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Need help lowering the front

  • Thread starter Thread starter UE19
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UE19

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Which pad or what do you shave off the spring. Top or bottom pad as you look at the spring still mounted on the car? Doing the front is going to be a real pain in the A@@. Rear was simple.

Thanks in advance.
 
If I remember correctly, it is the top. It helps to jack up the front a lot. That way, when you slide the spring out, you will have enough room for it to curve toward the floor.

Oh, and the other thing is to make sure that you have a jack under the a-arm when you unbolt the shock. Mine is limited by the shock travel. That means that when I take the shock off, the spring rather quickly lowers the a-arm. You don't want to have anything in the way when that drops!
 
Shaved the top and put the new spacer on the spring. Has anyone used any of the shim's from the lowering kit??? I'm not using any of 6 shim's that came with the kit, or the metal shim that was on top the old pad. Just straight pad.
 
I am running the pads that were sent with the lowering kit. Honestly, if I had it to do over, I don't think I would lower my vette. I know it lowers the center of gravity, and looks good, but since I have a convertible, I have less ground clearance than a regular coupe. The reason is the cross brace. It eats up my ground clearance. I end up dragging it on half the speed bumps I encounter. Ok, well, maybe not that bad. But I do catch it occasionally on the freeway. When there is a a bump on the freeway, and it is spaced just right, the cross brace hits the ground. That is not a good thing at freeway speeds.

I raised up the back a little the last time I went in for an alignment. I will raise it a little more the next time I have it aligned.

Just something to think about.

mike
 
Heres a "copy and Paste" instructions that I had writing out for a fellow member about a year ago, and also did this same just recently for another member about 2 weeks ago, so here you go, and I hope this will help you out........


It's so easy to do! Infact, the hardest thing to do is to cut the rubber off the spring.. that stuff on there is tuff!!
Unbolt the outer tie rod & sway bar, on both sides, losen the spring retainers which is holding the leaf spring to the frame of the car.
On either side that you what to start on first, get a block of wood ( 2 by 4 ) and a small floor jack will be fine, put the wood along with the jack under the spring closest to the a-arm, with out it being ON the a-arm it's self and slowly jack the spring up untill it's not resting on the lower a-arm ( about a 1/4 to an 1/2 inch off ) Disconect the ABS sensor thats located on the brake assembly, thats very important for you to do so!! ( if yours has one) remove the 2 bolts that are holding the shocks to the lower a-arm (they're located near the spring in the lower a-arm), unbolt the lower ball joint stud nut, you can use a two jaw puller or what I did was unscrew the nut untill it covered the end of the stud and with a hammer, tap on the top of the nut and not that hard or you'll ruin either the nut it's self or the stud or both. (try using a hard rubber mallet first)
Before doing this, find something to put under the wheel hub.. another block of wood would be fine just to stabilize it and it should come free with no problem!!
repeat this on the other side and let the presure off from the 2 by 4 and jack free and you should be able to slide the spring out from either side after you pull back at the wheel hub away little, the spring will slide out from the lower a-arm.
It will not come out all the way if the car is not jacked up high enough and it does not have to!! you just need to be able to slide the spring far enough to be able to reach the rubber mounts.
With a steak knife or I prefered a hack saw blade, saw off the rubber mounts and try not to cut into the spring it's self... take your time, don't rush!!.
Do this on both sides.
(Helpfull hint: while cutting the rubber off, lift up on the side that you started cutting at, at the same time you cutting away, the reason is that if you dont do this, the rubber will grab onto the knife/sawblade and you'll make very slow progress if any at all. The first side that I did without doing this took me about an hr and a half to cut, untill I lifted the rubber up off the blade thats sliding back and forth, the other side took 10 min to complete the job, big difference.)
This will give you the drop that your, I think looking for!!!
The wheels will be, depending on what size rims you've got, if your running stock 17's will be about an 1 inch to an 1 1/4 from the fender wells, and NO!! THEY WILL NOT RUB!!
You will have to of course hopefully with out saying, take the wheels off to do this job, and the ride is fine, just a little more stiff, and I do mean, A LITTLE!!
I hope this helps Aloha.
e-mail me if you want bigger visions of lowerd pictures of my car at Dahawaiianpunch@hawaii.rr.com
 
Howzit...Bra

Mahalo on the reply. I just sent u an email.
 
UE19 said:
Howzit...Bra

Mahalo on the reply. I just sent u an email.
I havent recieved it yet. try sending to this address...dahawaiianpunch@hawaii.rr.com
Look forword in hearing from you my friend.
 

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