Spohn Performance, Inc.

to bad the third gen ones wont be out for another month, dont hold your breathe tho.. lol now im gonna wait to put my engine in because i have to have one of these, ive waited so long.

 

what have we been waiting for

 

hell yeah. that'll be perfect for when I yank the 305 and put in the 350. there was no price listed...have any clue what it's gonna be about

 

Maybe around $400 or so.

 

doesnt someone make one of these already ive heard that the culprit for third gens bump stiring is this true

 

Another month? I think that statement is like a year old in itself.

 

tubular K members from spohn

yes a few companies but so far none have been designed and built well enough for road use and fitment. judging by the quality and design of the rest of spohns line up these K members should be top notch.

definitly, but after all this time another month is just a drop in the bucket i guess. figures i just had my stock K and As sandblasted, por15d and rebuilt, ohwell.

 

for the price ...I hope it's the same as the LT's version....the mild steel version is $445...which seems pretty good, motor mounts are an additional $50 and the chrome-moly version is an additional $250

 

If you think its going to be ready in September............. 2006.........

 

Least I would tend to trust the Spohn one.

He does make quality stuff.

Very unlike a lot of the stuff I have dealt with on friends cars pertaining to tubular subframes.

later
Jeremy

 

how much lighter is the Spohn k-member suppost to be than stock?

 

ypu seem to know quiet abit about after market on these cars. this leads me to a ? because this k member is the only thing left stock in my suspension set up in your opion with this much stonger then stock k member will this take care of the bump steer issues with the third gen cars or is there something else that i am over looking. very well could be because after i put my eibachs on it dropped the car 2 in front1.5 in back an i had to make a bracket to get my panard bar level again the car is great when you are aggresive but when in cruise mode bump steer is horrible right in the middle of corners to agrevates the hell out of me. thanks for all

 

a k member is not going to help with any bumpsteer, if your car is lowered a lot you prob need a bump steer kit, i think baer sells a real nice one for our cars.

 

a bump steer kit hugh i have never heard of one as much time an money in this car thats funny. do you know what it is an how it works

 

yeah it lowers the tie rod ends down so they are level with the drag link, that way the geometry is correct.

 

What if any benefits can be realized from this mod on a street driven car? Everything on my suspension is spohn minus a-arms, coilovers, and k member. I like the idea it will lighten the car and make room for headers, however I am afraid like anything else tubular or race bred that it will not fair so well on the mean streets that a daily driver sees. Plus I am always weary of being the first to try something as you will be subject to the initial bugs the prodcut has. However I am in the middle of a motor swap and I fell now would be the time to replace this if I ever wanted to.

 

Simply having the tie rods level with the drag link doesn't mean your steering geometry is correct. Bump steer is much more complicated than that.

 

So advantages:

40lbs less or so?
Clearance for headers
Stronger im sure...
Shiny and Red?

What else?

What is the advantage from having this rather then stock? What do you guys think?

 

does it come in any other color?

 

You can special order one in just about any color.

 

That's not true. BMR have made kmembers for years. I have one on my 4th gen. As a matter of fact, my entire suspension is made up of strictly BMR/Spohn products and there's no difference in terms of their construction or fitment. They're both equal.

BMR is second to no one. Sorry. Not that Spohn is bad, as I said earlier,they're equally as good but to say no one builds kmembers for 3rd gens that are strong enough is for daily use is untrue. I'm anctious to see Spohns upcoming Kmember, but I'm willing to bet my left nut, it won't be much different than what BMR has been offering for ages now on third gen's....

 

You mentioned that you have one on your 4th gen, but have you experienced one on the 3rd gen? I'm just curious to hear how they hold up on a daily driver from someone who has experienced it first hand.

 

A k-member is pretty far down on my list of "things to do" for my '88. But seeing as how I have numerous other BMR products (including the kmember) on my 4th gen, and ALL pieces are strictly top notch, I don't see how/why they would offer anything of lesser quality for a 3rd gen. Take a look at BMR's website and check out pic's of their 3rd gen kmember, both stand-alone and "installed" pictures are on there. It's a heavy duty piece that's for sure. Only downside (to some people anyway) is that you have to upgrade the factory A-arms for the kmember to fit.

Don't know about Spohn version though. Considering the price for both the BMR and Spohn kmembers will be roughly the same, you can't go wrong either way.

On the other hand, if Spohn's version can re-use the factory A-arms, that might be a deciding factor for a lot of people who don't want to upgrade their A-arms.

 

Yep it can reuse the factory a-arms. That was one of the goals that Steve had in mind when designing the k-member.

 

In that case, like I said, that will seel the deal for a lot of members who want to reuse their old A-arms. Well done Spohn.

Doesn't make much difference to me though, as I'd be upgrading my A-arms at the same time as the kmember, so whether the factory arms work or not is largly irrelavant to me.

I'll still have to see final pic's of Spohns kmember before I decide which I'll end up going with when the time comes.

Should be a really nice piece.

 

Agreed, I'll check these guys out. Maybe I'll grab one when I pull and work the engine.

 

Sorry, I have no idea what is going on with this site. I kept getting database errors. Sorry about the numerous posts.

 

I wouldn't necesarily say it's "stronger" , maybe more so than other tubular k-members out there, but have you EVER heard of anyone that had a problem with stock GM piece? you could do dukes of hazzard style stunts and that breaking would be your last problem.

 

I'm excited. I'm going to order one with a-arms in october/november. I've been wanting to do this mod forever, but wanted it to be a spohn piece first. what do you guys use to hold the motor in place while you switch k-members?

 

id say engine hoist or just pull the motor good time to detail out the engine bay good luck looks like a nice piece whats your main reason for this mod?

 

i've seen these little hoists that sit on the shock towers for putting in an import engine.... I'm gonna try and snag one. or maybe just do like you said and use the hoist, since i have one. I'm doing that for weight savings, mostly. I just wanna do the a-arms and everything as one swap since it will be easier.

 

what kind of wait saving is there between the stock pieces an the spohn pieces? yeah if i were gonna do it id do the a arms at the same time agreed easier and wouldnt make much sence at thiat point to use stockers. ive heard that the stock design supports a ton of flex and becomes a major issue after takein care chasis flex through out the rest of the car.

 

You heard wrong, it would take hitting something huge and solid to cause any kind of flex in a stock a-arm or K-member. The stock bushings would squish completely out before you had even a 1/4" of flex in the stock stuff

 

if this is the case what is the advantage to the aftermarket tubular k mem an a arms weight, additional room. was just going through some old mags yeah here in chevy high performance oh ok upgrading k mem for weight reduction an a arms for reduced flex would be a good investment at this point. so its the a arms that flex under exterm loads that flex man looking at those pieces thinking they twist an flex thats really driving hard you prolly wont see those stresses on the street unless you hit a pot hole. i wander what the weight savings would be over 50 lbs? you look at pieces such as the torque arm i can see but in that case what shocked me was building these hefty pieces an then reconecting to the tranny tail shaft i made my own an welded it in stress off tailshaft tuneable for street strip but im having probs with the k mem unless you want the room just go for the a arms right?

 

they say over 65 Lbs. who knows. I want the clearance without haveing to screw with it later. wish it had been here sooner, but you can't rush quality. I'm just glad took his time to get it right. this will close out my suspension other than coil-overs/shocks. not that I'm going to switch, but the only thing I'll ever need to touch again in the future will be shocks. I have the entire rear suspension done, and i have the front sway bar and TDS wonder bar and lowering springs. git 'er dun.

 

65Lbs thats the K mem alone or with a arms? i here ya bout the suspension but i dont think i will ever do the coil overs. the room would be nice im setting pretty low with the 2 inch drop always scrappin another 65 off the front would be nice cant wait to read you guys reports on the pieces ive dropped alot of weight an added alot of power keep us posted on these parts. an some more info on the weight would be great

 

There simply isn't much advantage. You'll save some weight, but I doubt it's 400$+ worth. You can buy alot of lightweight stuff for that price. Pretty much any header available for a 3rd gen is designed to work with the stock K-member so you really don't need a bunch more room. In fact some K-members have clearance issues with some headers.

Your not going to get much flex in the stock A-arm, all the cornering loads are getting transfered to the a-arm in compression. There is simply no way you are going to compress the a-arm in this manner. The spring loads on the other hand will load the a-arm in a buckling mode, one could argue that the tubular arms are weaker in this respect. Going to coilovers bypasses this problem (not there is much of one anyway) Unless you are already running a solid bushing, your simply not going to be eleminating any flex by going tubular. If you go tubular but stay with poly bushings you are just wasting your money for 5lb's of weight reduction.

Tubular K-members are pretty popular with the mustang guys for a couple of reasons. Mainly because the good ones move their lower control arm forward 3/4" and moves their steering rack to correct for some bump steer issues. As far as I know there really aren't the same problems with the 3rd gen. If some one would release a K-member that would convert to a dual a-arm setup, then it might be worth it.

 

hey! if u want to take a look of it go to hawks main page and u can look at it.

 

tried to take a look took me to a site computer geek must of done something wrong

 

Any one know if you can still jack your car up from the center?

 

call spohn and ask, i wouldnt recommend it tho.

 

Why not? Because of safety, or possible damage to the member?

 

anybody received the spohn kmember yet? i got it yesterday

 

i looks way better quality than PAracing one. my brother has the pa one i have spohn. looks way stronger.

 

I'll probably get blasted, and talked to about saying this. But, I don't like it. It lacks triangulation. It has the same flaws that many of us have been questioning about m any of the other K-Mmebers out there. I doubt that will give you anywhere near the rigidity of the stocker, and I bet it weighs as much also.

 

Shhh... dont say that, people are watching.

Guess they finally proved me wrong, its out. Good, at least now people should be getting their wish.

 

Well,

I can go by various spohn offerings and can vouch for quality and welding ability.

This is over years of using his stuff and multiple vehicles and friends etc.

His looks vastly superior to the PA Racing K-member (which I have seen split in an under 10k mile application). Whole spring perch area just started seperating.

I can also vouch the PA Racing one was welded like garbage from day one as well. (Wasnt m choice to make but I repeated profusely to not use it)

But hey! PA Racing will send u a new one with fancy new gussets also welded in like crap if u complain enough.

I love the idea, but for the near future till any tubular k-member goes 100k getting beaten daily driver on potholed roads, I'll stick to modifying the stocker.

But, if I was gonna buy one, spohn would prolly be the only one on my short list.

later
Jeremy

 

I just have one question, whats up with the notches? Suspension clearance?

 

I like how spohn changed "coming in late september" to coming soon lol.

 

i guess is clearance on the center link and inner tie rods