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Very impressive! Always cool to see a unique project where EVERYTHING has to be thought through on your own. You must have spent a lot of nights thinking this thing through and it is starting to show.
What kind of work did you put into the suspension design? Did you do modeling or calculations on the geometry? I was noticing your rear arms look like they'd produce a fairly steep camber curve based on the frame vs. spindle separation distances, but it may just be the photos. Too much camber gain can be a problem for braking and acceleration. Did you make room for sway bars?
What spindles did you use front & rear? Are they also Cobalt parts?
Looks like you'll have plenty of room for a rumble seat out back now
What kind of work did you put into the suspension design? Did you do modeling or calculations on the geometry? I was noticing your rear arms look like they'd produce a fairly steep camber curve based on the frame vs. spindle separation distances, but it may just be the photos. Too much camber gain can be a problem for braking and acceleration. Did you make room for sway bars?
What spindles did you use front & rear? Are they also Cobalt parts?
Looks like you'll have plenty of room for a rumble seat out back now
Thread Starter
FormerVendor
iTrader: (2)
Joined: Dec 2013
Posts: 549
Likes: 3
From: Rancho Cucamonga, CA
Very impressive! Always cool to see a unique project where EVERYTHING has to be thought through on your own. You must have spent a lot of nights thinking this thing through and it is starting to show.
What kind of work did you put into the suspension design? Did you do modeling or calculations on the geometry? I was noticing your rear arms look like they'd produce a fairly steep camber curve based on the frame vs. spindle separation distances, but it may just be the photos. Too much camber gain can be a problem for braking and acceleration. Did you make room for sway bars?
What spindles did you use front & rear? Are they also Cobalt parts?
Looks like you'll have plenty of room for a rumble seat out back now
What kind of work did you put into the suspension design? Did you do modeling or calculations on the geometry? I was noticing your rear arms look like they'd produce a fairly steep camber curve based on the frame vs. spindle separation distances, but it may just be the photos. Too much camber gain can be a problem for braking and acceleration. Did you make room for sway bars?
What spindles did you use front & rear? Are they also Cobalt parts?
Looks like you'll have plenty of room for a rumble seat out back now
As for sway bars, yes there is room for them. I am going to wait to put them in until I can drive it. I want to see how bad it rolls and which end of the car start sliding first. I am thinking I will only need one sway bar in the end. I mounted everything as low as possible, so my roll center is very low.
The front and rear spindles are from a 93 Miata. I chose them because I needed a car that had double wishbone suspension. Big brakes are easy to find for a good price. I also wanted a popular bolt pattern to make choosing wheels easy. My next quest is to find a good shop to build some custom axles. I don't think it will be too big of a deal. Just expensive...
Last edited by CBM Motorsports; May 6, 2014 at 05:52 PM.
On The Tree
Joined: Sep 2009
Posts: 111
Likes: 2
I would love to see more detailed photos of your suspension setup. This looks like a great build. Check with www.driveshaftshop.com for axles.
CBM - Thanks for sharing the added detail. I hope I didn't come across as critical; I was mostly curious about the process and just couldn't judge well from the photos, so I asked. I think what you're doing is just plain awesome and I'm jealous in a way that you are doing your suspension from scratch. Your camber rates don't sound off base; approximately 0.5deg/inch of travel overall and I assume a faster rate near ride. On my Nova I did the Gouldstrand mod on the front suspension and get about 2* change in camber over 5.5" of travel, though of course the curve isn't linear so I get more rate at ride height and compression than on drooop where the curve actually starts going the wrong way. I have an image of the curve and there is some decent discussion on camber rates here: http://www.pro-touring.com/threads/8...Guldstrand-Mod Of course as you have likely discovered this is only one piece of a very complicated puzzle.
It will be tough to determine your swaybar needs right off the bat, but I suspect you'll need them to help you tune things. Also if you want to have a more comfortable ride, you probably will select lighter spring rates which generally will require stiffer way bars for performance handling. Being able to dial in the under/oversteer is a huge benefit to adjustable sway-bars
I'm sure I'm just telling you stuff you already know or things I am wrong about that you know better than I do. Thanks for sharing the project for all of us to learn from!
It will be tough to determine your swaybar needs right off the bat, but I suspect you'll need them to help you tune things. Also if you want to have a more comfortable ride, you probably will select lighter spring rates which generally will require stiffer way bars for performance handling. Being able to dial in the under/oversteer is a huge benefit to adjustable sway-bars
I'm sure I'm just telling you stuff you already know or things I am wrong about that you know better than I do. Thanks for sharing the project for all of us to learn from!
Thread Starter
FormerVendor
iTrader: (2)
Joined: Dec 2013
Posts: 549
Likes: 3
From: Rancho Cucamonga, CA
Bandit -
Keep your comments coming. It helps posting a build with pictures so that I can get new ideas from the readers. There are many people out there who know a lot more then me and if someone sees something funky, by all means, bring it up! All the picture posted before the coilover pictures had just a solid piece of metal in place of a coilover. So the ride height is a bit lower then it will be. It does have a higher camber ratio as the car approaches its bottom out point. I have to do some more welding under the fenders. So when I do, I will post more pictures of the arms and everything.
I like your Nova too. My last project car was a 70 Nova. It had an old school 383 that I built. Did 400hp to the wheels. Never took it to the strip though...
Thanks to everyone else for all the good comments!
Keep your comments coming. It helps posting a build with pictures so that I can get new ideas from the readers. There are many people out there who know a lot more then me and if someone sees something funky, by all means, bring it up! All the picture posted before the coilover pictures had just a solid piece of metal in place of a coilover. So the ride height is a bit lower then it will be. It does have a higher camber ratio as the car approaches its bottom out point. I have to do some more welding under the fenders. So when I do, I will post more pictures of the arms and everything.
I like your Nova too. My last project car was a 70 Nova. It had an old school 383 that I built. Did 400hp to the wheels. Never took it to the strip though...
Thanks to everyone else for all the good comments!
Last edited by CBM Motorsports; May 7, 2014 at 05:38 PM.