Suspension upgrade Qs for '65 coupe

[DeltaMustang65]

Well, I stopped by Mustangs Plus today for their show, did anyone else? They have a lot more room for cars now that they're expanding.

Anyway, I talked to one of the guys "guarding" one of their track cars, and it turns out that they HAVE done battery relocations to some of them after all. They also run the cables along the frame rails, away from the exhaust and all that. So now that it's 2-0 in favor of that route, I'm probably going to get that done tomorrow.

While I was there, I also picked up a set of Grab-a-trak upper & lower control arms, some poly lower arm bushings, and their roller bearing spring perches. I passed on the subframe connectors for now, because I want to get these 2 projects finished up and the ride height equal before I start welding things down there. I saved about $50 thanks to the sale , and here's hoping that I get another $50 gift certificate from the drawings they're doing!

[DeltaMustang65]

Well, the battery is all hooked up now and the car is finally running again. All that's left is to secure the cable to the bottom of the car with the little plastic loops that came with the kit. Not quite sure how I'm going to do that, though...

I would have installed the new lower control arms as well, but I can't get the rubber bushings out of them in order to replace them with poly. They don't have the lips that the poly bushings have, so there's nothing I can grab onto and pull. Trying to push them out didn't work, either. Grrrr!

I'm so close...

[DeltaMustang65]

I took my lower control arms to get the bushings pressed out at a local machine shop today. Cost me $70. Totally unnecessary expense, they NEED to sell these with more than one bushing option. Anyway, they're ready to install now. I'll have to wait until Monday to do it, because I have to work this weekend. Work sucks.

After that's taken care of, all I need to do is break those god**** upper control arm bolts loose and find my center punch so I can relocate them. I think there's a little monkey or something in my garage that keeps misplacing my tools...

[bmxmon]

$70?? I think you got hosed. I bet if you brought it to a competent mechanic next time they'll do it for much cheaper. The last thing we (my family and I) needed pushed in was a front seal for a sbc, a guy at the place we had it done did it for free. I also once had a different place press on an axle bearing, that cost me like $20 i think... Shop around man...

[DeltaMustang65]

Well, I had the bushings pressed out at a custom truck shop because they came recommended by Mustangs Plus. I actually went to MP first because they have that little "restomod garage" or whatever it's called. They don't have a press for these, they just install parts they sell as is. Believe me, I would have shopped around, but I trusted MPs opinion. I guess I'll have to not do that in the future...

Now that the entire rubber bushings and shells are gone, I checked the new poly bushings for fit. Is it normal for these poly bushings to not use shells? It seems kinda odd to me, but they seem to be fitting without them.

[DeltaMustang65]

I almost have the old lower arms off, but the bolts going into the spindle are being a severe pain in the ass. I went ahead and called it a day.

I'm really beginning to worry about the poly bushings. As I mentioned before, the shop I took the lower arms to pressed out the sleeves along with the rubber bushings. The thing is, the instructions say that you're supposed to keep the sleeves. However, it also says that you can use 2 extra little pieces of poly when using the original arms. This isn't making much sense to me. I'm really hoping that I don't have to take the arms back to the shop and go through the whole ordeal of going after them for ****ing up. At the same time I don't want to install the arms with the bushings as they are now, even though they seem to sit ok, and have them destroyed. I'd have checked the fit myself but the damn old arms don't want to come off yet. Has ANYONE here had any experience installing poly bushings on replacement lower control arms???

[DeltaMustang65]

LOL I guess that's a no. Well, I tried hammering the hell out of the spindle where the ball joint bolt passes through with no luck. I also tried using a pickle fork a couple days ago, no luck there either. Not to mention I've soaked this in penetrating oil time and time again. I'm starting to wonder if I'm gonna have to take the car somewhere to get these things off, or at least loosened up so I can take care of them at my garage.

One other option I've been toying with is getting ahead of schedule and installing some new front disk brakes. My thinking is, maybe I can get my hands on a kit that includes the disk brake spindles instead of the ones that use the original drum spindles. I'd be able to remove the upper & lower arms along with the spindles as a unit, without the need to mess with the ball joints. Only problem is that I checked out MP and Sac Mustang, and I can't find any disk brake spindles, included in a kit or separate. Any thoughts?

[bmxmon]

Get a bigger hammer! They'll come. When I replaced my spindles I was surprised how hard you have to hit those suckers, but once I got one the rest came easy, and how often do you get to wack your mustang with a bfh?? I dont believe anybody sells new spindles, you either have to get some from the junkyard/ebay from an early model stang or get some granada spindles.

[DeltaMustang65]

Well, I went and got a hefty engineer's hammer and beat the hell out of this thing, and STILL no luck. I'm pretty much taking turns between that, cranking on it with the pickle fork, and soaking it in penetrating oil.

I had the thought of cutting through these with my angle grinder. I suppose I could slice the top and bottom of the bolt off, and maybe try to stab or even drill the bolt out of the spindle. I'm really ****ed off about this because these are now the only things holding me back from being done. The upper arms are ready to come out. I was actually working on them lately so as not to be driven insane by the lowers.

[bmxmon]

check this out: Mustangs Plus - Shock & Fall! - Page 1

[DeltaMustang65]

I've read that article several times, and that's exactly what I've been doing. Remember, I live about 10 minutes from MP (hooray!).

I think the problem is that the suspension has never been apart. The article mentions something about it being 3 years since theirs has been apart, and it only took 3 whacks. Well, I'm pretty sure it's been 42 years since mine was apart (right before it was assembled), but 42 whacks has long since passed.

*grumble*

I'll go at it again tomorrow, I have work today. Maybe I'll just keep hammering it until it's no longer recognizable...

[bmxmon]

Oops, sorry! Thats gotta rock living that close to them...

[DeltaMustang65]

I don't know if the joint finally had enough, or if I found a secret magical method to separate it. Anyway, I had the spindle hanging from the upper arm while connected to the steering, and I disconnected the lower arm from the car again. I decided to rip apart the rubber sleeve around the joint in preparation to cut the bolt in half. However, before that, I decided that since I'm going to destroy the bolt anyway, I might as well make one last attempt to knock the bolt down by hitting it from the top (normally a no-no). I didn't have to worry about the bolt mushrooming now, you see.

This time, I folded up a greasy rag and placed it on top of the bolt to soften the blows, and got ready to beat the living crap out of it. I warmed up by first giving it a few light whacks. 1, 2, 3, the 3rd one wasn't even full force, maybe half. To my surprise, the arm dropped to the floor.

I'm not sure, but I think I might be the proud owner of a magic shop rag. I'll find out for sure tomorrow, when I try the rag first thing on the passenger side arm. If it comes off easy, the rag has magic powers. If it takes forever like the driver's side arm, then it's just a plain 'ol rag.

Moral of this story: Don't listen to anyone. Go ahead and hit that mother-*&%$in' bolt directly from above! The lower arms aren't rebuildable, anyway.

[rwhite65]

Glad to hear you finally got it!!

[DeltaMustang65]

Well, it turns out the shop rag isn't magical after all.

I set everything up to duplicate the conditions of the driver's side, did my best to pound that thing into oblivion, but it didn't work.

My pickle fork kit worked, though. I ended up trying to use the small fork end thingy, which I wasn't able to get around the bolt before. I was able to get it to fit by ripping the rubber boot off like I did to the other side, and hammering it on. It didn't want to fit at first, and it didn't want to come off after I was able to spread the joint apart with it, but it worked.

The good news is that everything is just about ready to be installed when I get around to it again this weekend.

[DeltaMustang65]

YAY! Everything is installed now. Putting this shit back is SO much easier that ripping it apart.

All that's left is to relocate the upper arms. However, before that, I'm going to clean up and paint the strut rods and replace their bushings with poly. The struts are the last weathered-looking pieces left up front, so it'll be nice to have them looking like they belong.

I almost bought new strut rods when I picked the bushings up, but guess how much they wanted for them...$59.99 each! WTF, that's almost as much as my lower arms cost each...for a freakin' ROD. What is the world coming to?

Anyway, just a couple more small steps and it'll be time for an alignment and test drive...then onto front disks.

Two quick (and possibly final) questions, though. Would castor, camber, and toe-in be thrown off if I removed and reinstalled these parts properly? I'm going to take it straight to get realigned when I'm done, but I don't want to hurt anything on the way.

The other thing is about shims. Do I have them and how do I spot them? The book I'm reading says that I should mark any shims for later use, and that I may have to adjust their thickness to compensate for additional camber from relocating the upper control arms. This is new to me, I don't even think my shop manual explains it. How do I make sure that everything is relatively in order so I don't show up at the alignment shop looking like a total noob?

[DeltaMustang65]

Well, I found the shims when I pulled the driver's side upper arm. There were 5 shims per bolt, 4 big shims & 1 smaller shim on the forwardmost bolt, and 3 big shims & 2 smallers shims on the rearward(?)most bolt.

Does anyone know if this is the correct # and size of shims for a stock suspension? Also, should I add or remove shims to better suit my current setup or just let the alignment shop handle that? If I can do it, how would I go about figuring out the correct # and size of shims to use?

Sadly, I might have been done today if the template I printed out was accurate. A very important dimension was off by 1/4", others possibly were too but I didn't see the point in checking after that. "Actual size", my ass.

MP has paper templates that they use in their shop, which I'll probably pick up if I can't get my hands on some metal templates.

[DeltaMustang65]

Hmmm...

I'm unable to start the holes for the Shelby drop, so I think I'm just going to let MP do it in their shop. MP seems to think I should get a bumpsteer kit, but I'm not convinced. I'd rather wait until the drop is done and check to see if there's even a need for it. I'm not spending $200+ unless I'm sure. Anyone have any thoughts/experience with this?

...Hopefully they do alignments, too, so I won't have to make 2 stops.

Other than that, MY work on the suspension is done. I think I'll rebuild the steering next, instead of installing front disks. It didn't look too good under there.

[DeltaMustang65]

I'd like to give a big thank-you to Alex, Mr. White, Stanger66, Mr. Rudis, and MDJay. You guys are a great help.

I hope this topic has helped other suspension newbies like myself realize that this CAN be done relatively easily yourself. I'm very happy that I was able to complete this project, as it not only has greatly increased the handling of my Mustang, but it also feels much safer to drive, as well.

Thanks again.

Matt

[DeltaMustang65]

I finally got around to getting a quote from Mustangs Plus' "Restomod Shop" on getting the Shelby Drop, but they want around $750.00 for it. It includes an alignment that they don't do, but send the car out for. Still, this seems rather steep.

I pressed them on it, asking why it was so much for punching a few holes. They said it's not just that, but removing the upper arms and all that. I replied that I know that because I rebuilt the whole suspension myself (and removed and reinstalled the upper arms, springs, shocks TWICE) and the hours they were quoting just didn't seem to add up to how long it took ME, a newbie. They didn't really have much to say at that point, and I felt like they were just trying to screw me or something.

Also worrisome, I called them in the morning with questions on that and getting subframes welded in and they said they'd call back later, which they never did. Both guys I talked to seemed kinda shady, and not too knowledgeable. Honestly, I don't know if I'd have the work done there even IF the price was right...

Has anyone else had this done at a shop, and what was the cost? Thanks in advance.

Matt