Rear Suspension Problems

[Guest salty_monk]

I see, its only my idea when it doesnt work HUH?

Not at all, it would have worked fine if they were adjustable with enough adjustment or I'd emptied the original ones on the coilovers by drilling a hole in them or something...

 

I guess I should have said, it's a good idea that works but be careful you have enough adjustment or empty the zimmer dampers first (maybe a problem with shaft lubrication if they are empty....)

 

[Bob Tucker]

With a No. 1 Dicky tool......a 2 pound hammer....really.

 

The rear was wallowy at first with the donor dampers. I got a new spring assisted pair of shocks at Stoneleigh which transformed it.

(check Miss April for proof...)

 

Bob

[Guest tom2b]

I bit the bullet yesterday and cut the spring cups out, a friend of mine is fabricating the coilover mounts for me and i will be fitting these shortly. Thanks for all the help.

[Guest Stevieshood]

To be honest, whatever you do with the standard Sierra semi-trailing arm suspension, you can't win

 

I tracked the spring/driveshaft problem down to the whole alignment of the torque tube. You can't just bolt up the rear subframe and expect it to be aligned - it won't be! (unless its a fluke). When I bolted mine up like in the video, the subframe was skewed to the right and the left hand spring was fouling the driveshaft. I tried to move the mounting points on the floor of the chassis as far as possible, but ended up sloting the vertical mounting points to get it straight. Then bolt up the diff.

 

Even though the wheelbase and static toe are now right, the camber is far too negative because the wishbones sit too high at the recommended ride height. It only gets much worse with lots of boaty suspension travel. You can limit it by fitting concrete springs but that makes the rear end far too stiff and sketchy, with a loss of traction over rough surfaces. I've just started designing some new wishbones with different upright angles to fix this, and reduce a bit of unsprung mass to improve the ride. Its not perfect, but at least I can fit some fully adjustable coilovers to sort the damping. Also, an anti-roll bar will help give me a good traction/cornering compromise.

[Guest tom2b]

Thanks for that steve, finally an answer for the reason to this problem!

[Guest salty_monk]

So there you have it... suspect it's down to Rh (more so) & Ford tolerances...

 

Perhaps there were a few chassis jigs that are just out of kilter....

 

[Guest tom2b]

To sum it up............."the usual suspects!"