ride height questions after front end rebuild 1973 dart

[moparjon]

I am trying to set the ride height after a front end rebuild on a stock 1973 dart slant 6 . I noticed that i am almost out of room on the adjustment bolt , for the torsion bars , in the lower control arm . i can't find my notes from when i took it apart , but i don't think it used this much of the bolt . It was at the proper ride height before being rebulit . Did i not lineup the LCA with the torsion bars correctly ? i think i had them hanging down loose , but with the strut rods attached when i slid the torsion bars back in . OR , are they just really worn out ?

Also , the passenger side ride height is almost to specs as per the FSM . The drivers side is a little more under spec , but the drivers side is already sitting a bit higher than the passenger side . i don't get that . what am i missing ?

The first picture is passenger side , second is the drivers side . note how the drivers side blade is alot further from the frame .

 

[jdsduster]

set it to the ride height you like,and then have an alignment done

 

[Desoto291hemi]

You didn’t swap sides with the bars did you ?
There is a right side bar and a left side bar

Tommy

 

[Kendog 170]

LCA hanging. Back adjuster all the way back and make sure the adjuster arm (Important) is pushed back down toward the adjusting bolt. Then install TB. If not you may not get enough adjustment. JMO Post 3 odd # on Drivers side I believe. Or their marked R and L I forget.

 

[moparjon]

You didn’t swap sides with the bars did you ?
There is a right side bar and a left side bar

Tommy

No . i left them in place , just backed off the LCA's , so i could avoid mixing them up .

 

[moparjon]

LCA hanging. Back adjuster all the way back and make sure the adjuster arm (Important) is pushed back down toward the adjusting bolt. Then install TB. If not you may not get enough adjustment. JMO Post 3 odd # on Drivers side I believe. Or their marked R and L I forget.

Should i take the torsion bars back off and start over ? Can i leave everything else still attached ? I would hate to take everything apart again if i can avoid that .

 

[Kendog 170]

Well it looks like your out of adjustment if you want more ride height. Was your adjuster arm pushed down toward the adjusting bolt?

 

[RustyRatRod]

Torsion bars clocked wrong.

 

[moparjon]

Well it looks like your out of adjustment if you want more ride height. Was your adjuster arm pushed down toward the adjusting bolt?

i am not sure , i can't remember .

 

[moparjon]

Torsion bars clocked wrong.

what should i do now ?

 

[RustyRatRod]

what should i do now ?

Probably work on getting the bars back clocked right.

 

[moparjon]

Probably work on getting the bars back clocked right.

lol . sorry , i guess i meant , how do i do that ?

 

[RustyRatRod]

lol . sorry , i guess i meant , how do i do that ?

You should start by getting a factory service manual for your car and reading it.

 

[Oldmanmopar]

Set the ride height to the factory specification while on a jack in the center of the rear so leaf spring tension difference don't show up . the height is 1 7/8 That is the difference between the lower ball joint base and the center of the pin of the lower control arm. Do this on a level surface side to side. in the front. Rear don't matter at this point due to it being on a jack in the center. Once the height is set let the rear down and see if there is a change in the front.

When adjusting my height with 002 003 old school SS springs the car was level while on the jack. When I let the rear down with one stabilizer link out in the front of the car it leaned to the left. It took one turn on the left bar to level it. Then I put the link back on for the stabilizer.

When going to the track I would take that turn out and take the link out of the stabilizer. so the springs would work like they should

If you have factory springs or replacements of the same. You may not get a change when letting the rear down. I always use the tripod method to set the height then level the car to the factory spec when on all 4's . This will give you an idea of the bar and spring condition and tension. One reason some adjusters are unequal when done . But it is good to know what makes the uneven adjustment. front or rear? You will never know unless you do the front while the rear is jacked in the center. If the adjusters are badly unequal you will know the bars are bad . You will always get some difference the right side bar is smaller in diameter. but the left side carries more weight.

The proper method to set the bars is measured by the difference explained above . Not the total height at the fender or the bump stop. Can you raise the car ? Yes as long as the camber and caster can be set. I found most cars with the proper ride height the bump stop is between 3/4 and 1 inch from the rail.

 

[crackedback]

The arms that the adjusting bolts go in are clocked incorrectly. They need to be rotated one more flat to get the cup closer to the ground before the adjuster touches.
Odd number bar on drivers side... the way we used to remember... drivers are always odd!
As mentioned you may need to push the control arm down a bit to accomplish the task.

 

[340six]

set it to the ride height you like,and then have an alignment done

That's what i did. Measurement will vary from car to car. I have stock 340 leaf springs and front bars. BBP was stock and put 15 inch rims and tires since I had them. 15x6.5 and 15x8 (might be 15x7 I have lots of sets of wheels)
215/60r15 front and 275/60r15 (28inch tall) so that makes a difference from shorter 14 inch ones too

 

[RustyRatRod]

lol . sorry , i guess i meant , how do i do that ?

I'm sorry. I forgot to say to go over to myMopar.com and download a copy of the service manual for your car. It's a free download.

 

[Wvbuzzmaster]

Something everyone is forgetting to mention here is that you need to drive it during your torsion bar adjustment to desired ride height. I’m not talking far but enough to settle the suspension arms where they want to live. I’ve adjusted mine and jounced the front end and thought it was perfect but after a drive the front end came up a good inch! So this process is ugly (and why alignment shops hate torsion bar Mopars) but this is the only way to get it right. It is a trial and error process and an 1/8 or 1/4 turn at a time on the bolt is enough adjustment to have a measure-able difference in ride height, but you have to move the car enough for the suspension to settle in (why I say around the block and take your ratchet lol). I bet one drive your car will look like a gasser and you will be backing off the adjusters.

There is still a chance you are clocked one flat too far but you can fix that quickly enough.

 

[72bluNblu]

It's almost IMPOSSIBLE to mis-clock factory torsion bars with factory LCA's. So it's pretty unlikely that the LCA's are misclocked. You have to make a pretty significant effort to pull that off with factory parts.

With aftermarket torsion bars and/or aftermarket tubular LCA's it's a lot easier because of the differences in hex offset and the physical shape of the LCA, but that's not what we're talking about here.

More than likely this is simply because you're still using factory slant 6 torsion bars, and they're 50+ years old and just completely worn out. Torsion bars sag like any spring, and when that happens the car gets lower to the ground because the "sag" happens radially, and that changes the adjustment at the bolts.

As for the adjustment not being the same side to side, that's very common. Your car isn't loaded evenly so even if the torsion bars were brand new the adjustment would likely be slightly different side to side (engine is offset, etc), and like everything else the torsion bars will not wear out evenly either.

Time for new torsion bars. While you're at it, you should upgrade to larger torsion bars unless this is a drag strip only car, because the /6 bars result in a horribly under sprung car. The factory spring rates were designed for bias ply tires with very little traction, even all season radials like BFG TA's need a much higher spring rate for proper handling

 

[crackedback]

It's almost IMPOSSIBLE to mis-clock factory torsion bars with factory LCA's. So it's pretty unlikely that the LCA's are misclocked. You have to make a pretty significant effort to pull that off with factory parts.

With aftermarket torsion bars and/or aftermarket tubular LCA's it's a lot easier because of the differences in hex offset and the physical shape of the LCA, but that's not what we're talking about here.

More than likely this is simply because you're still using factory slant 6 torsion bars, and they're 50+ years old and just completely worn out. Torsion bars sag like any spring, and when that happens the car gets lower to the ground because the "sag" happens radially, and that changes the adjustment at the bolts.

As for the adjustment not being the same side to side, that's very common. Your car isn't loaded evenly so even if the torsion bars were brand new the adjustment would likely be slightly different side to side (engine is offset, etc), and like everything else the torsion bars will not wear out evenly either.

Time for new torsion bars. While you're at it, you should upgrade to larger torsion bars unless this is a drag strip only car, because the /6 bars result in a horribly under sprung car. The factory spring rates were designed for bias ply tires with very little traction, even all season radials like BFG TA's need a much higher spring rate for proper handling

IMO, it's easy to roll the cantilever up and out of position because it's in a free floating state. Most every car I've ever worked on required pushing down on the LCA to get that cantilever into the correct orientation. Run the bolt up and into the cup and start to tension the torsion bar.

Looking at his picture like a clockface, the cup should be around the 8 o clock position to start, level with the angle cut in the LCA where the adjuster block passes through. I bet his is around 10 o'clock, slips right on the bar there.

No chance should any torsion bar, unless it was in a fire and lost all tension, ever need that much bolt showing to come close to ride height.

Good luck to the OP. I'm out.

 

[72bluNblu]

IMO, it's easy to roll the cantilever up and out of position because it's in a free floating state. Most every car I've ever worked on required pushing down on the LCA to get that cantilever into the correct orientation. Run the bolt up and into the cup and start to tension the torsion bar.

Looking at his picture like a clockface, the cup should be around the 8 o clock position to start, level with the angle cut in the LCA where the adjuster block passes through. I bet his is around 10 o'clock, slips right on the bar there.

No chance should any torsion bar, unless it was in a fire and lost all tension, ever need that much bolt showing to come close to ride height.

Good luck to the OP. I'm out.

View attachment 1716469795

Sorry man, but that's just not true. I've seen torsion bars that had sagged to the point that the adjusters were all the way in, and that was with V8 bars. It's not only absolutely possible for bars to sag so much the adjusters are all the way in, it's actually fairly common with factory /6 bars. It's no different from a leaf spring going flat, springs lose their arch over time. Their spring rate doesn't change, but they do "sag" and that results in ride height changes over time.

The mis-clocking thing is not that easy. It's one thing to have to push the LCA down a bit if you haven't removed the strut rods or upper bumpstops. It's something else entirely to install them rotated by an entire flat.

It's a hex right, so 6 sides. That means from one full flat to another is a 60° swing. It's not something that's easily accomplished, because if one flat is available all the way at the bottom of the suspension travel (or slightly beyond it), that means the next flat isn't available until the suspension is almost fully compressed. So unless the OP raised the LCA's up toward the top of the suspension travel to get them installed, it's pretty unlikely he's a hex flat off.

I have misclocked an LCA exactly once. It was with a 1.12" bar that doesn't have the 20° hex offset like the factory bars, and it was using tubular LCA's. Tubular LCA's will hang straight down, because unlike the factory LCA's they're too narrow to contact the K frame when hanging down. Large bars with a small hex offset actually get inserted into the LCA with the LCA not all that far off the angle they need to be at when the car's at ride height, so, you get a hex flat available with tubular LCA's because they'll hang down far enough. With factory bars needing the LCA all the way down toward where it interferes with the K, the next flat is all the way toward the top of the suspension travel.

You're welcome to not believe me, but I suggest actually trying to mis clock a set of factory LCA's on factory hex offset torsion bars. It's not an easy thing to do, so doing it accidentally is pretty unlikely.

The OP likely just has flat worn out weak *** /6 factory bars.

 

[crackedback]

It's easy to misclock the cantilever., not gonna argue about. What is the difference in degrees from 10 to 8 o clock?

OP quote "It was at the proper ride height before being rebulit" Bars not out of tension. Doesn't think there was that much adjuster showing when disassembled. Hmmmm

Carry on with the crusade.

The picture posted had the situation EXACTLY like the OP's... I misclocked the canitlever. Oops. Fixed it now it is right

As I said, I'm Out...

 

[72bluNblu]

It's easy to misclock the cantilever., not gonna argue about. What is the difference in degrees from 10 to 8 o clock?

OP quote "It was at the proper ride height before being rebulit" Bars not out of tension. Doesn't think there was that much adjuster showing when disassembled. Hmmmm

Carry on with the crusade.

The picture posted had the situation EXACTLY like the OP's... I misclocked the canitlever. Oops. Fixed it now it is right

As I said, I'm Out...

All right, let's look at this. Here's your picture, with the flats marked with perpendicular red lines. Now, in your picture the LCA is conveniently parallel to the hex flat in the middle (that can change depending on the angle on the adjusting lever).

So lets break this down. The upper red line isn't possible, so that flat is not available. The blue dashed line is about where the LCA would hit the frame. The other limit would be where the adjusting lever hits the frame, as that's possible as well, which limits the position of the lever by itself. It's going to have a steeper possible angle than the entire LCA, but it won't be as steep as the upper red line.

The bottom red line is likely not possible as well. The body of the LCA hits the K frame when the LCA hangs down. I didn't mark a line on your picture, but based on what I've seen with my own factory LCA's I don't think that bottom line is a possibility either.

So, if you put the adjuster all the way up, and the LCA all the way down, you MIGHT be able to access 2 different flats on the torsion bar. But you would need the adjusting lever all the way up and the LCA all the way down, which of course is completely wrong by the FSM install instructions. And not easy to do I might add, because usually the adjusting lever is fairly loose in a factory LCA that hasn't been reinforced and tightened up. They tend to hang down rather than stick up.

The other thing to consider is the /6 bars. They have a 90 lb/in rate. The front corner weight on an A-body is usually around close to 800 lbs, unless you've done some weight reduction. So, that's 8" of suspension compression with just the weight of the car, you will twist the bar that much from unloaded to ride height. There's about 5.5" of suspension compression on most A-body's, bump stop to bump stop. With the upper bump stop removed you probably get another 1" to install the bars, we'll be generous and call that 1.5", and that's still only 7" of compression. So, the adjuster MUST take up the rest with a /6 bar. You can't install the bars with load on them already.

If I'd taken the angles on the factory LCA's from bump to bump I could give you the exact figures, but even with brand new /6 bars you need a lot of adjuster to get the car to the factory ride height. It doesn't take much sag to use the whole adjuster, and it's NOT easy to misclock the factory bars and the factory LCA's. Possible, yes, easy, not at all. Aftermarket bars with different hex offsets and tubular LCA's with more K frame clearance are a different story. But you still need to install the LCA at an extreme angle to do that.

 

[Newbomb Turk]

I just ran out and looked at my car.

My adjusters are not that far up and I had them set for an all iron engine with /6 bars.

 

[72bluNblu]

I just ran out and looked at my car.

My adjusters are not that far up and I had them set for an all iron engine with /6 bars.

At what ride height?

Sure, in theory if two cars are at the same ride height and have similar front end weights they should have similar adjustments, if the torsion bars are new.

Realistically, if we're talking about used, original torsion bars that are now 50+ years old the condition and mileage on the bars will have a significant effect on the adjustment, even with everything else being equal.