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Wed Jun 05, 2024 3:15 pm

I am looking for part recommendations for setting up an IRS suspension.

The torsion housing has been raised 4" and I want the body to site between 32" tires. I figured some 3x3 arms would get there or at least close but I am totally clueless on which ones. I want to run disk brakes but I am not the welding type.

Any advice or recommendations would be great. I figured whatever hubs I end up with I would have to get adapters to change out the bolt pattern to something a bit more American for the actual wheels.

Thu Jun 20, 2024 9:00 pm

I will take a shot at answering, I am putting together a similar set up to get my rear wheels out past the body.

I got my 3x3 trailing arm from appletree many years ago. Mine don't have any shock mounts, but the ones they sell now look like they have shock mounts welded on (I would double check with them because some descriptions say no shock boss). Here is a link to a 'half kit', but they also sell just the trailing arms.

https://www.appletreeauto.com/VW-SUSPENSION/SUSPEN...-type-2-cv

I would also check if the shock mount is in the stock position of the normal trailing arm and if it will align with the upper shock mount coming off the torsion bar tube. Lots of guys run these arms with long coil over shocks with custom upper mounts and they eliminate the torsion bars with the spring plate conversion kit. But you can run the 3x3 arms with the stock torsion bars - no problem.

If you are not doing a long travel suspension for off roading, you can use Type 1 or type 2 CV joints (so obviously you need an IRS transmission and not a swing axle transmission). The type 1 and type 2 CV use the same axle and spline, but the type 2 CVs use a larger flange in the transmission (easy to change) and at the stub axle and can handle larger angle between the CV and the axle shaft (up to 19 deg for the 'race prepped' versions) where the type 1 is limited to 12 deg max.

I recommend that you get the trailing arms and install them with bearings and stub shafts and set the toe in and install the transmission and measure for your axle length set the trailing arms so the stub flange is level with the axle flange and measure in-between them and subtract 1/4" to get the correct axle length) and look at the CV angles at your min and max ride height and then buy the correct axles and CV joints (and flanges and stub shafts).

Then you can get whatever rear brakes you want - disc or drum. Lot of options there for VW wide 5 (1967 bug had IRS trans and 5 lug drums), VW 4 lug or Porsche 911 5 lug pattern (with a pricey disc brake kit) and you can adapt from any of those, but I would stick with a 5 lug brake set up to adapt to an american wheel - the 4 lug to 5 lugs adapters usually have a weird offset stud to make it happen.