Ladder bars..??..

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j par

j par

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I'm considering ideas for my next project for the car.. of course the theme of my car is old school so a ladder bar rear suspension seems synonymous with old school.. at least to me.. I have a parts list started but I'm not exactly sure what I need and what I don't... Right now I have the 0 0 2 in the 0 0 3 leaf springs and was wondering if I should trade one of those out to have them match? Again using the ladder bars as my primary traction instead of the leaf springs?..
any help on getting this accomplished would sure be appreciated and this is what I have Summit dream cart LOL...
Screenshot_20200424-071310.png

originally I never thought about the floating housing mounts but once I seen them it seemed to totally make sense...
 
Boy, you must have discovered GOLD on your land.... LOL. 4 months ago you were saving to buy head bolts, now your blowing your nose with hundred dollar bills :) Is this for traction or looks?
 
318willrun said:
Boy, you must have discovered GOLD on your land.... LOL. 4 months ago you were saving to buy head bolts, now your blowing your nose with hundred dollar bills :)
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I appreciate the help...
Notice I said dream list.. it will be one piece at a time....IF..
 
318willrun said:
Oh, I forgot. YOUR thread, wipe the smile off our faces - get down to business! :D
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Or at least we could just get a start with some help instead of not starting like this and getting nowhere...
Oh well it's screwed now I'll just figure it out on my own as always..
 
j par said:
Or at least we could just get a start with some help instead of not starting like this and getting nowhere...
Oh well it's screwed now I'll just figure it out on my own as always..
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Toilet paper is hard to find, but not face tissues. Get a box and cry...…. One remark before I asked if it was for traction or looks...
 
I had ladder bar coil over shocks on my 67 SG Barracuda. They were great and are easy to tune to go straight. Old school but I like them.
 
SGBARRACUDA said:
I had ladder bar coil over shocks on my 67 SG Barracuda. They were great and are easy to tune to go straight. Old school but I like them.
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I was hoping to keep my leaf springs but I wasn't sure if I wanted them you know how they are now where they lean to one side and how that would affect the ladder bars?..
 
j par said:
I was hoping to keep my leaf springs but I wasn't sure if I wanted them you know how they are now where they lean to one side and how that would affect the ladder bars?..
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Ladder bars with leafs - this guy did what you can do with your harbor freight welder
 
I do like the idea of them attaching to the bottom and having them hang down as that seems more old school. I also like that girder type look as well.. I like the Hem joints on the rear love the competition engineering for adjustability.
I'm just not sure how I'm going to get out of doing those floating housing mounts..
Actually I'd love to build them out of square tube myself but I would probably borrow a good welder for that...
 
TrailBeast said:
I wonder why he didn't make those uglier?
Probably because there was only about 1% more ugly left on the scale to be 100% ugly.:lol:
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I like the exterior design it's just that interior ribbing that needed help. I would have just used the same Square tube material in the center. and of course one has to imagine it all one black cohesive color...
 
I also had a 65 Coronet bracket car with ladder bars leafs and sliders. I never really cared for it. It just didn’t feel the same on the launch like the Barracua did. It seem to move around on the launch.
 
I ran ladder bars with coil overs, and thought they worked great. Seems to me that the guys that ran leaf springs that worked best had single leafs with adjustable shocks. Honestly though, a pair of super stock springs is just as old school, just not as noticeable as ladder bars.
 
Have you considered a leaf/link system? The '70 Motown Missile made good use of it (with SS springs), and the details are spelled out in the old Mopar Chassis Book. Used that as the basis for the setup on my '72 Colt "back in the day" that worked very well for me. Not as visible as full ladder bars, but definitely "functional old school"...
 
You can get the same or better performance for less money with a caltrac bar type system. Then spend your money on quality DA shocks, which you’ll need anyway.

I’ve run my stick car with ladder bars, tuned two other stick cars with them, and one low 9 second flip top Austin with them.

Took me two trips to the track to junk my ladder bars and install a 4 link.

Ladder bars HATE clutches. Shocks working with ladder bars HATE clutches. They are way too short. Like 76 inches or more too short, and way too high. I’m talking about IC here. And clutches HATE that.

Dave Morgan wrote an article for some magazine sometime in the early 2000 IIRC. He learned what I already knew. He was helping on a Camaro that was going low 9’s with a 5 speed.

Data logging was just becoming affordable for the average guy. So maybe it was the late 1990’s. At any rate, I forget who they bought the data logger from but they hooked them up with a potentiometer to measure the speed at which the shock moved in rebound (extension).

The potentiometer couldn’t read the speed because the shock extended so fast the potentiometer was outside its limits.
That means the shock had no control over axle movement, and that particular shock wasn’t capable of being valved to control it.

Because of data logging, shocks are in a different universe from where they were in 2000. But the point is sticks and ladder bars don’t like each other. Calvert type bars (the Asassin bar has more adjustability than the Calvert bar) will do what a ladder bar will do for less money and less work. And you still need a quality shock. And better headers.

I can never find the emojis you use, so you got what I could find.



Edit: WTH???? It didn't post my emoji. Unreal. Let me try again.

Edit II: No bueno. Dammit jPar, you got an emoji but I can’t make it stick. I hate emojis.
 
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70aarcuda said:
Ladder bars with coil over shocks
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have ladders bars on my Dart i shared pictures of yesterday.
They work unreal good. Never have to worry about spinning, assuming the track is even modestly prepped. Drive the car around everywhere
Some of these guys on here need to go to a drag strip once in a while. Ladder bar rear suspensions are ultra common. Cheap and effective for most any 8 sec car and on up car
Probably see them on more bracket type cars than anything. Way more effective than leafs, and i have had both
 
B3422w5 said:
have ladders bars on my Dart i shared pictures of yesterday.
They work unreal good. Never have to worry about spinning, assuming the track is even modestly prepped. Drive the car around everywhere
Some of these guys on here need to go to a drag strip once in a while. Ladder bar rear suspensions are ultra common. Cheap and effective for most any 8 sec car and on up car
Probably see them on more bracket type cars than anything. Way more effective than leafs, and i have had both
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How many fast STICK cars do you see with ladder bars? OP has a stick. Not even close to any slush box.
And a ladder bar isn’t any more tuneable than an Asassin bar.
 
yellow rose said:
How many fast STICK cars do you see with ladder bars? OP has a stick. Not even close to any slush box.
And a ladder bar isn’t any more tuneable than an Asassin bar.
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yellow rose said:
How many fast STICK cars do you see with ladder bars? OP has a stick. Not even close to any slush box.
And a ladder bar isn’t any more tuneable than an Asassin bar.
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i said at the track. 99% of cars there aren't sticks.
Typical weeky race car at a track many are ladder bar rears.
I stand by what i said
 
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