if you talk to some of the old timers that were actually there, which I do every opportunity I have. They too will tell you this classification stuff was confusing.. Most of their information came from magazines and what track they were running at or sanctioning body. Because obviously there was no internet.
There are numerous examples of gassers and altereds that sat quite tall back in the early 60's. But I think what most people call a "street freak" is either sitting far to tall, or has the extreme uphill nose high stance that some builds do these days. I too am not a fan of either of those, but I don't mind a little higher stance. What looks strange or off to me is when there's a big gap over the rear tires, or a nose that's far too high compared to the rear. I'll wait to comment on whether yours is too uphill until you've got the engine/trans in it, and the tire and wheel combo on it front and rear. I personally prefer no more than 2" of tire hanging outside the rear fenders. Anymore than that just isn't my thing. Also don't care for the builds where they tub the rear and tuck the slicks inside the rear. It just doesn't fit any era of gasser.
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