L.a.p 1302

[Humble]

I'm interested in those tubular lower control arms. Do you think they would hold up to high grip, high speed track abuse? Maybe add a triangular gusset over the swaybar bushing area?

[typ4boy]

Originally Posted by Humble

I'm interested in those tubular lower control arms. Do you think they would hold up to high grip, high speed track abuse? Maybe add a triangular gusset over the swaybar bushing area?

Read the post dude .......please.

[Humble]

Originally Posted by typ4boy

Read the post dude .......please.

sorry, missed that :P I blame a crazy on-call schedule and no sleep for 3 days.

Also, +1 for wally's idea on raising the ball joint area. You could angle and slightly extend the tubing on the outside of the bushing area with minimal work.

[Bruce.]

Hang on guys, you've got it upside down.

The key measure is the angle between the top strut mount, the balljoint pivot and the lower arm inner mount. This angle needs to remain less than 90 degrees.

If you modify the lower arm, you are just changing the shape of the arm and the balljoint pivot remains in the same place verses the other two key suspension points.

The modification required is to space the balljoint down, away from the hub.

So those lovely arms are just fine as the are. You either need a different balljoint with a much longer stub so that a spacer can be put on first or a machined extension that mounts on the end of the balljoint stub. Substituting a ballpoint with a threaded stub might make it easier to make an extension piece.

If you look again at the right hand diagram above, you should see what I mean.

Cheers!

[Wally]

Thanks Bruce! Your right of course. Its easy to loose track of things sometimes
I agree we won't get past something like these:


Those will weigh though, so its great Lee makes something lightweight to compensate

[Tim]

Originally Posted by Wally

Thanks Bruce! Your right of course. Its easy to loose track of things sometimes
I agree we won't get past something like these:


Those will weigh though, so its great Lee makes something lightweight to compensate

Anyone knows where I can buy a pair of these?

Thanks!

[typ4boy]

Happy New Year to all the German look Freaks.

[evilC]

Originally Posted by Wally

Thanks Bruce, that is EXACTLY what i meant! Not sure if possible with new arms from Lee, but if there would be a way to incorporate the extension, then that would make it an extra selling point and I would want a set now as I am contemplating extension possibilities at the moment.

The higher up mounting on the inside is theoretically a sound alternative, but the arm is already on the high hole of the mounting (as original) with '74-> suspension and higher is fysically not possible there..

Whats the weight difference with stock arms Lee? Seems like it would be hard to shed weight on the original design, but would be happy to be proven wrong of course! It would be nice if the extra weight of the extension(s) - which would be heavy - could be made up some by lighter arms!

Originally Posted by thomas07056

A pic from my first front suspension

Originally Posted by typ4boy

Right o iam with you all now wally you cant believe the weight difference between the two moly is so light . so what we need is higher ball joint end ????

I agree with all of that and Rob's compression strut. But just to add my 2p worth; I don't feel comfortable with the butt joints either side of the anti-roll bar bush housing that will be weaker than the plain tube. The TCA has really only an axial load (horizontal for most of the time) so the tube can be light. But the antiroll bar exerts a bending moment at the point of the bush within the bar. Add in the fatigue factor of many load applications and it does seem weak although no figures have been applied. The solution would be to take the bush out of the centreline of the TCA - put it above or below with a speader to prevent local distortion. Put it below and it realigns the anti-roll bar towards a standard geometry. However, put it above the TCA and you have reduced the pitch forward, creating more anti-dive. Classically, you would have done this by dropping the pivots down on a strut car but there is nothing stopping the other end going up instead. You can't drop the anti-roll bar bushes down because of ground clearance issues on a lowered car.

Is that logic correct?

Clive

[typ4boy]

Originally Posted by evilC

I agree with all of that and Rob's compression strut. But just to add my 2p worth; I don't feel comfortable with the butt joints either side of the anti-roll bar bush housing that will be weaker than the plain tube. The TCA has really only an axial load (horizontal for most of the time) so the tube can be light. But the antiroll bar exerts a bending moment at the point of the bush within the bar. Add in the fatigue factor of many load applications and it does seem weak although no figures have been applied. The solution would be to take the bush out of the centreline of the TCA - put it above or below with a speader to prevent local distortion. Put it below and it realigns the anti-roll bar towards a standard geometry. However, put it above the TCA and you have reduced the pitch forward, creating more anti-dive. Classically, you would have done this by dropping the pivots down on a strut car but there is nothing stopping the other end going up instead. You can't drop the anti-roll bar bushes down because of ground clearance issues on a lowered car.

Is that logic correct?

Clive

This is a PROTOTYPE it is not the finished article , i love the way some people always got plenty to say about others work like oh iam not happy about butt joints. just give it some time the finished article will work and will not be sold until its had a right good hammering on our test cars, unlike some folks that spend all there time on internet forums i drive my cars to the limit on the road and try to brake every thing we do way before it goes public. rant over, The finished product will be bigger od tube and one piece with an incert for the antiroll bar rather than butt welds also will have diamond shape strength plates top and bottom.

[evilC]

Originally Posted by typ4boy

This is a PROTOTYPE it is not the finished article , i love the way some people always got plenty to say about others work like oh iam not happy about butt joints. just give it some time the finished article will work and will not be sold until its had a right good hammering on our test cars, unlike some folks that spend all there time on internet forums i drive my cars to the limit on the road and try to brake every thing we do way before it goes public. rant over, The finished product will be bigger od tube and one piece with an incert for the antiroll bar rather than butt welds also will have diamond shape strength plates top and bottom.

I confirm you did say this was a protype and you had some reinforcing to do but by posting the photo you invited comments - perhaps I should have said that its the most wonderful piece of fabrication that I have ever seen? If you had bothered to read my full comments you will see that it revolved around the load applications on TCAs that I also invited (instructive) comments on. Forums are about debate not sycophanic praise and I for one am fully aware that anything I post may be the subject of unflattering comment.

I thoroughly enjoy the debates on this forum as it attracts very knowledgable people in intelligent discussion - long may it be so.

BTW I too drive my ideas and am more than prepared to admit mistakes and change anything if doesn't work out. Unfortunately, my interest in cars and engineering has to take third place to my business and family commitments so I don't get the time to produce as much as I could.