Hot Rod mag suspension build up - what's your opinion?
Hotchkis actually built lots of Dodge Dakota suspension when absolutely no one else was doing that.
It seems like you have some chip on your shoulder or something.
Year One, Goodmark, Edelbrock, all started making parts for other brands before Mopar parts. Edelbrock started with flathead Ford stuff in the late 40's. So I guess you don't buy parts from any of those guys??? These aftermarket businesses are small. They tackle the relatively high volume parts first and then move to the lower volume stuff. Or they hit markets that are wide open.
There's been places selling Mopar suspension stuff for years. Just no one bought the stuff enough to keep the places in business.
Actually, what I was trying to point out was that for older Mopars a lot of vendors, who have been around for decades, haven't taken the Mopar crowd seriously and all the sudden have realized that market existed. For quite a while now you could open a Danchuck catalog and buy a complete frame set up for a tri-50s Chevy from Hotchkis, complete, ready to roll, or a subframe kit for the GM F-body. Is it a matter of going after the high volume market or what they perceive to be the high volume market? Maybe you're right on this one, seeing that the Dak frame made it's way under a lot hot rods, they saw this as a high volume market and decided to tackle it. For the older stuff, though, is it a matter of Firm Feel, RMS, XV, et al, showing them that, yes, there is a demand for such things and now they're scrambling to get a piece of the pie? Was this article written for Hotchkis or for education purposes? Seems like there are better suspension systems on the market for our Mopars, why not test those?
As far as a chip on my shoulder, not at all. Remember that Ed's, Offy, Weiand were some of the first to come along with intakes available for our engines, going back to the 1G's and the Polys. Hell, Ed's was right there with some of the first aftermarket parts when the engines were released to the public! ('54 239 OHV Ford Edelbrock aluminum 4bbl intake in my possession, made the year the car was made!) I remember when it seemed like Iskenderian was the only cam grind on the market for Mopars, too. Now Hughes has come along, dumping a lot of R&D, waking up Comp, Crane, that the Mopar market is real. That's had a bleed over affect into AMC, Buick, etc.
Maybe I just didn't do a good job of explaining myself, and you pointed it out, but I'd rather go to companies like Firm Feel and support their business, or for basic packages someone like PST or Just Suspension, companies who have been putting kits together for decades and realized that we aren't just some kind of freaks sitting around dreaming about what we do with our cars if someone made just the right parts. Hell, I have one of the most over looked Mopars in an M-body! Ever tried to find suspension parts for
that? Thank you Firm Feel! Thank you PST for finally releasing a urethane bushing kit for it!
I like your second post, by the way. Driving characteristics are something that get ignored and suspension is something that needs to be understood and studied very carefully. Not just for racing on the track, but for every day driving. It's something that I've been doing a lot of reading on so that my '74 can be built to be a real road car. I was trying to point out that g's are a universally accepted baseline, with all the magazines and manufacturers using it. Is measuring g's the best way to measure? No, as you've pointed out. But it seemed like the article was really dumbed down to compare the car to a more modern car, just for comparisons sake.
