Rear ride height adjustment ??

[cbeers]

Hey everyone,

I recently replaced my spring plate bushings. It was a "learn while doing" experience and I made a mistake. I loosened the ride height adjusting bolts, causing the driver's side to sit a little lower now. The good news is that I had scribed all pieces so I have a pretty good place to start with in getting it back to where it should be.

My questions are:

1) Since I need to only adjust the two ride height bolts (two M-14s closest to the torsion bar cover) can I do that without getting back into the other bolts for camber, toe etc. located in the middle of the spring plate?

2) Anyone have tips, such as rasing the trailing arm with a jack?, to make the process easier. I guess what I would like to know is if there is a way to "unload" those two M-14s to make the adjustment process easier?

Thanks in advance,



-Chris

[DW SD]

The camber adjusters and toe adjusters clamp the two sides of the spring plate together. Those nuts will have to be loose to make adjustments to the ride height adjusters, I believe.

You want the torsion bar to be unloaded, in the neutral position. The wieght of the trailing arm and components tied into it, if dangling, will load the torsion spring opposite of when the car is weighting the torsion spring). Again, you want neutral. You could lift the car onto jack stands, placing the car on the jack stands (outboard corner near sway bar mount is a good spot) and then lift the trailing arm 1/4" to 1/2" or so at the shock pickup location with a jack. You could tweak it a bit to optimize neutral, but at that point, the torsion bar should be pretty close to neutral. You should be able to move those bolts freely (or close to it). If you have an assistant, they could take lift the weight of the trailing arm, caliper, rotor, e brake assembly, C-V joint and axle, also. I used a vehicle lift and actually lowered the trailing arm onto a jack stand just a touch. That worked, too.

I'd recommend marking locations of your camber and toe adjusters too. You may want to have an alignment shop check the alignment and corner balance when you are done.

You may want to look into (search) the tri-pod method of corner balancing too. This may allow you to get the torsion pre-load even between the rear trailing arms.

Hope that helps

Doug

[djmcmath]

Do not loosen the camber/toe adjusters. I'll say that one more time: do not loosen the camber/toe adjusters. To change ride height you only need to loosen the ride height adjusters.

To unload the springplate, just pick the car up. Lift it in the normal fashion, remove the wheel just like you'd normally do, break the two adjuster bolts loose, adjust as necessary, then put everything back together and set 'er down. Too easy.

[DW SD]

something bothered me about my response. I checked it out. You won't need to unlock the toe or camber adjusters. Check this photo. This is of mine, only two weeks ago. Just undo the two bolts closest to the torsion bar for ride height adjustment. Process for unloading the torsion bar still applies. When my car was up, I could move the ride height adjusters without unloading the torsion bar, however. It would be easier to unload it, though.

[David]

These bolts are usually set at their lowest setting from the factory. I guess that's so you can raise the car as the torsion bars fatigue. If you've never changed them before then you could go back to that setting. When I changed my torsion bars I set the adjustment right in the middle so when I get the alignment and corner balance done hopefully I won't have to pull the torsion bars to adjust.

[cbeers]

Thanks guys, this is what I was thinking, but I wanted to get some input since I tend to do things the bassackwards way

Doug - your set up looks sweet!!!! Somebody has been busy cleaning!


-Chris

[juanbenae]

how does she sit today?

[cbeers]

Purdy

I am still thinking that it may be a little off, but it is very close. On the freeway I can get some wandering, sometimes, but it is in both directions so I write that off as due to the road.

Nothing like having the proper tool for the job.

While I was messing around there, I put new sway bar bushings on too.

-Chris

[juanbenae]

that wandering has everything to do with your shot bushings in the front

[stlrj]

Wandering is usually alignment. If it was due to bushings then alignment shops would be out of business.

[cbeers]

stlrj,

K9 is just pushing me into doing the front end now too. Which I just might do

I agree that the alignement is not perfect right now, but it is good enough to get me by until I finish with my other plans....



-Chris