My SN95 LCA Install

[Daily 86 SVO]

I'm not going to go over the pros and cons of this install, but I wanted to point out different things I ran into that I haven't yet seen posted here.

For starters, I went ahead an went through most of the suspension on my 170k SVO. I've owned it since 2000 (with 36k miles), and have only replaced the koni shocks. I bought American Muscle upper and lower rear control arms, front SN95 LCA, Motorsport B springs, MM ball joint shims/adaptors, and poly front spring isolators. Probably going to need shocks again, but that might be for next year.

The rear was fairly straight forward. Lots of liquid wrench and an impact are good to have. Took about 4-5 hours. My friend with a rust 86 GT said mine was a piece of cake compared to his. I have a pic of the arms/bushings on another thread http://www.svoca.com/forum/showthread.php?30167-Rear-Bushings

The fronts were interesting at best. One spring was actually broken, about half of the bottom most coil. Probably explained why one side was approx 1/4-1/2" lower in the front.



I would recommend when putting the new LCA in, raise everything with the spring, then connect the ball joint and sway bar first, then try and wrestle the pivot bushings in. The rear most bushing will go in no problem, its the front most that is a little 'off' that seems to be the case here (same mooge part everyone buys). We tried everything initially with moving the rubber bushing over, but it just came back naturally. To get them in, you will need to BEVEL where the mount for the front goes in so the rubber bushing and the pin can slide over properly when jacking it up. Doesn't need a very big hammer, and don't go too crazy with it, only needs just a little room to guide it in. Once in, it should look like this:


Here the big thing that really made me write this. All of the pushing and shoving of the shock/spindle trying to get it in gets lost with where you are grabbing to move things. Please take my advice and CHECK YOUR BRAKE LINES to see if somebody didn't mistakenly grab an move it. In my 'test drive' with everything in, it only took 1/4 mi of the rubber brake lines (new last year) rubbing against the tire to breach them, and surprise, no brakes. I know I should of checked it when I put the wheel back on, but I didn't. You would be surprised how little the parking brake does at speed, but I was able to get it home without anybody getting hurt. Here is the line:


I'm still waiting for the suspension to 'settle', because the front is just a bit higher with the B springs that I like. It ended up the rear at the same height as before, and the front .25" higher (about 20 miles driven so far).

When the weather gets better, I'll take some pics.

[svono50]

Thanx for posting the write-up and photos. Did you happen to measure up the two arms to see how close they really are in length? Did you notice any difference in camber? Just curious.

You got lucky with the brakes, glad to hear you didn't have an accident due to it. I had one of my SS braided lines 'flip' on me and end up riding on the inner radius of my rim a few years ago. Didn't figure out that faint grinding sound till I lost my brakes and pulled the brake fluid soaked wheel to discover the carnage. I was ~200 miles from home, but was able to plug that line and 3-wheel brake it home.

[Daily 86 SVO]

I did not get a chance to specifically see what the distance was from the bushings to the ball joint. The only thing I have to go on is the comparison picture (ignore the sledgehammer):

[svono50]

Fair enough, only geeks like me would be setting up some measurement layout to get that kind of data. Now that picture does bring up another question though. How did your swaybar endlinks line up to the new arms? From the picture, the SN95 mounting point is a lot closer to the spring cup than on the SVO arms, so I am guessing the links may be toed in and back a bit at the bottom?

[Daily 86 SVO]

Here is a bad pic of it, to me it's hardly noticeable. Maybe I can take some more pics later tonight.

[fast Ed]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this swap, and good questions Ted. I've got the pieces on hand to do this swap on my car, hopefully it gets completed this year.

[svono50]

Looks closer than I would have thought looking at the a-arm pic, good deal.

[Daily 86 SVO]

Here is a pic of it before the suspension work:

After:


Like I said, the front is about .25-.50" higher now, back is about the same. Cloudy day and black car makes it tough to see, sorry.

[svono50]

You can tell the front is a bit higher in the after pic. I would give it some road miles and a little time for the isolators to settle in, but don't expect more than ~1/4" at most. Hard to tell, but the gap is almost the same front/rear, so it doesn't look like you have a dragging tail or anything.

[Daily 86 SVO]

I think what I'm stuck on is the fact that the car always had a rake to it (I like a slight rake), and now the rear has come down some, it took that away and I'm having a hard time with it.

[svono50]

I get that, I played with my springs too when I put them in. For me the front drop was too much and I had to double stack a top isolator to get the desired rake. Your choice would be to remove your top/bottom isolators to bring the front down or add/stack isolators in the back if you prefer to not start chopping sections of coil off.

[gbeaird]

I get that, I played with my springs too when I put them in. For me the front drop was too much and I had to double stack a top isolator to get the desired rake. Your choice would be to remove your top/bottom isolators to bring the front down or add/stack isolators in the back if you prefer to not start chopping sections of coil off.

OR, grab a pair of rear LCAs that have adjustable spring perches. That way you have a little more adjustability. I went that route, and some day I'll get the front FMS-B springs installed, so I can finish up the way the car sits.

[Daily 86 SVO]

Finally got around to removing the 'new' front isolators in an attempt to lower the front end. Actual measurements were 26.5" front and 26.25" rear from the road to the middle of the fender before today's work. After we saw almost a full 1" drop in the front, which really thrilled me. I'm going to re-post the two pics from above along with the third pic so you can see it in sequence (sorry about the light in the third pic, it was getting dark fast tonight).

Stock before the swap:


After LCA swap but WITH isolators:


After LCA swap but WITHOUT front isolators:


I'm pretty happy with it so far. Might get curious and take out the upper or lower isolator in the back to see how it looks. Going to put the stock SVO wheels back on after a grind/polish job, and need to put the upper wing and badges back on after the paint job (that was an experience, first time doing that major body work and might post it up here).

[svono50]

The final stance looks good to me. I would think pulling the rear isolators out may lose much of the rake. I would start with just the lower isolator, so you can keep the top of the spring isolated from the frame rail and maybe keep some road noise out...if that is important to you.

[ciscokid]

Hey Daily 86, thanks for the write-up. From your descriptions it sounds like you didn't have an issue as described in
http://www.svoca.com/forum/showthrea...-fitment-issue
Is that right? Did you keep the rubber bushings or replace them with polyurethane?

My understanding was that you could not use the SVO front sway bar with SN95 LCAs as the SVO sway bar is wider than the regular Mustang bars. Did you find that to be true?

It sounds like you kept the SVO spindle, brakes and struts. Is that also correct?

Thanks. I'm planning on doing this on my 85.5 but I want to use the 94/95 spindle and put the 13" Cobra brakes on it.

Bill H