More LCA - Hotchkis problem ?

morgan · Post by **morgan** » Sat Jun 01, 13 7:55 am

Certainly will be I assure you !

Pete · Post by **Pete** » Sat Jun 01, 13 8:47 am

It will be interesting to see how the handling is improved - remember - loads of caster

morgan · Post by **morgan** » Sat Jun 01, 13 11:36 am

Indeed. Torsion bars are monsters- i am hoping Roger ( monkfish) will be able to wrestle the uber-adjustable-ucas into submission.

This started as a 'I will just do the bushes' and now look. New everything, monster torsions and a big wilwood. This really is IT. No more !!!! Lesson learned.

Pete · Post by **Pete** » Sat Jun 01, 13 11:44 am

Stoker motor next....

Roger · Post by **Roger** » Sun Jun 02, 13 9:49 pm

morgan wrote:Indeed. Torsion bars are monsters- i am hoping Roger ( monkfish) will be able to wrestle the uber-adjustable-ucas into submission.

This started as a 'I will just do the bushes' and now look. New everything, monster torsions and a big wilwood. This really is IT. No more !!!! Lesson learned.

Sounds good. Really want to see what a good amount of caster does to the drive. Im getting irritated by my lack of caster. I said no aftermarket arms to myself, but ive got to do domething.

Pete · Post by **Pete** » Sun Jun 02, 13 11:14 pm

Off-set UCA bushes will give you maybe a couple of degrees more caster whilst retaining that "stock" look.....

Dave999 · Post by **Dave999** » Mon Jun 03, 13 11:21 am

and roger can definitly supply them. the Pedders A body ones he carries fit your car cos they are basiclaly all the same, universal fit

i don't necessarily belive everything rick ehrenberg says, but he thinks pedders offset upper bushes are the bee's knees and has been " at it" on the mopars for a long Time.

he doesn't like Mopar performance rubber offset bushes because the offset causes the thin side to fail quickly or some such

Dave

Roger · Post by **Roger** » Mon Jun 03, 13 8:25 pm

Pete wrote:Off-set UCA bushes will give you maybe a couple of degrees more caster whilst retaining that "stock" look.....

Done that already. Nowhere near enough.

Roger · Post by **Roger** » Mon Jun 03, 13 8:28 pm

Dave999 wrote:and roger can definitly supply them. the Pedders A body ones he carries fit your car cos they are basiclaly all the same, universal fit

i don't necessarily belive everything rick ehrenberg says, but he thinks pedders offset upper bushes are the bee's knees and has been " at it" on the mopars for a long Time.

he doesn't like Mopar performance rubber offset bushes because the offset causes the thin side to fail quickly or some such

Dave

Dave, ive had the mad idea of using a set of offset bushes but in Dodge Pheonix upper arms. My logic says as they are right hand drive, they will be stamped with the built in castor the opposite way from the yank ones.

Any thoughts, including where to get them from in Oz?

Of course, it would be easier to fit aftermarket ones, but that wouldn't look right.

Dave999 · Post by **Dave999** » Tue Jun 04, 13 12:58 pm

Dodge phoenix arms will probably be generic C body arms

i wasn't aware of any RHD or LHD handed-ness in the actual arm pressing.

(obviously there is a Left hand side and right hand side arm)

i.e i thought they were just mirror image of each other and the orgin of the car made no odds

I thought i could use US A body arms on my car with no probs

i thought any slight tweaks for road camber in left and right hand drive situations were part of adjustment or a function of the mountintg on the chassis.

the guys in Oz are happy to use tubular arms from the US on their RHD cars.

you have way more experience with this than i do i.e seen many more cars so i'm baseing this on just mine

as far as i can tell it matters not which side the steering wheel is on

the arms are stamped to put the top balljoint directly above or just ahead of the bottom joint to give neutral or negative castor (which was the fasion in them there days)

so to get some positive caster you needed the front pivot mount of the arm further out from the center of the car than the back pivot to pull the top balljoint back in relation to the bottom so a line through the centre of each balljoint ball hit the road just infront of the centre of the contact patch of the tyre.

i.e you lengthen the side of the triangular arm at the front and shorten it at the rear to sweep the upper balljoint back towards the A post

and there was just never enough movement on both bolts to do that
you needed much bigger offset washers and a longer slot at the mount

i.e front bolt with fat side of washer in towards chassis rail moves front pivot out
back bolt with fat side of washer directly pointing out moves rear pivot in
and the top balljoint moves back a smidge

back bolt then sits closer to chasis rail than front bolt and you should approach neutral or some positive castor provided you car does NOT have a rake i.e nose down attitude to start with.

offset bushes

put them in to exacerbate the situation further

so if you have your bolt on the front set, out-wide to move the front side of the arm out further you need the thin bit of the bush inner most so the arm sits even further out. you run the innner section of the ARM eye as close to the already spaced out bolt as posible

You alter the pivot point from the centre of the hole in the arm to car side of it effectivly lengthening the front side of the tringular arm
and then do the reverse at the back bolt fat side of bush inwards making the outer edge of the arm eye closer to the already wound in bolt efectivly shortening the rear side of the tringular arm

I believe, but cannot confirm until i find the right magasine that this goes againts the instructions that come with the bushes

they are offset and have arrows on them designed to achive more negative castor.

negative castor being what was dictated by chrsyler at the time the car was made to give floaty light power steering so that you could steer that 3 tonne car even if you were 96 and had arm made of string and feathers for fingers

now all of my assumptions could well be wrong and i have in the past got me offset bushes arse about elbow, this time i drew a picture and it seems right.

on the other hand

if RHD arms are special

some off a phoenix might work... didn't C bodies have different upper bushes??

however i bet the mounts are welded to the car so impresciely that any difference in the arms is spoilt by poor QA when welding the body together..... or previous kerbing

you might get them off

TJ wreckers in dandenog
http://www.google.co.uk/#sclient=psy-ab ... 66&bih=572

the valiant guy
http://www.thevaliantguy.com.au/

queensland valiant spares

http://valiantspares.com.au/

Dave

Ivor · Post by **Ivor** » Tue Jun 04, 13 1:19 pm

Dave999 wrote:
negative castor being what was dictated by chrsyler at the time the car was made to give floaty light power steering so that you could steer that 3 tonne car even if you were 96 and had arm made of string and feathers for fingers

Dave

It's Dave's world, he's back!

morgan · Post by **morgan** » Tue Jun 04, 13 2:41 pm

Now THAT is a 'Dave999' post. Always love 'em.

Roger · Post by **Roger** » Tue Jun 04, 13 9:20 pm

Cheers Dave!

But, having tried to set up a few on my wonderful aligner, there is always more castor on the right than the left, if you put the adjusters in the "mid postion both sides to compare. This makes sense as the manual says this should be so, and logically, its to counteract the camber of the road.

Hence my conclusion its deliberate as on every single mopar ive tried to set up, the result is always the same.

What i do now is set up the left hand side with as much castor as i can achieve whilst keeping the camber roughly 1/2 degree negative. Then do the other side.

So my logic was to go to a RHD variant, hoping, blindly that someone will have had the good sense to revise the design. Can see them knocking out cars that steer into the kerb! But then again..........

I thought a Pheonix was a B body. My bad. Is there an aussie B body? Whats it called? My googling brough up the Pheonix.

Ive fitted offset bushes to my car, which heps, but im still no where near the castor i want or need.

Clearly aftermarket arms are the solution, as i suspect they are a mirror image to start with. But thats not in keeping with my car. Though right now, with the way it drives, thoughts of alterkation front ends keep passing through my mind.

Im not convinced, that even with the castor corrected and my steering box screwed down as tight as possible, it will still steer/drive Bananarama!. Its a mopar, its what they do. Its the one thing about the car that i am a long way from happy with.

Roger · Post by **Roger** » Tue Jun 04, 13 9:22 pm

Ahh, yes. I think you are right about the instructions with the bushes. I noticed that at the time too!

Should have used Pedders ones, but they are red, so that was a no no.

morgan · Post by **morgan** » Wed Jun 05, 13 8:14 am

Oh blimey. You are gonna hate these then Roger !! Couldnt get less 'stock'. Although maybe you will end up full of love for the massive adjustment. Either way, it'll be entertaining.