Extended front trailing arm questions

[bw65vw]

I have searched on here quite a bit but haven't found much information about using an extended upper trailing arm on the front when lowering the front. I am in the middle of my project and have 2.5" drop spindles and will probably add a 4" narrowed adjustable beam. I have seen pics and comments about the front tires rubbing the headlight buckets when lowering also as it seems to push the wheel a little forward in the wheel well. I saw a few Utube videos about using upper control arms that are an inch longer to tilt the front wheel back in the opening. It seems to me this may help some with the caster issues from lowering as well? I plan to have a little rake to mine which may exaggerate the caster problems as well.
I just haven't seen it discussed here much and was wondering if others had thoughts or experience with using them? Also any sources for buying them? The only one I have been able to find is Cage66 fabrication.
Thanks!

[TDCTDI]

You’d be better off lopping an inch out of the pan head to move the beam back. But then, the inside of the trailing edge of the tire gets closer to the pan/heater channel as it is getting wider, therefore decreasing steering radius, a situation already aggravated by a narrowed beam. (But hey, it will at least get the Ackerman angles a bit closer to correct again)


The arms need to stay fairly close to the same length to avoid some nasty caster changes that would occur if one arm was longer than the other, including “overcentering”. In addition to this, caster changes caused by the unequal arcs of the arms would also cause some pretty ugly toe in/out changes and ultimately bump steer that are already completely screwed by the shorter tierods.
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[Dibaltic]

I have both upper and lower arms from Cage66 along with his extended pitman arm. If you get your narrowed tie rods from SlowLow and tell him you have the cage arms, he will put a bend in the passenger side the rod to clear your wheel well opening. Without the bend in the arm the tie fod would hit that opening unless you wanted to cut there instead.

[Richard D]

What about pie cutting and tilting the head? I have seen that done here on the forum, is that to rectify this problem?