'95 F-150 track ready street beast

[Sbeck09]

I really hate having to concede defeat, but I think it's time.

I spent the majority of last week at Arizona Bike Week and blew off responsibility since I needed a break from everything. Don't think my mind wasn't on the truck because it very much was. I severely underestimated the difficulty of designing and fabricating an entire front suspension. And I'm not whining. I'm so proud of what I have learned so far. But as a result I am seeing the downsides to using the wrong components.

Check out this photo:





That Rule represents the Kingpin axis if it was perfectly in line (the grove is the actual center-line). I can easily see how the struts fall along that plane when installed, but it presents a very difficult hurdle when adapting to a real upper control arm. Ideally I want my upper and lower mounting holes spaced about 11.5-12 inches apart on the spindle. In order to have clearance for the bolt to move with the upper uniball I would need to move to upper mount up to about the 14 inch mark. That's a BIG change in roll center and camber gain. So I believe it may be time to lay these strut spindles to rest and go with a real double wishbone spindle.

Now that brings me to a dilemma. If I was running a GM bolt pattern on the hubs I could pretty much have anything I want for spindles, but I'm running the 5x4.5 Ford bolt pattern and I don't want to change it as I want the entire truck to be the same (remember I have the complete S550 Mustang rear end). So I looked at a few options as I mentioned before. So far I see where you can get a different hub for the Corvette spindles, but I can't work with that upper ball joint. So those are out. The thing that keeps coming up is the ridetech tall spindles. I can't find any measurements on these so I suppose I'll need to call and ask nicely. These seem to be a solid option for the money with plenty of reasonably priced brake kits. I'd try to make Crown Vic spindles work, but the brake kit is just too expensive.

So that's where I'm at. The engine was completed today and I worked on the frame a little, but nothing to show in pics. I'll keep working on other areas while I workout what to do for spindles.

Anyone have any bright ideas or further input here? Feel free to share. I could use the input right now.