Hey All - New to the forum here and looking to check my understanding. My dad has a 57 Chevy and has always loved the g***er look. We're not looking to put a straight axle in it, but were thinking about installing ball joint spacers (the solid block that goes between the ball joint and the control arm) along with a taller spring. We ordered the spacers from eBay and Moog 658A springs back in 2020 but have been tackling other projects on the car since. We're getting back to the front suspension this spring and were talking about getting the spacers and springs in. I've spent some time looking on here and elsewhere but want to check my understanding. I'm thinking with the spacers and springs installed, this will cause the lower control arms to angle downwards more (pushing the frame up) creating a positive camber effect (top of the wheels moving outward). Is that correct? Seems like we would just need to add shims to correct the positive camber. Has anyone run into an issue where the camber is unable to be adjusted enough? Looking online it seems like a mixed bag of it being a walk in the park or a big issue - hoping to see if anyone has first hand experience. The other challenge I think we'll run into is the spacer hitting the rubber snubber on the frame. Is this dependent on spring length or rate, or is it just always an issue with these types of spacers? I'm thinking that if the spring isn't allowed to extend as much, the top control arm shouldn't move downward as much on acceleration and the spacer may not hit? Any help or advice is appreciated!
The 658A spring has a lot of spring rate, it will make the car ride like a dump truck unless you have an iron headed big block and no other weight removal off of the nose. What engine? And what other weight removal? Yes the ball joint spacers do hit the upper snubber brackets when upper arms lower down ( ride height rises). Spring rate, height which both affect ride height will cause this. Post up a pic of your goal on the ride height
You're going to have to cut the bump stops off of the outside of the spring pockets on the frame, but you should be able to get the camber where it needs to be. It all depends on the spring. I don't remember the part number of the springs I used on the 56 in my avatar, but they were speced as 64 Chevy station wagon, 409 w/AC. I was able to get the camber to spec with no problem, until I added a 1" spacer on top of the springs. Now I have a touch too much negative camber that I can't get rid of. I'm hoping taller balljoints will cure that problem. Also, while your in there, don't forget to add shock extensions or get taller shocks. Stock length shocks don't allow enough rebound for the springs to extend properly, which limits upward travel, potentially destroying the shock by the tops getting pulled out. I hope all this rambling helps more than it confuses.
Thanks for the replies guys - I appreciate it. I forgot to mention in the original post that we do have the shock extensions, so I apologize. @427 sleeper do you have the additional spacers on top of the springs in your avatar picture? Speaking of the bump stops: I see what looks like rivets there. Is that all that's holding them on? Or are they also welded in place?
Rivets and welds, here is a pic of one online that someone didn't completely remove. Its a good idea to do because you can still use an upper bump stop.
That looks like a load on the upper ball joint. Years ago [maybe no more?] there used to be a ball joint spacer that went from the upper ball joint and bolted to the stock spindle ball joint hole. It had some offset in the holes so by rotating around would help adjust camber/caster.
The old Genuine Suspension spacer kit, note the bottom spring spacer too. Some folks had trouble the the upper spacers turning on the spindle after a while.
I remember the style above, we had a car or two come into the shop way back in the day with problems of those spacers slowly turning. I'm thinking the boss welded tabs on each side on the bottom edges to keep them from turning. Been many years ago but the boss figured out how to cure it. Again I'm pretty sure it was by welding tabs to prevent it from turning.... ...
The tires will not move out at the top, but actually move in! And more times than not removing metal off the frame will not be the only change needed. That takes care of the ball joints hitting, but it wont fix the alignment issues these spacers often create! Whoever realigns the front wheels will also run out of adjustment even after they've removed all the shims stacked in the upper control arm mounts! It can end up that you'll need the mounts themselves cut off the frame and moved out 1/8"-1/4" to allow the correct adjustment on front wheels after adding the ball joint spacers. The C type spacers didn't have these issues as they were built to offset the ball joints and avoid those problems.
Or better still , easier to do some research!! G***er's had 10% engine setback and Altered's had 25% setback [to the wheelbase] Engines may not be raised more than 24" from the ground, measured from the front crank pulley Traditional G***ers were level [not like these Urban Myth pseudo race cars with the "Carolina Squat"] They remind me of a dog taking a ****
Yes a tack welds or two would stop the "C's from moving. Local Superior Spring used to do that but the thought wasn't to raise the car so much as to bottom out the upper A arm rest.
Yes, I put a 1" spacer on top of the springs. It boosted it roughly 2" more, and the ride is not God awful. Tall, skinny tires and no front bumper also creates the illusion that it sits higher than it actually is.
When I said "it might be easier to put a straight axel in it", I was not talking about raising it to the moon, but that it might end up being less work overall to end up with the same results. Tri five Chevrolets have several kits available.
I was glad that that nonsense was pretty well gone by the time started doing front end work and didn't have to fight with it. The guys who jacked up the front ends of their cars to look like a "g***er" in the 60's didn't give a rippy doo dah about tire wear. A buddy of mine had a sack full of twist in coil spring spacer hidden in the trunk of his folks car along with the tools to install them in the springs and when he got the car on Friday nights to go cruise for a few hours he would stop at a gas station where a buddy worked and borrow a floor jack or if the hoist was empty stick it on the hoist and put the spacers in and go up and down the Ave for a few hours with the nose jacked up about 4 inches and then go back and pop them out and stick them back in the bag and go home. He got busted cruising the Ave one Friday night when his folks went out to dinner with another couple and just happened to pull up alongside him and his buddy on the Ave with their car all jacked up in the front. He got to cruise in the back seat of other guys cars for a couple of months before he got the car on Friday night again. All I am going to say about that look is short pieces of 2x4 stuck between the coils don't ride worth **** and you can draw you own conclusions on that one but I was 16 at the time.
G***ers COULD HAVE 10% setback, but many didn't. It's a maximum, just like the 24" crank rule is. A lot of g***er engines had crankshaft centerlines lower. But as much as I dislike the nose bleed stance of modern g***er clones, there were plenty of era g***ers that didn't sit perfectly level. The whole idea of raising the frontends higher was to get better weight trasnfer, and a quick look at Larry Davis's book G***er Wars that is full of original photos will show a huge number that had frontends higher than the rear. Frontends didn't come down until rear slicks were developed that hooked up, and guys didn't need higher frontends to get the cars hooked to the track. That happened in the later 60's.
Back in the day, LOT of guys had tri five Chevies, including me. I don't remember any g***er wanna bees, of any brand, trolling the streets.
I drove my '55 Chev 150 g***er on the street all the time back in the 60's, and raced it occasionally at the drags, but not every weekend. Maybe guys today might call it a "wannabe" because it wasn't a dedicated G***er, and served dual purpose?
You are exactly right... And I would like to add to your statement if I may. Larry Davis also has another book ***led Super Stock Racing the Family Sedan. In that book are plenty of pictures that show Super Stock cl*** cars that raised the front end and in some cases, they lowered the rear of the car for the same reason. The tire technology wasn't the greatest and they did it for better weight transfer. Every make... Chevy, Ford, Pontiac, Plymouth, Dodge, ETC was done that way. There are no wannabes in either Super Stock or G***er cl*** cars from back then. Both cl***es existed so you could bring a street driven car to the strip and have a cl*** to run in. I've seen pictures of Stone/Woods and Cook Swindler B on the street in traffic when the car was first built! Both cl***es, when they started, the cars had to be licensed/registered for street use, have working lights, full interiors, and no major body modifications. Of co****, as time progressed, the rules changed and the cars became full tilt race cars that were illegal for the street.
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