[Wazoo151]

Hey all,

I ordered a set of del-alum bushings for my upper/lower control arms from Global West, along with their offset control arm shafts. When I was admiring their pretty blue aluminum last night, I realized that, with the $127 for the shafts and $121 bushings, I had paid for nearly half the price of the tubular upper arms, which have these things already installed.

Should I just bite the bullet, return what I have bought and get the whole upper arm shebang? They are admittedly mighty sexy, but this car isn't going to see any racing use, just spirited backroads driving.

FYI, I most likely wouldn't be replacing the lowers with tubulars along with the uppers.

Thanks!

Robert

 

[Rich-Allen]

I guess the question to you would be; "what do you want to get out of the car". If you go to david pozzi's website he explains suspension in great detail. If you just want to improve your stock suspension than the Del-alum bushing will do fine. If your looking for better cornering and overall handling you need to go a little further.
A lot of guys go with the Gulstrand mod and the del-alum, even more seem to go with a tubular UCA, spring and shock.

I pulled my hair out for a week before pulling the trigger and buying tubular everything with coil over for the front and Hotchkis TVS for the rear.

Here's a link to davidpozzii.com HERE
Good luck on your decision.

Rich

 

[Wazoo151]

Maybe I should go into a little more detail then...

I too have the full Hotchkis TVS kit with KYB shocks front and rear, no coil-overs though. I plan on driving the car, showing it locally, and enjoying it.

 

[Rich-Allen]

If you plan on showing it and since your changing the original suspension you might want to go with the tubular stuff.

Some of the suspension gurus say that you don't need LCA as they don't do that much to improve handling. What seems to have the most benifet is the UCA, new spring and blistien shocks. When i bought all my stuff I figured why just leave the original LCA if your replacing everything else?

I paid $2800 for: UCA, LCA (DSE), Pitman Arm, Outer Tie rods, Inner Tie rods, Idler arm, Quick ratio power steering box, Hotchkis TVS, lower leaf spring plates and QA1 Coil over shocks.

The week prior I bought Intro wheels with new rubber and 4 wheel disc (Baer)

My garage is full of crap and this weekend I'm going to start replacing parts. I want to take my time and clean everything up and paint any old remaining parts. I figure a month of weekends should handle it.

Matt at http://www.mattsclassicbowties.com helped me get everything I needed at a reasonable price. If your unsure about anything you need give them a call.

Rich

 

[Wazoo151]

Thanks for the opinion, Rich. I ordered the tubular GWs after all. GW was great about the return and I should have them in a few days. I am a little hesitant about buying the lowers right now, as I just paid for the rest of the TVS, Wilwood big brakes, and a Flaming River rack and pinion setup. No wheels and tires yet, but my mountain of parts in the garage is getting big. We'll see once the car comes back from welding and I'm putting it all together.

Robert

 

[davidpozzi]

Using the tubular upper arms is a wise choice. Be sure to align the car with more positive caster, hopefully you have power steering as the extra caster increases effort on manual systems.

Tubular lower arms don't add any performance, however the GW and Speed Tech lowers with the coil seat insert do allow the coil spring to be rotated to any index position, this helps if the coils are cut to adjust height.
David

 

[Rich-Allen]

Wazoo, good luck on the project. :beers:


Rich

 

[Wazoo151]

Thanks guys. I had read David's site before (great work btw) to get some ideas. I do not have power steering; it's a manual Flaming River rack that I picked up very gently used, but I am used to driving non-PS cars; I've had several manual-steer 240Zs, although they were significantly lighter.

Now I'm wrestling with buying the tubular lowers, if only for the "ooooh" factor. My wife was no help. Wait, let me rephrase that. My wife is great, she totally understands my obsession and lets me do whatever I want with the car. However, when I asked her opinion, she just didn't care one way or the other.

I am using the Hotchkis springs, which have a drop in them already, so I am not that concerned about being able to change the perch position; is there any real reason to go with the tubular lowers?

Robert

 

[68Lemans blue]

I didn't because I couldn't justify the cost, and they do nothing but LOOK GREAT,I just made my stock one's LOOK GOOD...Happy Motoring