Well I have searched the archives for the Torque Arm and have read quite a bit about it. I am going to get the Sphon when I order it but I have a few things that I need cleared up first.

#1 Will it be a good part to put on a pretty much stock suspension? I have shocks, struts, STB, and it is lowered.

#2 I read some people had to weld something in their car. What was it and does it come on every TA?

#3 Would it be worth it to order the driveshaft loop?

#4 Fill in anything you would like to help me with my decision.

On a side note the car is going to stored when winter comes so there will be a lot of other parts suspension parts are going on during that period so I will be ready for the Ram Jet 350 sometime next year.

 

By itself, it will do very little in your situation, maybe nothing at all. By lowering the car you have completely destroyed the already imperfect geometry of the suspension.

The first thing you need is LCA lowering brackets. Without that, every time you manage to get your tires to accidentally hook up a little bit, the force they apply to the rear end will atttempt to rotate it up off the pavement. Then, the TA, and a set of LCAs would do some good.

I have Steve Spohn's street (poly) TA, his LCA lowering brackets, and Lakewood (cheap) poly LCAs. It's actually hard to make the wheels spin now, where before they would spin and hop and leave me sitting still with no way to use even half of the power I had.

SFCs will make a big improvement too.

OBTW - no welding, cutting, bending, or other sodomy on my car for the TA or LCAs, only for the SFCa and the LCA lowering brackets.

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"So many Mustangs, so little time..."
ICON Motorsports

[This message has been edited by RB83L69 (edited August 29, 2001).]

 

Thanks a lot RB83L69 I will go ahead and get some LCA's and the lowering brackets as well to help out with the geometry I have heard that with my car lowered like it is isnt good for me at all. I know that the rear hops a lot while I am driving and make a fast turn. As far as LCA's are there any others that are better than the next. I have heard good things about Global West, Lakewood, and Sphon.

 

All 3 of those ar good products, but are optimized for different purposes. IMHO the Spohn ones are not suitable for the street, but might be the best for drag racing. The Lakewood ones are probably best for the street. The GW ones are set up somewhere in between.

What happens when you lower the car, is that the front attachment point of the LCA (which starts out already lower than the rear one from the factory) becomes so much lower than the rear one, that when the rear tries to push forward on the car body, the LCAs are already partway "rotated" upward, so the forward force on the rear end makes it try to rotate itself upward even more. This unloads the tires, which lose traction, which quits pushing on the body, which lets the springs push the rear end back down, which puts more force on the tires, which hook up, which make the rear end push forward on the tilted LCAs, which rotates the rear end up, which unloads the tires, .... over and over again, at the rate of about 3 to 6 bounces per second depending on the shocks. Classic wheel hop.

The brackets fix this by making the rear attachment point of the LCA lower than the front; so now, when the tires bite, the forward force on the LCAs makes the rear end try to rotate downward, thereby driving the tires harder into the pavement.

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"So many Mustangs, so little time..."
ICON Motorsports

 

We have four different versions of LCAs, so I don't see where a statement that they are not suitable for the street is appropriate. Our tubular poly bushed LCAs (Part #201) are the same set up as Lakewood, and every other std. poly LCA on the market, with the exception of a higher build quality, hardware, material, and finish.

Sorry, couldn't sit back and let that one go on with the show....

Steve



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Spohn Performance: F-Body Chassis/Suspension Specialists

 

Question #3.

I believe all the Spohn TA now come with a loop also. They didn't originally.

 

Which ones would give the best handling, Steve?

 

I stand corrected Steve... at the time I was doing my research, you had only the rod-end style. Who knows, if I were shopping today, I might decide differently.

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"So many Mustangs, so little time..."
ICON Motorsports

 

Thank you very much for explaining that for me RB83L69. I can now finally understand what is going on when people talk about wheel hop when the car is lowered. So with the relocation brackets it will lower the LCA to under the rearend makes perfect sense to why you would buy the brackets in my eyes. I am thinking that I will be going for street and a little strip but for now just street. So Poly/Poly would be the best for that huh?

 

No problem!

Yes, IMHO poly is best for the street with a little strip ocasionally thrown in; the rod-ends would be better for what might be described as more stressful use. Your passengers will appreciate it.

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"So many Mustangs, so little time..."
ICON Motorsports