67 Barracuda- Brakes and suspension on a 5000 budget- advice needed

This is one of the threads @72bluNblu posted in with his list.

I'm pretty much duplicating it, but with Viking warrior double adjustable shocks. So far, so good. $5k should be plenty for a decent suspension build but you might start to stretch it if you want a better rear end (you want a better rear end). Your goals seems to match up well with the explorer rear axle swap though, might be a good idea to read up on it.

Thing about the adjustable strut rods and controls arms is that the stock replacement parts available are all garbage, and modern tires require a different alignment to work their best. I would say that adjustable strut rods are non negotiable for a car that will see serious street time but that's solely based on my comparison of the stock parts that came off my front end compared to the new "stock style" replacement parts I got from reputable sources (they're garbage compared to OEM design). If you have some NOS strut rod bushings you can use, then reusing the stock strut rods would probably be fine. The garbage replacement parts might even be OK, but I'd bet you wind up replacing them frequently and I know alignments aren't cheap in my town..

Offset bushings can suffice for the control arm, but offset ball joints are weaker so unless it's a trailered, drag only car, I'd stick with good stock style ball joints. Tubular upper arms are a wise investment though, especially for a disc brake swap up front.