turning torion bars down?
- Thread starter Aldrich66Imp
- Start date
GJS
Senior Member
You're gonna wanna go ahead and get yourself up to speed on stuff like this.That's bit closer to the language used. Sorry must be my age
Very nice Imperial btw!!
Carmine
Old Man with a Hat
...or when a Kia backs into it in a parking lot, misses the bumper and destroys the whole front end.it's not going to be permanent so he put it back once he gets a little older...
Aldrich66Imp
New Member
mean destroys the whole kia? don't think a pop cans gonna really hurt these imperials
Carmine
Old Man with a Hat
I think when you find out that whole front end is welded together (and therefore hard to align) and that the grille is chromed pot metal; you'll wish you had the protection offered by the big steel bumper that just slid under the pop can and did nothing.
furyus 67
Senior Member
Agreed! Unfortunately you happened to step into a long standing tennis match of "lower it" and "LEAVE IT STOCK". As Matt stated earlier most of our patrons on this sight would rather see them restored to factory prestige! Others on here such as myself see a stock vehicle much the same way an artist sees a blank canvas. Although I am far from an artist, I'm not afraid to grab a brush!!
saylor
Senior Member
unsolicited comment -
just realize that when you loosen/drop the front end, you are un-springing all your spring i.e. the front suspension.
try not to die -
- saylor
just realize that when you loosen/drop the front end, you are un-springing all your spring i.e. the front suspension.
try not to die -
- saylor
MrMoparCHP
Old Man with a Hat
I'm not so sure that is true, you are changing the relative position of the control arm to the torsion bar, this would be no different than moving the upper spring pocket up on a coil suspension. Changing the adjuster bolt doesn't increase or decrease the load on the torsion bar.
Will it change the dynamics of the handling, absolutely. I know someone who built dropped spindles for his a-body Barracuda and even modified the lower control arm to move the ball joint up 2".
Alan
saylor
Senior Member
Mr Mopar !
Ill respectfully accept that, and now I want to really really know the really answer. lets we will try to find out.
is it really unspringing the front end? why do we twist the torsion bar in the first place? could it be sprung enough to provide suspension spring by just being in place? can they be set overly tight in order to make the front end more rigid? etc.
good stuff maynard.
Ill respectfully accept that, and now I want to really really know the really answer. lets we will try to find out.
is it really unspringing the front end? why do we twist the torsion bar in the first place? could it be sprung enough to provide suspension spring by just being in place? can they be set overly tight in order to make the front end more rigid? etc.
good stuff maynard.
MrMoparCHP
Old Man with a Hat
They are only unsprung when you install them, the second you tie the upper an lower control arms you add some minimal amount of load on the springs.
The simplest way to look at a torsion bar is to think of it as an uncoiled coiled spring. When you compress (or extend) a coil spring the rod that forms the coil actually twist just like the torsion bar.
To better understand the torsion bars you need to understand the design of the lower control arm. The socket that the torsion bar goes into is floating in the control arm. There is a lever on the socket that extends into the control arm, this is where the adjuster bolt makes contact.
The pivot/socket is free to spin in the control arm, you can spin it 360, without that adjuster the suspension would just bottom out and sit on the bumpstops.
Now if the adjusting bolt was on the frame and twist the bar then I can see it loading/unloading the spring but not with the way it is designed.
Alan
commando1
Old Man with a Hat
Alan, this one of the rare times here I have to disagree.
I won't try to research the mountain of data on torsion bar out there and then attempt to boil it down to a few lines here.
Basically, a car's ride height is a function of applied load vs. spring resistance.
That's why when you go to a larger diam. bar, the ride ht. increases.
livininharrow
Senior Member
here is the way I see it. lowering the front end by adjusting the torsion bar bolt works just fine but it compromises the ride. I prefer dropped spindles to get the lowering effect you want. then you will still have the wonderful torsion bar ride that mother mopar gave us compared to other inferior designs.
Duncan
Well-Known Member
Nice car. One note - I suspect the lean to one side is due to one leaf spring being 'weaker' than the other - the lean can probably be fixed by having the rear leaf springs resprung. I did that to my Plymouth and it improved the overall stance tremendously ( it raised the rear end, which was droopy before the respringing. There is a good chance that might raise the rear end which will make the front end appear lowered (and part of that lowered look might be true since raising the rear end will put more 'weight' on the front end).
MrMoparCHP
Old Man with a Hat
Not being a mechanical engineer I do not see how changing the relative position of the wheel will change the spring dynamics, having the wheel already 2" into its travel will. Changing to a heavier bar and running the bolt to the same setting will cause the car to sit higher but the ride height will not change the bar position (amount of static twist) that is purely a factor of static weight. That is assuming the same bar just a different ride height, now switch to a heavier bar and you will see less twist just from the static load, so you will need to run the adjuster in less.
So without changing the bar but just the ride height the degree of twist on the bar will not change.
Now if you change to a heavier bar it can resist the weight easier and will not twist as much. Because of this you will not need to run the bolt in as much, adjusting it the same the car will sit higher.
The adjuster bolt was designed to even out differences in springs, was not designed to alter ride height. The factory service manual does not give a range just the difference (measured from the bottom of the ball joint and the bottom of the torsion bar socket) on the 69 C-Body it is 1-1/8" (+/- 1/8"), doesn't matter what bar, tires etc. Same measurement, all bodies, all engines all bars... (within the c-bodies).
I wouldn't lower the front with the torsion bar more than 1", any more you risk having handling issues.
Alan
70bigblockdodge
Old Man with a Hat
You guys are talking about 2 different things Alan is saying that it's like having 2 different coil springs of the same pounds/inch but one is wound 2" taller, the ride high will be higher. Stan is using 2 different rate springs each wound to the same heights.
I'm gonna weigh in... that is sweet...
The wheels are not my taste, but I don't hate them on your car.
I am in agreement with you Carmine, but I have given this some thought with my cars (bumper height, not lowering)... with the number of high bumper SUVs and crossovers on the road, I think it will be pure dumb luck to have the stock bumper line up correctly in an accident with a modern vehicle. But if it does, I fully expect to give better than I get in said collision.
Now lets hope that NEVER happens to any of our C Bodies.
Carmine
Old Man with a Hat
I am in agreement with you Carmine, but I have given this some thought with my cars (bumper height, not lowering)... with the number of high bumper SUVs and crossovers on the road, I think it will be pure dumb luck to have the stock bumper line up correctly in an accident with a modern vehicle. But if it does, I fully expect to give better than I get in said collision.
I agree that with so many SUVs on the road, the chance of bumpers lining up decreases. That's why I'm not going to lower my odds! In the summer, i'll drive something old every day of the week, and that means mixing it up with 50 miles of X-way each day.
I have no doubt that if I meet bumper-to-bumper, especially with my formal, I'll come out ahead. I even went with the taller tires for that reason. Bumper to top of my decklid, ala lowrider; not so much.
But if the car is just a museum/car show piece, I suppose it doesn't matter.
67Monaco
Old Man with a Hat
No, spring rate on the bar doesn't change simply because the adjuster is in a different spot. You'll simply not end at the same rate of twist and thus resistance before you hit the stops. If the stops were moved higher in the travel eventually you'd get to the exact same amount of twist on compression.
If the adjuster was set to 9 o'clock at factory and travel goes to 10:30. Then the adjuster was changed so that it is now 10 o'clock the rate is the same it's just the travel now goes to 11:30 but you'd hit the stops at 10:30 before you get to same rate of twist as the factory setting. Move the stops to 11:30 and you're back to same rate of twist and travel just with screwed up alignment.
70bigblockdodge
Old Man with a Hat
Isn't that what I said when talking about Alan's senerio. Stan is the one who changed the rate with thicker bar which you could back off and still have same ride height and back off more to lower and the higher rate would keep you from bottoming against lower stops.
Are you just testing my reading comprehension?
Did I pass?
67Monaco
Old Man with a Hat
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