A guy over on FB asked about how to measure backspacing on his wheels; Jeff asked me to post it here - a great article that I found useful too: He asked ". . .How do you measure the backspacing ? From inside to rim, or inside to the outside of the tire ? My car is a 1959 Ford Fairlane 500 Thank you in advance. . ." -------------------------------------- Lay the wheel on a flat surface, front side facing down. Lay the yardstick across the top of the rim, from one side to the other. If there is a tire on the wheel you must then lay a flat edge the correct size of the rim, from one side to the other, which will lay flat onto the edge of the rim, not the tire. Measure the distance from the inside mounting surface of the wheel, where the lug nut holes are, which mates against the axel hub on the car, to the lower edge of your flat ruler/stick lying across the top edge of the rim. This measurement is your "Back Space" measurement. Here's a great article on backspacing and offset: http://www.streetdreams.org/tech.php Hope that helps. Ron
Good info Ron. I havent forgot about you and I apologize for being late on measuring mine. I have NOT been able to work on my baby at all, sick kids and everything else just hasnt allowed time. She is just sitting. I guess she got bored to and puked half of the antifreeze on the floor in the meantime, great! One step forward, 2 back.
hey, that's okay. Family first, this stuff can wait. But I moved on. I had a set of stock 6" rims off a newer Ford that I'm going to use. The rim offset & sizing info in that above article & post helped a bunch, plus I doublechecked and put one of the wheels on the car to ***ure clearance - they do. I'm going with 225-70s on it, maybe next weekend. Hoping to take some of the squirrelliness out of it; I know it won't remove all but should make it a bit better. That and a hefty new front stabilizer bar. Whew - 70mph or faster with it is not good right now. . . I'd hate to jump to ludicrous-speed before tightening it up a bit first. Let us know about that Fabulous Falcon Find too, eh? Good luck with it. Sounds like maybe 2 over-cautious individuals, but one can't be too careful these days.
Duh? Did I miss something? I didn't know you were having "squirrelliness" issues with your new toy, Ron. Wh***itdoin?
I think we have a handle on the issue, mostly failure on my part to replace the springs while it was being rebuilt; that and it's just acting like a 50s car handling-wise. I'm re-learning how to drive the car and am having a blast. Should be an easy remedy. Springs are gonna be replaced all around next fall/winter, rears will be re-arched to give it the rake I want without relying entirely on the air shocks. Front X-member was replaced and the frame is dead-on straight, thanks to Paul the perfectionist fab guy who replaced it. All other suspension and steering components are new, box has been inspected & adjusted and it actually steers much easier and effortlessly than I expected. But I want to stiffen it up a bit. Right now it kinda reminds me of a '76 oversteering land yacht of a Thunderbird I had briefly as a driver/demo during my Parts manager days (I asked the boss to please give me an F150 instead!) I let my son in-law take my '87 TurboCoupe (keeps his Formula Firebird company in his 'birds nest'), he's bringing it over from up north this weekend. If time allows we're going to pull the front stabilizer bar and try it on the '56. Somebody here said they think they're interchangeble (will confirm dimensions) but the TC has a much heavier bar so it alone should make a difference. If so, off to the boneyard for a good used one. One piece at a time. It'll probably take awhile but as most say, they're never done, eh? It's not seriously squirrely, part of it might be the driver (my new pickup has me spoiled) and I dont' want to take it out of commission right now, I'm carefully having too much fun with it! Grandsons - 4 of 'em anyway - get to try out the seats this weekend - off to the ice cream parlor we go... No, wait!
The Jalopy Journal
