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Rear suspension thoughts

Jimjordan2

Donation Time
Went for a nice solo ride this afternoon here in So. California. From my home in Newbury Park I took Potrero Rd to Westlake, then took the 23 to Decker Rd down to Malibu and then North on PCH to Channel Islands and brought the 101 back home. Lots and lots of twists and turns for many miles.

Mighty nice ride for a 52 year old suspension. So my thoughts are to replace all the front suspension, which has been planned, so not the problem.

I notice in a few real sharp hairpins to the left I was rubbing my tire on the passenger side. (Oh, yeah rubbing on the rear, not the front) Didn't really notice it on the right turns. I'm running 185x70x13R tires, which fill up the well pretty good. I'm running pretty new std shocks from SS.
Any thoughts on beefing up the rear suspension, or is it just the tires I'm using?
67 Series V, 1725 engine.
 

alpine_64

Donation Time
Jim,

Was it the tread of the tyre rubbing or the edge or sidewall? Was it making contact with the flat horizontal face of the wheel arch lip or the pinched edge?

While your tyres are far from wide they are larger than stock, and depending on the offset of the rim may be much closer to the line of the guard. This on the rear gets rid of the narrow track look but can start to cause interference issues.

Assumimg the rear springs are original they will have compressed aneld flattened over time, effectively lowering the car. Again... Looks good but brings tyres and bodywork closer.

You could have the springs re-arched, you ciuld install after market springs that are lower but stiffer. You could roll the pinch weld lip of the wheel arch up to avoid the contact.
 

bernd_st

Bronze Level Sponsor
Pretty common topic with this wider wheel dimension. Unless you want to change the rims towards narrower track you need to trim the wheel arch lip a bit. The axle is not always 100% centered so triming just one side is ok. You can grind off up to 5 mm without any problem. Just make sure to apply some anti rust coating afterwards...
 

Jimjordan2

Donation Time
Thanks all for your replies. Yes, rubbing against the sidewall of the tire, so actually all your suggestions make sense. Will have to decide what I should do now.
Or just not run in the hills. Nah, what fun would that be? ;)
 

65beam

Donation Time
Our series 4 and series 5 both have185/13 tires. The rear springs of both were rebuilt when Tiger Auto restored the bodies/suspension and he rebuilt the front suspension of both. The rear springs were rearched and bushings installed. We have no issues with tire rubbing. The series 5 does set higher because we used to travel in this car and the trunk was usually full of luggage, etc.When he rebuilt both the front and rear suspension of the Harrington it was set a little lower. The rear springs are the same rating as his Tiger. All bushings are new. He put it thru some pretty hard driving recently with no problems.100_0563.JPG 107_0996.JPG
 

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Bill Blue

Platinum Level Sponsor
Be sure to replace the large bushing in the rear spring. It is what absorbs lateral forces placed on the rear of the car. It also has a major impact on what happens to front end. I had posted some before and after pictures of the car cornering, can't find them now. The difference was pretty dramatic.

Bill
 

65beam

Donation Time
Unless you have a lot of weight in the trunk, this photo shows you need to re arch the springs or replace tham and check the bushings at the same time.
 

ALC 68A

Donation Time
When replacing the rear leaf spring bushes, they need to be the original style with the offset eye, rather than the universal concentric type, to ensure the correct curvature on the leaf spring. These were unobtainable in the UK when mine needed replacing to pass the MoT test and I had to make do with the concentric ones which, as the springs were sagging anyway, did lower the ride height. As part of the restoration, the springs were retempered (it's an S3 with an extra leaf compared with the SV) and the bushes replaced.

As an aside, in the UK steel stock is now metric rather than Imperial and the thickness originally used to make Alpine springs is between available sizes. Therefore, a spring made of the same number of leaves is potentially softer or harder than the original, depending which side of the proper size you go. When I was on the SAOC committee a few years ago, a fellow member got Owen Springs, the oldest spring manufacturer in the UK, specially to grind down the thicker stock to the correct original thickness and make a set of springs from scratch to the original specification for his Series IV.
 

alpine_64

Donation Time
Jim... Per my earlier comments if the springs have sagged and flattened out that will cause the rubbing .... Your stance at the rear is slammed
 

Jimjordan2

Donation Time
OK, I've done some homework on this, went out and did some measurements. Possibly this photo is misleading. The car is parked on a slope, slightly uphill. When on a flat surface, I have a 6 inch measurement just forward of the rear wheel. I have a 5 3/4 inch measurement just aft of the front wheels. Wouldn't the re-arching then jack me up to far in the rear? Don't I want my car level at the pinch-weld?
And how much clearance should their be? I couldn't find that.
Thanks

I can only wait until I change the front suspension with it's new rubber and springs, etc. etc. screenshot.png
 

65beam

Donation Time
The green car in my previous post has a rear distance of 9 inches and 8 1/2 at the front. The blue car is 91/4 at the rear, 81/2 front. Both cars have front and rear suspensions that were restored by Tiger Auto in Dayton. Both cars have 13 inch wheels and if you look straight at the front wheels they both have a gap of roughly 3 inches from the top of the tire to the body. The blue car has a rear suspension that sets maybe 1/2 inch higher on the gap because those were set stiffer because several years back we traveled a lot with it and the trunk was usually full. Doug did some other mods to the Harrington so it isn't stock but the tires do show a gap between the top of the tire and the body.
 
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