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Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:27 pm

I am trying to figure out how this 64 chassis was lowered. The sway bar is about 8 inches off the ground with no weight on it. Can anyone tell me? How do I know if I have dropped spindles? They don't look particularly new or anything...what's up with this?

You might notice also the bend in the rod on this third picture, again, I have no explanation.

Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:31 pm

They don't look like dropped spindles to me.

Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:32 pm

yeah, me neither...soooo, how was it lowered? or was it lowered, is eight inches stock?

Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:45 pm

Does it have an adjustable beam by chance?

Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:46 pm

alexs64 wrote: Does it have an adjustable beam by chance?

nope, no adjusters to be spoken of

Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:48 pm

Maybe they removed some or one leave?

Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:48 pm

Is it possbile to have a pic taken from the very front of the pan? I mean to show the whole area wheel to wheel?

Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:48 pm

No adjusters, but it may have been cut and turned. The welds could have been ground down if they sleeved it internally.

Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:51 pm

Possibly some of the torsion leafs are broken or removed. Just a thouht.

Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:55 pm

Good call on the torsion bars. Take a look and see how many u can actually see inside the beam. Not exactly sure how many need to be there but maybe I can check mine out later.

Thu Jan 20, 2005 5:59 pm

Thu Jan 20, 2005 6:00 pm

Thu Jan 20, 2005 6:24 pm

the torsion bars are probably broken.

Thu Jan 20, 2005 9:25 pm

Torsion bars don't break, they probably have been pulled to lower the car, old school style. It's been a real long time but I think originally it had four full torsions bars and six half bars. Three on top and three on bottom. The proper way to lower a car this way is to pull the half bars, cut out the centers and use the ends to maintain the integrity of the outside keyway and the setscrew that secures the arm to the torsions [that would put the car in the weeds]. Pulling and cutting the outside two half bars would drop the car a few inches and still maintain a reasonable ride.

Based on your pic, It doesn't look that low, so if it's not just old car sag then I'd guess that only the outside two half bars have been cut. The low brow way was to just pull the half bars and discard them. Then crank the setscrew down to spread them to fill the keyway and hopefully the setscrew will hold and the torsion arm won't wiggle out at the worst possible time.

Only way to tell is pull the arms and have a look see. Even if it looks complete, they still may be cut. You'll need to remove them. If the half bars have been cut, you should be able to remove them relatively easy.

Good luck

-jeffrey

Thu Jan 20, 2005 11:23 pm

I know it may sound odd, but did the car ride crappy when it was whole?? I bought a 70 off some guy in Crenshaw that had put HD truck shocks on in the front. When I took the shocks off, the front shot up like 6". Some peoples brains just don't function correctly (the crackhead in Crenshaw)

Fri Jan 21, 2005 4:00 am

thought the ball joint beams had 4 main bars, and 6 half bars whereas the linkpin had only 6bars in total? shur thats wots in the 'how to modify beetle suspension/chassis/brakes for high performance'

Fri Jan 21, 2005 4:57 am

King/Link front ends have 4 full width leaves and 4 split leaves.

Fri Jan 21, 2005 7:50 am

jhicken wrote: Torsion bars don't break, they probably have been pulled to lower the car, old school style.
-jeffrey

actually; they do and can break! when i put my adjustable beam on a while back, i had to use the old torsion bars out of the original beam. there was one small bar broken (in half) and (beleive it!) one big bar broken >>> also in half! i had no choice at the time but install the broken bars! my car ended up leaning a little. lower on the drivers side than on the pass side! after leaving out the small broken bar, the car saat REAL low. i ended up adjusting the beam to it's highest setting and it still sat low all cause of that one removed bar!

anyways, moral of the story is.... your bars could be broken, although if they were, the car would most likely be leaning to one side or the other. i'd bet on one being removed or old sagging bars! good luck! 8)

Fri Jan 21, 2005 9:37 am

vdubvr6, cool toyboxs! I gotta talk to you off-line sometime. I gotta disagree about breaking torsion bars, unless the leaves had been removed and altered or heated to make them brittle, it would be almost possible to break when installed in a beam. The distance between the keyway supports within the beam prevent the bars from flexing enough to alow them to break. The actual flexing only happens on the end of the leaves.

It's likely that a previous owner or mechanic had messed with the front end before you got it.

-jeffrey

Fri Jan 21, 2005 9:40 am