tech question

This is probably a stupid question but ive seen a lot of hot rods with the bodies of the shocks mounted to the axles and the shafts mounted to the frame. I work with racecars a lot and they almost always have the body of the shock mounted to frame instead in order to reduce unsprung weight. Is this possible on hot rod or no? If it is why don’t people do it more often?

 

Yes with a pressurized shock. No for most.

 

Reducing unsprung weight is a very important, even though a lot of Hot Rods ( including mine...) have a pretty bad Sprung to Unsprung weight ratio.
There is just so much you can do on a light car with a I beam in the front and a 9" in the back.
I would be more concerned with using a good quality Shock ( like the Konis that are on my Roadster) than a tiny advantage in Unsprung weight.
Besides, how much of the total weight of a Shock is in the body and how much is in the rest? The body might not be the heavyest part.
( I have never taken a Shock apart to weigh the individual pieces, but it would be interesting to find out...)
I do know that a oil filled Shock like a Koni will not work if you mount it upside down...

 

Mounting the body of the shock to the axle is the way that they are designed. They are actually mounted upside down on race cars to gain that slight advantage. It's like aluminum lug nuts, ounces eventually equal pounds when added up.

 

If you knew the whole story of how much effort is expended on saving weight on a race car, the mounting of the shocks upside down is child's play.

Frank

 

I've got a lot of time invested in saving weight. Drilling rotors, aluminum lug nut, t******* extra bolt length, glow in the dark gauges to loose light bulb weight, heck my aluminum steering wheel even has holes drilled between each nub. I've got it shaved down to 1445 lbs. Next place to go is the ballast in the drivers seat.