Technical Fenderless Model A - Rear Coilovers - PLEASE HELP

Guys I need some help with coilovers... so I recently got this Model A and I'm ironing all the little things to make it a highway driveable car, but the rear suspension is an issue. When I got it, the shocks were wrong, I got the correct length and I also made a correction to the 2nd longest leaf .... it was touching the edges... by the way the rear suspension had been worked on before... they removed leafsprings and its my belief they removed one too many, so the car sits kind of at the right height but now there is no more possible travel because the leafs are too flat... anyways.... my options are to look for old leafs and try to add them and see if that works but that would lift the rear and I do not want that, or add coilovers... and I think I wanna add coil overs so the car can be lowered 2 more inches on the rear, leaving the car and tires at a better height. This weekend I drove my 52 Ford F1 and mannnn ... it feels like a Cadillac compared to the Model A and my f1 has a dropped front axle and leaf springs on the back, so I know its possible to get a better ride.

My question is... what coilovers are you all running, and is your ride nice and comfortable? I currently have plys on the front and back so that adds to the stiffness.

Please post the brand and coilover rate if you have a fenderless Model A. Thank you all

 

First off, are the spring eyes reversed?

 

No they are not reversed

 

This is pretty subjective, everyone has their own ideas, but to my eye a highboy Model A looks right with the rear fender wells riding right at the outside diameter of the tires. Your's is not far off from that, you only need to drop it maybe a couple of inches. If the spring eyes are not reversed that may get you what you need. There is a great thread here on the HAMB by @Ron Brown on lowering a Model A, if you can find that thread he gives a step by step approach to getting the right stance. He does it with a Tudor sedan, but the same principals apply to a coupe. I think a Model T rear spring is part of the equation.

My 30 pickup does have Aldan coilovers on it and the rear of the frame is z'd, and I'm pretty happy with the ride height and stance, it's just about right IMO; but I don't recall for certain what the spring rates are, I think they were 220#'s. It was the standard coilovers carried by Reids Hot Rod Shop back when they were opened. There's more to it than just the spring rate, there is also the angle of the shocks from perpendicular that affects the ride quality. My advice would be to check out Ron's thread and use the approach he used to get it sitting right.

 

Here's Ron's thread: https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/lowering-my-model-a.995027/

 

Nice looking coupe. Please post pics - full sized, of what it looks like now including shackle angles.

 

Call Cory at RJ,s Speed Shop. He is a member on here

 

I will go over this and check the parts being used, but I'm sure the only way to get a few inches lower is to have a reversed leaf, but I would have to look for the pack of leafs because the last owner removed too many. My tires and fender line is about 2.5 inches apart, the ideal is like 1 inch, so if I could get 1.5 inches lower it would be ideal with better handling.

 

I will try to reach out, thanks

 

I will take some pictures of the rear so you get a better idea

 

I started with Bilstein with quality in mind but one was leaking in the box and the replacement kept stretching out over the horizon so I sent them back and went with Ridetech. Great quality and great customer service. Just my experience.

 

Man I’ve got to be honest that sucker sits niiiiiiiice!

anyhow, I would really recommend playing with air pressure in those tires to see if that doesn’t smooth the ride out. I’ve dropped 3 pounds and had the car feel entirely different. With such a simple suspension on such a light car little stuff can really make a huge difference. My second thought is better shocks. I changed them front and back on one of my cars recently and I was shocked at how much improvement there was.

there’s not a lot of travel to be had with this set up but there’s a ton of little tuning tweaks you can do for often big results if you feel like dicking around with it.

 

Just an idea, before doing anything get a really good side shot and then post that in the photoshop thread and one of the guys there will be able to show you what that looks like. You may be surprised that it looks better as is as you will lose some rake etc. Personally I really like how it looks but its your car not mine.

 

Old school ( and I'm old ) just reverse the eyes. Second, are you using a spring out of a SEDAN or out of a ROADSTER. Those are different springs. I learned the hard way when I was 15. A sedan spring will really jack up the back of a coupe or roadster. Another old school trick was to clip the ends of the second to bottom spring and then Z the springs into a drop using a torch. A cheap hack but that was traditional. Not all solutions are in your bank debit card. Just saying not trying to be harsh. The fastest is to buy a custom spring.

Nice looking coup. Personally I would not change it unless the ride is too stiff.

Remember Roadster guys say """" Coupes are for chickens. Sedans hold more chickens that coupes """.

 

A Model T rear spring will lower it a little

 

Ok so bellow are the rear suspension images. As you can see a lot of leafs were removed, and I do not have reversed eyes, so if I was to go with springs I could go with reversed to lower about 1.5in. So when I got the car, the leaf following the main leaf (the second one) was actually touching the end, so I actual cut off about 2 inches off and while doing that I added some grease in between leafs. Question... is the shackles suppose to be at a 90degree or is this also wrong. Right now the gap is about 3 inches between tires and top fender line.

Last night I was watching a show (Hotrods by Troy) that gave me an idea, they were talking about rear suspensions and how he sets them to ride comfortably. He says he usually sets the coil or spring with no shocks and makes sure he can compress the spring by simply pushing down the car, once he gets the right softness/stifness he then introduces the shock, so it got me thinking my shocks might be too stiff for this light car... they are new gas charged. I do remember when I replaced them I was able to push my car down by hand, and I actually drove the car with no shocks at around 30mph just to feel the springs, soooo it got me thinking. I will take my shocks off again and drive in an uneven road not too fast and see how it feels and maybe. .. maybe ... search for really soft shocks, with very low compression resistance so my springs can compress easier.

 

I did remove some air and it did help a bit, but not too much, I bet radials would be much softer, maybe the new Cokers in July might be a nice upgrade

 

yeah and reversed will help a bit too

 

Yeah I love driving my cars and driving in the highway is a must, so I really need to dial the rear suspension so I can drive it at 65mph with no issues, I'm gonna try it with no shocks and see how soft it gets, if it feels better I will be in the search for some superrrrrrr soft shocks

 

I have heard classic VW shocks are soft

 

Well right away I can see that main spring is to long. Look at your shackle angle! Those should be 45 deg or close. I bet it’s bottoming out the spring at the shackles when it compresses. Does the car have a pan hard bar? With the shackles nearly vertical it would make it want to sway some as well.

pictures help a ton!

 

With a spring behind the axle you should be able to get it pretty comfortable. The spring is too long, you could go with an aftermarket spring (the right width) and then play with the number of leaves to your liking. I personally don't like coil overs on As (or anything else).

 

Is that a 2", 2.25" or 2.5" wide spring? What is the width between the hangers centre to centre? What is the width of the spring when it is off the hangers? The spring width should be about 3" less then the hanger width. If that is a 2" wide spring, you should probably be running 9-10 leaves. A good spring shop should be able to reverse the arch on your main leaf and there are hangers for the 2" spring that are 2.5" pin to pin compared to the normal 1.5". Posies or Speedway sell that hanger, part #2057. The second leaf from the bottom appears to have been cut short taking tension from the end of the main leaf. I just did all this with a 37 front spring to go in the back of my 30 Tudor. I have an aftermarket frame that did not have the spring kick to take a Model A rear spring. I just removed the coil overs which in my opinion looked terrible. All will be finished this week and hopefully it all works.
Warren

 

I suspected that, I just could not remember how the angle was on other cars. Yes the car has a pan bar and it does pull some at bumps, the only issue is that if I add more leafs to fix this it would lift the car more, so if I wanted to leave the leafs the best option would be to change the rear cross-member with a flatter one, I think there is one from a different model that is much flatter and would accommodate the springs higher making it lower. On another note, I took off the shocks and went for a ride, and it is much softer that way, so another option would be to get super soft shocks just to keep the suspension from bouncing, I'm gonna look into VW shocks

 

That's not a model a rear spring. So swapping for a t spring isn't happening. It's possibly something like a 40 front spring. Panhard, good, so shackle angles aren't an issue as long as they don't bottom out. Gas shocks usually way too hard for a light car. Oil filled is what you need. I like the way the car sits as it is.

Chris

 

Adding leafs isn’t going to fix the shackle angle it needs a shorter main leaf.

can you measure how far apart the hangers are? From center to center of the mount on the rear axle side of the shackle.

 

Maybe my eyes but this looks like a generic aftermarket modern spring. The leaves do not stack tight, it's too long and the shackles are the wrong angle. A spring when it squats will get wider eye to eye and the shackles have to swing to do that. I would look around for a good used original spring, sandblast it and set it up right. Also check the maker of the shackles. Long time ago the only ones available were made in Argentina. Totally wrong dimensions. But then that was a long time ago, I am dating myself again.

Looks like this is one of those mail order spring mount kits on the rear end. The spring is just not up to quality, the mounts mounted on the rear end may be welded in the wrong place for this installation. The mounts will work, the spring just is not right.

If the coupe was perfect, all you could do is put gas in it and drive around. That gets boring after a short while. The fun is working on it and figuring out how things work. Then guys like us get to chatter on the internet telling stories while watching you do it. So in the end we all get to have fun while watching you work/have fun. Think about it. Not the destination but the road getting there !

 

Yeah I cannot even see an arch on these so I'm not sure where they came off, and yes the shackles still work this way, I just order some cheap oil filled shocks, hopefully soft so the springs can do their thing

 

Totally agree, these are not Model A leafs.. honestly who knows from which car they came from, and yes you are right, this is not the original rear end so the mounts could be welded on wrong too, modified cars are like box of chocolates .. you never know what you're gonna get. lol anyways, I just ordered some cheap oil filled classic VW shocks, this might be the easy fix, because I just took the shocks off and its much softer.. my new gas charged shocks are too stiff on this light car and its not letting it compress, hopefully this works, I will update once the shocks arrive next week.

 

It’s not uncommon to see a 40’s ford front spring mounted in the back like that. I was asking hanger measurements just to compare with what springs are available at that size/ measurement.

that being said if better tires and different shocks makes it feel acceptable I wouldn’t see any reason to mess with what’s there any further.