Torsion bar upgrade?

[elnielsen]

Hey folks,

Torsion bars are off and we are replacing all suspension rubber with graphited polyeurothane. Lower control arm bushings were the worst. Anyways, 318 car (refreshed; bearings, timing kit), A-904-LA, the little baby rear end.. Nothing fancy. Also put in 2" lowering blocks on the rear leafs and intend to lower the front the same by the way of torsion bar adjusting bolts. It rode with about 6" clearance, and 4" should be perfect..

My brother is pushing to upgrade to new thicker torsion bars. I don't think it needs it. Our first time with a torsion suspension. What would be the effects of big block bars? Pure stiffening suspension performance? Or zero gain overkill?

Thanks all!

 

[DrEamer]

I would consider drop spindles if you want 2 inches. That way you can keep all of your front travel, and keep your the same ride quality with the bars you have.

 

[Chryco Psycho]

the 70s springs were soft by todays standards , IMO it could not hurt to go to a .96 bar at least ,good shocks will impact the ride a lot as well usually more than spring rate .

 

[Ted70challenger]

Stock torsion bars are soft. If you lower with the adjustments it will likely bottom out on mild bumps. Go stiff 1” it won’t bottom out . Or new lower spindles .

 

[elnielsen]

Thanks guys, are these lower spindles part of any disc brake conversion kits (front only), which is the next project?

 

[DrEamer]

I knew I had seen a post somewhere from the A body forum on this subject, just took awhile to find it. Anyway, he had drop spindles and took them off, and went with bigger bars and using adjusters. Certainly a good read with good info.

Drop Spindles - PST vs. Magnum Force vs. Fatman vs. ?

 

[elnielsen]

Thank you for that. I also found this other post where people were reporting that bigger/stiffer is all additional gravy. I'll be able to handle a stiff suspension so long as it takes curves like on rails. Anyone running 1.12" Torsion Bars in their Ebody???? How you like them?

I have a 318 car. I want to drop it 2" (from 6" to 4"). I already included 2" lowering blocks in the rear. I found these E-body torsion bars: Mopar-Chrysler Torsion Bar set for E Body Cars for 1965-1973
They come clocked at 15 degrees, if I buy super stiff thick 1.24 bars, will this negate my ability to drop the front end 2" using the adjusters?

 

[Ted70challenger]

One thing I think you should look at is how little travel the front suspension has . Usually only 2” to the rubber stopper bottoms out . Lowering reduces travel, on a suspension that has just enough . Also one more thing to consider is lowering your suspension greatly affects alignment. Lowering will certainly move the wheels into positive camber ( bad ) .

 

[elnielsen]

From all the forum posts I have read, lowering using torsion bars is the best way to lower it because it drops the suspension into a better suspension geometry (given that is is required to have it aligned based on the drop), which actually improves the amount of travel versus other methods of lowering. And, the stiffer the springs the less it is going to travel within its articulation. I'm just wondering if these springs which account for being too stiff for the original adjustors to function, if that stiff is still going to allow the drop and if it will ride unadjustably higher than I want?

Hey I did just install new rubber stops.. What if I give those a shave to increase articulation?

 

[elnielsen]

Actually now that I think of it, the new stops are much lower profile. The originals had a square base with a triangle top, the new ones juts the triangle top.

 

[elnielsen]

Oh it's only a smidge of clearance