ride height

[john h]

Hey all,
I had my front suspension and steering components rebuilt a couple years back and I never felt the ride height was quite right.  Recently I added new wheels and tires.  went to a 17" wheel and different width and profile tire.  Basically added about 1.67" taller tire/wheel when it was all done.  Anyway, I read in my book where to take the measurements from, and to have hte car on flat ground with full tank of gas but no other load in the car.  take measurements (A) from the Adjusting blade and (B) from the ball joint housing.  subtract B from A as A is always taller etc.  and the magic number should be 1.125" I'm only about .44" apart.  According to the book I need to go counter clockwise to drop the car.  My questions are:
1. is this right so far?  have I miss understood?
2. should I remove the weight from the suspension when turning the bolt?
3. how difficult should it be to turn the bolt?
4. how many turns should it take to change the height nearly 3/4"?
5. I have single adjustable QA1 shocks.  should I change the shock to have a lot of rebound to take this measurement?

Thanks in advance for any replies.

John

[ChallengerHK]

The general consensus is that the front tires should be off the ground while adjusting ride height. Also in general, I wouldn't worry with those measurements unless you wanted a completely stock ride height, with completely stock components. Most people are measuring the distance between the top of the tire and the top of the fender lip.

[73_Cuda_4_Me]

If you are at .44, and want to get additional 3/4", you'll have to go clockwise on the adjusting bolt (more tension on torsion bar to raise). Do this with front jacked up so that control arms are as 'relaxed' as possible before adjusting (bolts can strip under load-not good!!!).

Use a lot of penetrating oil on bolts before hand... even then you may have trouble - I did it for two weeks and still snapped a bolt off flush with nut, and had to torch it out. New Moog's in place now. I put never seize on bolt threads of new ones for future adjustments if needed.

With stock torsion bars, I got about same change in height as change in adjusting bolt, measuring from hex end of bolt to face of nut (currently running 2 inches bolt below adjusting nut each side). Gives me 24-1/2" from floor to lip of wheel well at tire centerline, running 14" wheels.

Note that when you let car back down after adjusting, the front end will not settle because of tire friction... take it around the block before measuring again so it can settle properly.

Your shocks shouldn't affect ride height adjustment unless they are coil overs...

 

[HP2]

If you added 1.67 height to the tires all the way around and you adjust the front suspension to the stock recommended height, odds are you will end up with a nose high stance. In stock form with equal height tires, the rear of E bodies tended to be lower than many seem to recall. Remember you are dealing with a ratio between the control arm pivot and the fender lip. A  .75" increase in height at the pivot may translate to a 2" change at the fender lip.

Personally, I set mine where I like the rake and then set alignment from there. According to the factory manual, my current ride height is 0. My lower ball joint in on plane with the control arm pivot. Its much lower than some like, but it works for me.

And yes, if you make significant changes in ride height, the shocks can become an issue. If you have stock length and travel shocks and you lower or raise the car significantly, you run the risk of limiting travel or overtopping the stroke. This typically isn't a problem if you stay within 1-2" of travel at the wheel centerline, but moving beyond that you would want to check suspension stroke against the shock stroke.