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Mon Mar 14, 2005 3:10 pm

I have a manx-style Dune Buggy, that I stick strictly to the street in. I'm curious about these coilover shocks I've found a few places. Now, when using these do you remove the torsion bars so that the spring on the coilover is used? And then they are heigh adjustable?

I have a height adjuster welded in my front beam, but nothing in the back. I lowered it once by moving the torsion bars, but it had WAYY too much negative camber, so I had to raise it back up (1961 swing axle rear). I want something more easily adjustable, but adjustable swing plates are too expensive.

These coilovers are only like $50 a pair.

Anybody use them?

Mon Mar 14, 2005 3:24 pm

I have the coilovers on the back of my Baja bug. They have I think 4 steps in their adjustment. The adjustment doesn't seem to make a "lot" of difference though. I used to haul a lot of heavy stuff in the back of my car so I'd crank these up at those times, and back them off the rest of the time. And no, these aren't designed to replace the factory torsion bars - you can't do that anyway, because then the trailing arms would have nothing to attach to. Although you might be able to adjust them to spring less on a light car like a dune buggy - which it sounds like you've already been playing with. Those coilovers might be too much springiness for your car, actually.

andy

Mon Mar 14, 2005 7:08 pm

glutamodo wrote: . And no, these aren't designed to replace the factory torsion bars - you can't do that anyway, because then the trailing arms would have nothing to attach to. Although you might be able to adjust them to spring less on a light car like a dune buggy - which it sounds like you've already been playing with. Those coilovers might be too much springiness for your car, actually.

andy

Well, there are ways to get rid of the torsion bars to use true coil over suspension shocks, but thats for another thread :)

Twiz...

Those shocks you see are not suspension shocks, They are basically some shocks (if you wanna call them that) with some springs over them. Reminisent of the ones that were on the back of my XL100 dirt bike I had when I was a wee ladd. I'd be willing to bet thats where they got there start back in the day and someone relized that their bug got jacked up by slapping them on. They are gonna lift you car up, even at the lowest setting, no matter what. I doubt this is what you are looking for. Also they suck as a shock in most any condition as far as lasting and ride quality.
I just went through this with a buddy and his cal look 67' sedan. He's got thousands of dollars tied up in this car and when he got it road ready the tires in the back sit dangerously close to the lip of the fenders and the high $$ show quality paint. Solution is to get the properly sized tires put on the BRM's, but he wanted no part of that. Instead he got the bright idea of putting a set of those shocks on. I argued with hime for quite awhile and then I gave up. He put them on, on the lowest settng the tires sit like \ / and its all jacked up redneck style. I got the "you were right" call a couple of days after he put them on :) The good thing is I need those shocks for an experiment on the fornt of one of my busses, so now I'll get a fresh set for cheap!

Mon Mar 14, 2005 7:23 pm

high camber is the nature of the swing axle suspension when you jack it up or bring it low. if you dont want that, your only option is IRS.

Mon Mar 14, 2005 10:51 pm

Sweet guys, thanks for the info.

When I had it low, the tires looked like this / \ which wasn't TOO bad, but it was a little much.

Now with it back how they were originally, they're back the other way \ / which seems much more dangerous to me (my other car is a Subaru Impreza, and I have a tendency to drive the buggy hard like I do the suby.... worried about tucking a wheel in with the buggy :shock: ). As I said, this Buggy stays on the street... I'm sure I'll take it on some dirt roads now and then, but no off-roading necessarily. I'd really like to get it set up for autocross :D

But thanks again for the info, I just wasn't sure. I will probably take it somewhere to have the torsion bars adjusted just right to give me better camber (I want just a weee-bit of negative camber). I don't want to even consider taking the bars out of the inner splines, that scares me. Then it'll be time for some KYB's!

Tue Mar 15, 2005 6:28 am

Might be pricey and might not be feasable due to clearence, but you might want to look into what they do with the drag cars. They raise the trannies up into the car sometimes, and swings are the trans of choice usually.

Good luck,