Anyone have a solid mounted rear axle? Ever since I saw that story on the Bomb Factory pick up in Hot Rod awhile back i've been compilation trying it out. Im sure its hell on your back and gets loose easy but I was just curious if anyones tried it and how bad it really would be on the street? <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-comfficeffice" /><o></o>
to me personally i would ask myself why? i understand the want to do something different but this to me is one of those things that just wouldnt make since.... go-carts are bad enough without rear suspension so imagine a car going 50
You better have some really goddam good sprung seats. I'd wager that a rigid rear would be a car you could drive for 20 minutes tops.
Go to a drag strip and watch the altereds drive around in realatively smooth pits. They hop and bounce all over the place at low speeds. Trying that on the streets would get you killed.....quick.
I helped build a truck about three years ago with a rigid axle and the hole build time I thought this is stupid!! Turned out I was right took the hole driveabillty out of the truck.
Bad idea, even if you could stand to drive it, eventually somethings gotta give, and somethings gonna break, this is a dangerously BAD idea no matter how you look at it. Hell I use to drive a jeep with stiff springs, but at least it had springs, and you could almost lose that thing on a tar strip if you hit it right. Don't do it.
Flipper is right. I have a drag race altered solid front and rear (funny car style). The pits and return roads alone pound the s' out of me and the car! There is no way you could relistically do this on the street. For very long. BTW the bomb factory altered was drag only, right?
It would be like driving a backhoe on the street. The only suspension you get is from the tires. There is no way to dampen it, so a harmonic builds up until you either slow down or loose control. -Jeff
A seriously bad idea for a street driven car. The real job of a suspension is to keep the tire in contact with the pavement. Without some sort of suspension to do that, your tire contact patch will move with the body as the road surface undulates, causing loss of traction and control. And, as mentioned, it has the secondary effect of causing a really ****ty ride....
I tried it once. In 1968 With no suspension, every tiny pebble and crack makes the car bounce--BAD Its uncontrollable. I was smart enough to not go faster than 25mph. You can not drive around a curve because centrifigal force will pull you off the road.
I've driven a car that was sitting on the bumpstops before and it beat me to death. Can't imagine what it would feel like without that little bit of rubber between the A-arms and frame...
Back in the 60s there was a chopped and channeled Model A sedan that would make you guys swoon. I asked him one of the few nights that he had it out why he never drove it.... You guessed it. The axle was welded to the frame to get "the look". He said it was just no fun to drive. We were young then too.
Not a good idea. As someone mentioned earlier,it's bad enough at the drag strip under relatively smooth and controlled conditions. A hard tail on the street will get someone hurt and even though it might not be you but hurt is hurt never the less.
<br/>Shot with C3000Z at 2007-08-14 I did it...........way back in High School 1986ish, this is one of the only surviving pics....It was a 68 Chevelle...If you study the top of the pic ypu will see the drivers side quarter window.......You never know unless you try it.........so I did, the car was built on a dare with my now brother in law, we were sitting in the local Burger King drive thru, and he says,'' so whats nexted are you going to put the engine inside the car?'' and he points to the center of the car......I looked at him and said ''yep''..............and the rest is history......The rear end I welded up solid and the trans bolted right to the rearend.........crazy, well maybe, but I won the dare.............The car was a sreet driven wheelstander, that was banded from the High School parking lot the first day I drove it to school.........Before I left fore the Army I pulled the engine and had the car crushed, so no one would try to ever use it..........Its great to come up with an idea and then do it, but alot of people never get past the idea stage and never try..........I am not saying it was a good idea, but at that young age, I got the idea and ran with it......Littleman, and I have never been right in the head, just so you know........ha ha
I just re-engineered my suspension, because it was bottoming out, and hitting the frame. I cannot imagine driving a rigid car regularly. I drove mine for 3 hours the way it is, with springs, only the WRONG ones, from mock up, and I said: "f- this ****", back to the drawing board. I like a car I can enjoy driving, or else I won't drive it. Then I'd just have a "garage queen", if I left it alone. I like to DRIVE!
Just for reference, my pops took his dragster to a local ****ty track that has dips and **** in the shut down, and the rear axle is obviously bolted to the frame. After making a p***, he hit one of the dips and the car basically became airborn. Not a thing he could do about it besides ride it out. Now imagine rollin down the street, how many potholes and dips and **** do you drive over?
Rigid hot rod is an oxy*****. Hot rods are modified for improved performance. Rigid axles take away the car's ability to be run hard, therefore making it low performance no matter how much HP ya got.
I rode in a 2000lb. hot rod yesterday. It has about 1 inch of wheel travel in the rear and the cheater slicks have a fair amount of sidewall flex. It has a compliant front suspension. The fibergl*** bucket seats have an inch of padding. I'd say this set up is about the minimum you can get by with. It'll go 0-90 in a heartbeat but you wouldn't want to take a cross country trip in it.
You are correct...........for a driver its not the answer, for racing its more excepted, look at dragsters , altereds and F/C's all of which at some point have run solid axle setups and have been some of the most wickedest cars on the earth...........my experimental 68 Chevelle hooked up real hard, I also had water tanks that I would move the weight around with, using some old electric motorhome pump.....to play with the weight transfer..........I was like seventeen yrs. old..........what was I thinking........but ya know ...it worked, Littleman........alot of rear engine diggers have 4 bar rear setups anymore, I do not know much about them, but have seen them...
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