70 Chevelle - Front Suspension advice

[brnyrd]

Good morning guys, ive spent a foolish amount reading and trying to find the 'best' answer for questions, but I just cant seem to find it. so here goes.

70 chevelle, goals are to have air ride - daily driven - power plant is a twin turbo 6.0L LS

now heres the reasoning. I live in Saskatchewan Canada, the roads here suck. I also live out of the city, 20 minutes. Most of my driving will be highway, and road trips with my car club. ive built and daily driven air ride hot rods, and never had an issue. this chevelle is to be driven, and shown. I want the versatility of air as to put it where I need it for each purpose.

I don't see many guys running speedway control arms? any reason? this car is not going to be track driven, nor raced. (well maybe a few passes down our local drag strip, to test those turbos out)

I have just finished building my rotisserie for the body, so that's about to come off. then its chassis/suspension time.

so questions are - speedway control arms yay or nay? which spindle to go with, can I utilize a 2'' drop spindle and still get a fairly decent front height with full air? im not concerned for the rear, as its fairly straight forward. adjustable links, rear sway, etc. and im boxing and building all tubular supports for the frame.

sorry I kinda bounced around there. any and all info is greatly appreciated. keep in mind my Canadian dollar sucks compared to your USD!!!! haha:usa:

[raustinss]

Speedtech....

[brnyrd]

Speedtech....


https://www.speedwaymotors.com/Speedway-1964-72-GM-A-Body-Chevelle-Tubular-Control-Arms,81680.html

[killer69]

Those are the same arms that Summit sells. Basically copies of a few different manufacturers arms. made off shore. Hense the price, probably cost 50.00 to make all 4. We pay more than that just for the ball joints in our arms. Who knows what material they are made of?
I know Speedway is a advertiser and a big distributor and they do not make them so I am not bashing Speedway. I guess if price is the deciding factor then these will be about a cheap as you can get them

here is another option same arm
https://www.summitracing.com/parts/sum-770251/overview/

https://www.summitracing.com/parts/sum-770250/overview/

[pitts64]

One of the reviews on the Summit arms on the Summit site said they got no gain in caster over stock arms.. If your not going to get at least 5 degrees positive caster, why bother......

[raustinss]

Yep agree with above ... don't take it the wrong way but , stop looking at price. Yours and others lives depend on this . Again my suggestion is speedtech or abc performance

[ra11ysport]

I agree there are more factors to it then just swapping out control arms. You really need the whole package like uca lca sway bar and spindles from the same company. Ridetech to me has the best designed control arms with the way the coil over mounts to the control arm is slick. I hate the t-bar mount. No disrespect to speed tech I own one of their sub frames. When it comes to bolt ons to a factory frame ridetech is hard to beat. This all purely my opinion.

[raustinss]

a t bar mount can and is easily modified to be a double shear bolt set up

[chuckd71]

Speedtech is awesome. Speedway...not so much.

[killer69]

I agree there are more factors to it then just swapping out control arms. You really need the whole package like uca lca sway bar and spindles from the same company. Ridetech to me has the best designed control arms with the way the coil over mounts to the control arm is slick. I hate the t-bar mount. No disrespect to speed tech I own one of their sub frames. When it comes to bolt ons to a factory frame ridetech is hard to beat. This all purely my opinion.

Why the Hate??? lol like to hear your opinion? here is one reason we use the T-bar which most don't understand, Due to the 50% motion ration on the Early cars when using the T Bat you actually get more ride height adjustment. Because you can mount the
T-Bar either on the inside of the spring pocket or on the bottom side this will give you about 3/4" of additional ride height adjustment!!

[ra11ysport]

Why the Hate??? lol like to hear your opinion? here is one reason we use the T-bar which most don't understand, Due to the 50% motion ration on the Early cars when using the T Bat you actually get more ride height adjustment. Because you can mount the
T-Bar either on the inside of the spring pocket or on the bottom side this will give you about 3/4" of additional ride height adjustment!!

I totally get why you did it that way and that’s cool! But they are a pain in the butt most of don’t have a lift so we are on the garage floor. I don’t know! I just never had much confidence in those little 7/16 size bolts with coilover being on the bottom of the control arm. I’m sure I’m wrong and it’s plenty strong enough but it’s just a confidence thing. Just so you know I’m a huge speedtech fan and I think you guys are killing it right now. Sometimes it’s just those little details that make you pick one over the other.

[andrewb70]

I totally get why you did it that way and that’s cool! But they are a pain in the butt most of don’t have a lift so we are on the garage floor. I don’t know! I just never had much confidence in those little 7/16 size bolts with coilover being on the bottom of the control arm. I’m sure I’m wrong and it’s plenty strong enough but it’s just a confidence thing. Just so you know I’m a huge speedtech fan and I think you guys are killing it right now. Sometimes it’s just those little details that make you pick one over the other.

The top of the coil over is mounted to the frame using a double sheer bracket. I don't know the exact numbers, but I suspect with a 7/16" grade 8 bolt you will most likely bend the frame, tear the welds, or have some other catastrophic failure before that attachment breaks.

Andrew

[ra11ysport]

146809
The top of the coil over is mounted to the frame using a double sheer bracket. I don't know the exact numbers, but I suspect with a 7/16" grade 8 bolt you will most likely bend the frame, tear the welds, or have some other catastrophic failure before that attachment breaks.

Andrew

It’s the lower T-bar that I’m referring too. The T-bar that mounts the coilover to the lower control arm.

[raustinss]

The bolts are way beyond strong enough and besides say that for some crazy reason both bolts break at the exact same time .....then what ...the car drops a couple inches and you pull over yes ?
I get the confidence thing but still the chances of breaking both bolts at the same time is crazy . You have a better chance of getting nuked by North Korea but you don't let that interrupt your day or life now do you . You want amazing confidence boost buy them ,use them and then convince someone else who thinks the same as you that they're nuts for thinking that way

[krom]

The thing is that you don't have to break both bolts at once. The second one bolt comes loose, the load on the remaining one instantly doubles. When the second one breaks, you've got double the load, on the loose bolt, breaking it. Then the wheel contacts the fender well, and the shock contacts the road surface, and you only have one front tire left to steer, and brake with

[raustinss]

No your brakes would work just fine . MOST of that style A arm physically don't allow the shock aka coilover to just drop out the bottom . More importantly I don't know how a bolt would just come loose . Regardless if I may ask how many times have you heard of this happening and what was the final result . Now I will say I'm sure it has happened a few times but my questions then are how was everything installed and torqued

[krom]

With the shock unhooked from the a-arm, the only weight on the tire, is that transferred from the other side by the sway bar.
So either the tire is in the wheel well against the body work, and locked up, or its locked up, because there is so little weight on it when you press the pedal.
Either way its locked, and not providing any braking or steering force.
FWIW the factory shock retaining bolts are only 5/16"

[raustinss]

bump stops ...? and we still haven't said if they were coilovers or shocks ..if its shocks the spring still holds the car up

[krom]

I totally get why you did it that way and that’s cool! But they are a pain in the butt most of don’t have a lift so we are on the garage floor. I don’t know! I just never had much confidence in those little 7/16 size bolts with coilover being on the bottm of the control armo. I’m sure I’m wrong and it’s plenty strong enough but it’s just a confidence thing. Just so you know I’m a huge speedtech fan and I think you guys are killing it right now. Sometimes it’s just those little details that make you pick one over the other.


bump stops ...? and we still haven't said if they were coilovers or shocks ..if its shocks the spring still holds the car up

seems pretty clear to me

[raustinss]

Yeah seems clear to you but the original post doesn't say ....says goals were for air ride but air ride can be achieved in 2 ways air bag and air "coilover style "