Thread: Suspension on "indaweeds" rods

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Anyone notice something about the front suspension on this magazine feature rod that you might not want on yours?

The world is waiting to hear Henry.

Gee, I am still learning. I don't see anything wrong with a torsion bar suspension after working on VWs, but I personally don't like the front so low that there are no frame horns. The scrub line looks OK but what is the clearance under the engine pan? Technically I don't see anthing really wrong except I would prefer more clearance and some minimal form of a front bumper. Henry's my "neighbor" (within 100 miles) and pretty sharp so I don't know, maybe Henry will tell me (us)?

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

Maybe something about where the tie rod is located ??? My eyesight iz' not so good. The more I look at it the fuzzzzzier it gets. Ya' got me, I dunno.

I could say the dropped axle....... It would look wierd on my "Z". HE He He

Henry do you have a picture of the front of the car? It's hard to see the front from the back. The tie rod looks kinda low but that could just be the camera angle. I don't see a front brake line but it might just be out of focus.

It looks like the feature article from Street Rodder, November 2004 issue with several other views including the cover and the article on page 34 et. seq. but other than clearance (!!) I don't see the problem (yet)!

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

i have my streetrodder in front of me looking at it ? i dont see any thing wrong , it has clearance , above scrub line , brakes are good , brake lines ,
the only thing i can see is the tierod looks like it is below scrub line ,i think is is in the photo angle.

I may be wrong, but it looks like the tie-rods are well below the scrub line. They're routed under the hairpins rather than through them. I have a very similar steering setup on my project, and there's no way I could have gone below the hairpins.

I don't think it's the angle, but maybe it is. It just jumped out at me. I see so many high dollar rides in the magazines that miss (ignore) stuff like this just to get a low stance.

The things I see most frequently are scrub line problems and weird angles on the A-arms if IFS setups.

The other possibility is that I'm totally clueless. . .

better to be dead and cool, than alive and un-cool

Just learning here. On page 37 on the right side of the middle of the page there is a view of the left front wheel and it does appear that nothing is going through the hairpin, but on the picture from the back there is a chrome "glisten" right on the hairpin that makes it hard to see whether the tie rod goes through the hairpin or under it. All I can say it that it would not make it up my driveway and I will have to grade my driveway just to allow my 4" dropped axle to clear with about 4" of clearance so that coupe would never make it up my driveway. I wonder what the clearance is under his engine and transmission pans? Evidently some of you are more consious of low clearance problems than I am but I will have to learn that soon.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

Just a few things to consider. First, this is not your "typical" setup. True, most tie rods pass through the normal hairpin arrangement. Since this car has the torsion bar system, the front of the frame sits much lower, particularly since the ends of the torsion arms attach to the center of the axle rather than on top as with most transverse springs. And it should be noted that the article made it a point to say the hairpins were custom fabricated for this particular car, so you can't compare their configuration to a ready made set such as from Pete & Jakes. If you look closely you'll see that the tie rods barely pass under the frame rails, perhaps an inch or so of clearance. It would be physically impossible to pass through the hairpins. That being said, the relationship to consider is where they are in comparison to the axle itself, and in that they look to be fairly normal.

With the frame that much lower, the oil pan and the balance of the drive train could be a problem. The pictures don't give us a clue, but since this guy has a long history of building cars, I'd guess he's mounted the drive train higher in the chassis to compensate.

Looks scary to me,if u have a blow out looks like the rod is gunna go down on the tie rod end first(might pull a little to the side of the blow out)looks like its well below the level of the rubber.I am sure u dont plan a car around a blow out but he may have some sort of belly plate to prevent the car from draggin the tie rod end!?