Double A-arm suspension
 

Recently completed "bolt-on" double A-arm front suspension built for type 1 pan. This was discussed in the past on another thread. Comments?

I like it. All Bugs should have struts :silly:
What spindles did you use?

Great to meet you at the show last weekend.

The photo doesn't do the design justice. I just wish i had my digital camera last week.

Keep us informed the tested you're doing.

pure55vw,

please email me pictures of you super sweet suspension for the suspension gallery.

Thanks,

Alex

looks real good.

congrats :D

Thanks all for comments! Next up is installing on a car for steering column fab, static load testing (brake windup, frame twist, etc..), turn circle measurement, ride height and clearance checks, overall ride evaluation, etc., etc., I'll keep posted how it goes. VW Type III spindles were used. Alex, I'll get that E-mail out to you. Thanks for posting pics on the gallery.

Hi,

Do you have any closer pics of that front end, it looks awesome!!

Cheers
D

Congrats! I'm heading in the same direction eventually, it's awesome to see something I've been thinking about for months in the flesh. Good luck on the testing.

Jason

The "Double Wishbone" thread referred to progress made on A-arm front suspension project. How's it going on some of the other A-arm conversion projects mentioned before?? Mine, which is shown on a pan in the suspension pix gallery, is now on a car. Steering shaft connection, static load tests, etc.. are finished.
Some things I have to fix, and there's a "million" little details to be done before it's drivable, but suspension compliance, camber gain, Ackerman, track, fender clearance and all that stuff looks good. I'll post some pix of the "test vehicle" installation soon.

Jay

Can't wait to hear how your front end turned out. I'll post some pics of my progress on my website when I get chance. It's very slow but steady.

Jason

pure55vw, do you have any advice for somebody thats lookin to do something similar to what you have done? What books have you read to decide on a design and did you use any suspension design programs?

For books, there was a previous thread on here ("Chassis Engineering", I think) with some suggestions. There are design programs that work well, although I worked all the geometry out graphically. That's the easy part. The hard part is deciding to make it "bolt-on" and working around the existing VW pan and body layout, using commonly available parts without modifying them, while not compromising your "optimum" geometry too much. Start with your 'givens' like wheel size, track width, required steering angle, ride height, type of steerin gear you want to use, etc., etc.. and work backward from there. Go to a wrecking yard and look at how all the different OEM's build suspensions, and also look for any parts you might be able to use. Study some of the A-arm IFS kits made for street rodders to see how they worked it out (I'd like to someday see VW customizers have the same type of kits available to them). This is just a start, but it gives you an idea. I guess the EASIEST way is to just copy someone else ;-) Good luck and pls keep posted on your progress.

Jay

Ive spent alot of time lookin at this guys site and I like how he went about designing his supension. http://www.beardmorebros.co.uk/index.html . Right now im looking for a good front spindle that I can use out of another car. Basically I want one with good brake options, plenty of rim options and can adapt to a double a arm setup. I like his idea of using a ford sierra (merkur xr4ti) steering knuckle and I might just try that too if another better option dosent come up. Right now I want to get rim size figured out and find out what steering rack to use. I heard the 914 rack was a good rack to use so I might just look into that. Im runnin a ford 2.3 engine so I could add power steering quite easily if I really wanted to but Id have to look into that aswell. Right now im collecting the caroll "To Win" series of books that basically goes over on how to build a racecar suspension among other things. I have an extra pan for my ghia so it wont be too big of a hassle to take measurements and whatnot. Do you have some closer spics of your setup? It looks awesome by the way. Oh and hey do you think I could get some measurements like camber change, roll center and caster toe in all that just for refrence? Thanks

What steering are you using? Can't really see any in the pic.

I used a Nissan rack on mine because it had the wide tie rod pivot centers I figured I needed. Had to adapt the tie rod ends and steering U-joint to VW, but could probably just as well have used a Golf rack to avoid that.