1970 GTO Version 2.0

[andrewb70]

Today I assembled the rest of the wheels and had the tires mounted. I am very impressed with the Falken tires. Neither front wheels needed any weight. One rear tire needed .75 oz while the other balanced with only .50 oz. That is very impressive considering the size of the tires.



Andrew

[andrewb70]

Teaser shot of the wheels on the car.



Andrew

[69Nova]

Holy crap! Thats gonna look killer Andrew. Cant wait to see it on the ground.

[6'9"Witha69]

Looks sweet!

[tom_a]

Awesome can't wait to see more of it. I assume your still waiting on brakes?

[Young Gun]

Pictures of it on the ground!

[gearheads78]

Oh hell yes

[andrewb70]

Awesome can't wait to see more of it. I assume your still waiting on brakes?

Yes. It seems that GM has been rather careless when shipping calipers. Many have been getting damaged in shipping. Hopefully I will have some brakes next week. Although its sort of a mute issue at the moment. I am going out of town and won't be able to work on the car again until the 18th.

Andrew

[BossaNova]

Wow. Those wheels are v. cool.

[andrewb70]

This morning I got my brake components from Kore3. Tobin at Kore3 has outstanding customer service and I am very pleased with the parts. I got C6 Z06 calipers, 14" DBA 4000 rotors, and Hawk HP Plus pads.



More pictures to come.

Andrew

[NvrDun71]

Looks like the updated wheel finish came out great. Not a bad lookin pile-o-break parts either.......When is she going to be road-worthy again?

[andrewb70]

.........When is she going to be road-worthy again?

I drove it again this evening. In the morning I am going to get an alignment. The C6 Z06 brakes are very nice. I really like how the ATS spindles work with the OEM style brakes. Everything bolted together beautifully.







The car is sitting a little higher in the front now. This is due to the fact that my old spindles had a 2 inch drop compared to stock. I believe the ATS spindles are about an inch lower than stock. I was going to lower it, but I think I am going to keep it this way. It's nice not having to worry about any sort of rubbing with the tires. I also think that the springs will settle some over the winter.

Andrew

[70 Chevelle]

Looks great ! can you get a closeup of your wheel ,caliper clearence? Looks like there is still plenty of room. Thats an 18 right?

[andrewb70]

Looks great ! can you get a closeup of your wheel ,caliper clearence? Looks like there is still plenty of room. Thats an 18 right?

My wheels are 18s but they also have WAY more caliper clearance than the average wheel. It's not so much the diameter. The face of the caliper is 1.69" past the surface where the wheel mounts. So the wheel has to be designed in such a way that it can accomodate that. I have about 1/4" between the caliper and the bolts that hold the wheel together.

Andrew

[wiedemab]

Looks Sweet! RTH here we come!

[SaturnVUEguy]

I say leave the front as it is, it looks really nice like that!

[gearbanger]

My GTO was at 4" under the crossmember and it looked really good, but I had some rubbing issues and I had to be really conscious of the headers because they were even lower.

I raised it to 5" under the x-member and it is so much better. No rubbing issues and the headers are much safer. Worth the trade I think. I still need to go get a realignment.

[andrewb70]

I measured the distance from the ground to the headers and right now it is 5". While the car would look a little better lowered, I think it is important to keep the car as practical as possible, without the danger of hurting parts. So for now, it will stay where it is.

Today I did a little project that I have been neglecting to do. Many of you have asked me what I am doing to retain the axle in rebound. To recap, I am using short 9.5" springs in the rear. The problem is that when the axle drops, the springs get unloaded. This is not a good situation. And while the odds of getting the car air borne are fairly slim, if it were to happen it might be catastrophic. The other issue is that the single pigtail springs do not seat really well in the upper spring pocket.

I picked these up on eBay for $20 shipped:



They are rubber spring isolators from a 4th gen F-body. They fit the single pigtail springs perfectly:





The rubber spring isolators fit perfectly into the upper spring pocket on the a-bodies.



Here is what I did to keep the axle from dropping too far. I took a 2" nylon axle strap. It used these to loop over the rear axle when I was towing the car. At the top I attached one end to the T-bar of the upper shock mount:



At the bottom I looped the loop around the shock mount stud:





When the axle drops and hangs by the straps, the springs are still compressed about 1". This will keep them safely in place in case I want to do some Dukes of Hazzard maneuvers.

Andrew

[Code Red]

looking sharp man

[cdoggy81]

Very sharp indeed!!!