First step to restoring my 1974 Duster; Front End rebuild (coilovers needed?)
Uhhh.....
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I just saved you almost $1260.
You don't need all of those things.
You don't need the lower control arm kit unless yours are damaged or rusted.
Adjustable strut rods???? No. Try urethane strut rod bushings.
Pitman arm? Those rarely go bad.
Those upper control arms have Heim joints...They are terrible for the street. Noisy and harsh riding.
Poly strut rod bushings are a bad idea. The problem is the strut rod works in two different planes, keeping the LCA located fore/aft under acceleration and braking but also tracking the LCA up and down as it travels. In the fore aft direction you want the strut rod bushings to be stiff, so poly seems like a good idea. But then as the strut rod moves up and down, you want the strut rod bushings to be soft, to prevent binding up the LCA travel, and in that area poly is a bad idea.
Adjustable strut rods on the other hand are just about perfect- the allow very little fore/aft movement, but travel freely up and down as long as they've been adjusted to the proper length to prevent any binding. In the factory suspension, the strut rods allow the most slop out of any of the other components. It's honestly a significant benefit to go adjustable strut rods even with rubber control arm bushings.
As for the lower bushing kit, if the OP doesn't know exactly when the front suspension was rebuilt I can almost guarantee the bushings are shot and need to be replaced.
I agree on the UCA's, you don't want heims there on a street car. But the stock UCA's are very limited for positive caster even with the offset bushings installed. For a driver what you can get from the offset bushings is ok, for a handling car I wouldn't bother and would go straight to a tubular UCA to provide the additional caster.
Swimming up stream here but I prefer coil overs for sure. There is a bunch of different ways to do this and as you have already seen some passionate opinions
@HemiDenny is a great vendor (HDK) on here as well as the guys already posting. In the end you have got some great advice from a bunch of knowledgeable folks. I would suggest researching the countless threads on this topic and get a broad view of the subject. A bit of research time and effort is well spent when it comes to front ends. I am biased as I race and have several HDK components on multiple rigs. By same token I race against a bunch of guys that do not utilize coil overs. Do you guy, and have fun be safe!
The only advantage to a coil over front end is the rack and pinion and header clearance. Beyond that it's all cons- requires chassis stiffening to work properly with the Mopar chassis because it doesn't load the chassis in the way it was designed, does not improve suspension geometry vs updated torsion bar suspension, depending on the kit can limit turn angle, depending on the kit can limit suspension travel, etc.
Ok I think I will do the bushings (both UCA and LCA)instead of replacing the upper arms and buying the LCA kit. This car would not see the track any time soon.
Edit: Any recommendations on the bushings?
And thank you!
You would want the K7103's, and installed to maximize positive caster. Not the way the directions show.
You mention the car is for daily driving, what are you going to be running for rims and tires? If you stick with sizes fairly close to stock in the front the offset bushings and factory UCA's will be fine, but if you plan on going to larger diameter wheels and wider front tires you might just want to get tubular UCA's with more caster built in. The wider the front tire gets the more positive caster you'll want. My Duster is a bit of an extreme example with 275/35/18's up front, but I run +6.5° of caster to counter the tendency of the wide front wheels tracking about where they want. With the offset bushings about the most you can count on getting is ~+3.5°. Some have gotten more, but some have had a hard time even getting to +3.5°, it depends a lot on ride height and how the car is set up for rake. If you do want to have more +caster than that, you will need tubular UCA's. And as I said before, I would choose a set that has bushings vs heims.
The poly LCA bushings work just fine, and they're actually easier to install most of the time. The factory rubber LCA bushings need to have the outer shell pressed out of the LCA to replace them, it can be a bit of an ordeal depending on your equipment. Most the the poly LCA bushings reuse the original outer bushing shell. The only caveat is that you do have to check to make sure that the poly LCA bushings fit with a TIGHT slip fit into the outer shell. If they don't because the shell is too big, worn, etc then you still need to replace the outer shell to get a good fit. Same for the LCA pin, it has to fit tightly into the poly LCA bushing. If it does not, you need to find one that does.
I always recommend adjustable strut rods and greasable LCA pins when using poly bushings, just so that everything can be adjusted properly and lubricated later if necessary because of the way that the poly LCA bushings work, they rotate on the pins so they need grease. Installed properly the poly LCA bushings will last the life of your suspension and minimize deflection, so you get less slop in the suspension travel. They're fine on a daily, I still use my car as a daily for the majority of the year and I had no issues with the poly bushings or adjustable strut rods. I've put over 100k miles on adjustable strut rods between my Challenger and my Duster, the heim at that location sees very little load and I haven't had any issues with them wearing out like I have at the UCA.
