Well I am Very interested in buying one of these. Namely for the fact that it is a quality piece and it takes the arm off my tial shaft housing on the t-5 lessening the already flex prone case. I have been reading for the last hour or so past threads on this particular item. Some folks say the thing doesn't fit due to lowering springs/worn stock springs, larger exhausts, or ground clearance issues. I know almost all of our cars are modified, however I am very uneasy about spending nearly $500 on a torque arm for it not to fit my application. Basically I run stock replacement iroc springs, have a 3" single exhaust with edebrock headers/ y pipe, and have a basic ten bolt rear. will this even fit? I am assuming the ground clearance issues with the optional drive shaft loops is because of lowered vehicles, which I should be fine with the new springs. The exhaust issues I am assuming are due to either people running duals or larger than 3" exhaust or some ill fitting y pipe. Lastly something about griding part of the power coat for it to slip on has to be done. Maybe I am paranoid, but I need some basic answers. Everything I read seemed to be dealing with specific car setups.
-SmallTires

 

hey to help you out with some of your questions.....i just put one on my 86 iroc a few months ago.. having iroc springs wont cause any problems at all. the only real issue with it is if you lower the car. you cant have the rear drive shaft safety loop but you can still use the front loop. the trans crossmember is about 2 inches lower then the stock one but it is built like a tank. it is a very strong unit. spohn does not skimp on strength. the torque arm is a tight fit trying to get it on to the rear end.... but its supose to be tight for a reason. it was very easyto put on if you leave the torque arm detached from the crossmember and you can move it up and down as needed to slip over the rear mount. i used a dead blow hammer and put a little coat of grease on the meeting surfaces of the rearend and the torque arm to get it to go on to the rear. i didnt have to remove any powder coat. the grease and hammer helped. it did take some pursuading with my hammer though....lol. just dont use a hard hammer to do this if you dont want to mess up the powder coat. you can get rubber hammers and dead blow hammers cheap enough well under ten bucks. my car is lowered about 3 inches and i have many other mods in the suspension and have had no issues with useing the torque arm/crossmember. and my car is a 5 speed. i baught my car with no cat on it and they put a strait pipe in its place and my front driveshaft loop just slightly touches it. but that is no issue the pipe is prob a lil to long and moved the cat back pipe over a little. no big deal. i am very pleased with the set up except the ground clearance issue. but the cross member i am assuming is built that strong to strengthen the subframe in that area. and to take the extreem punishment alot of us guys put on parts like that. spohn is more exspensive then most other companies........but his parts are worth every penny. there are many many people on here who swear by spohn parts and i am one of them. if you dont have any parts from him.....buy this and you will see why. any more questions let me know.

 

i am also probably going to get a sphoon tq. arm
- ive heard good things, and want it to connect my 700R4 to my 10 bolt


more importantly..

dude, SmallTires.. WHere did you find stock replacemnt IROC springs

i have been looking for those all over.. (stock ride height, with more rigidity).. i need them, because i lowered my car with 2" drop spindles, (not with springs), and i want the ride to be more firm so the car floats lesss.. therefore i need sotck ride ht. springs, and with rigidity.. nothing i come across is made for an IROC .. where did you get yours?

 

I had a T-5 one in my car for 8 years or so, and a T-56 one for the last 3 or so. For about 5 of the years that the T-5 one was in my car, I ran Edelbrock TES with the stock oval exhaust. The rest of the time there was SLP headers in it. It has a Hooker 3" cat-back in it now. I have the Moog stock IROC replacement springs in it, have had them since about 1994 or so. It's always had a 10-bolt, originally just the stock unit for the car (3.73 with drums), but now it has a 91 or 92 one with the PBR brakes, but I just stuck the stock gears back in this one because I couldn't hang with the weenie 3.23 (or whatever they were) TPI gears that were in it when I got it.

So I don't claim to have alot of actual experience with Steve's products or anything, especially not in a combo similar to yours; maybe somebody else can tell you more than me.

They both are within ½" or so of the stock dimensions, as far as exhaust and that sort of thing is concerend. If your exhaust fits a stock torque arm, it'll fit Steve's. Yes he makes his parts with a tight tolerance; but remember that a piece of sheet metal that you can literally bend with your fingers (or at least, I can; and I'm a 6'-1" 135 lb specimen of nothing but bone, dust, and skin) will deform alot easier to fit around cast iron than 1½" angle steel.

From your description of your car, it sounds to me like you won't have any trouble with it at all.

Get his lower control arm relocation brackets too. Those are probably THE SINGLE BIGGEST bang-for-the-buck suspension mod I have ever done to my car. The torque arm felt like I took a giant rubber band out of the drive line somewhere, and I REALLY liked that. But the LCARBs totally eliminated the wheel hop that plagued the car and drove me crazy for about 15 years before I finally did something about it.

 

Well by reading everything I have been over the last few months of my camaro build I am more than sure that spohn products are the right way to go. The price may be a little more than what I have seen elsewhere but the quality I have received speaks for itself. I already own his box LCAs, Spherical strut mount plates, did a whole poly bushing set from him, SFC's, Wonder Bar, and front and rear sway bars. So I am no stranger to his quality work. I was going to order his torque arm, panhard rod, and lca relocation brackets to finish off my suspension. Yes, this was alot of money this past month, but well worth it in my mind. The service has been excellent and so is the product. Anyway I really wanted this torque arm, but it sounded difficult to install and I am no stranger to installing stuff, but I have never been one to get in and start grinding things out or modifying them drastically to fit. So I was a little nervous about ordering it. However it seems I might be ok with this. I figure I will have a killer suspension by the time I am done. I don't run lowering springs however I do want to know what ground clearance issues you have. Does it scrape on speed bumps? How low does the tranny crossmember sit? Thanks for the lengthy reply as it was very informative.
-SmallTires

 

I actually got lucky (for me at least) and a buddy of mine had a cherry 89 iroc. It had some 20,000 original miles, beautiful car. Unfortunatly the car got t boned and it was a total loss. However the springs and various other pieces were perfect on it. Heck the springs still had the factory paper tags on them. I gave him $50 and got all the springs off it to replace my worn 100k plus mile factory springs. However Spohn does sell replacement factory pieces. here is the link.
-SmallTires

 

Actually our cars in terms of parts are nearly identical. I am running Edelbrock TES headers right now. Have a 3" single exhaust, and am running a 91 rear end with pbr brakes and 3.73's in it. So if it fits yours it has to fit mine. I was doubtful on getting the LCA relocation brackets, due to the fact I wasn't sure if they would work with non adjustable LCA's. However after reading the description I am going to get them as well as all of the previously mentioned stuff. I have pretty well decided I am going to do it all "right" the first time as I have never really liked wrenching on cars all the time. I perfer to build and enjoy rather then constantly be swapping in and out parts. My dad thinks I am crazy for spending this much on just suspension alone, but I figure it will pay dividends in the end. Your statement of the torque arm is what I was looking for exactly to convince me. Before I blew the 305 the car had alot of creaks and noises comming from it. I have the new motor now, but have yet to install it. I will basically gor from a stock suspension to an almost entirely spohn setup. I am guessing there is going to be no comparison when I get it together and driving it again next month. It has me drooling just thinking about it.
-SmallTires

 

I just installed mine and it fits very well. I had to grind small portions of the powder coat off on the rear flange to get it to bolt up.

Other then the possible ground clearance issue, another possible issue is the mount itself. The mount for the TA sits about 6" away from the k-member, which puts alot of load on the front bolts for the cross-member and sub-frame rails when the car is under power. Just pushing/pulling on the mount produces alot of movement. I had mine relocated closer to the cross-member, but I doubt this would work with the T5/700-R4. The easier solution is to get his stock style TA and cross-memer and leave the mount for the TA on the transmission. This will probably work out better in the long run.