"slammed" my 128, now I need to do the rear..

tomnj

tomnj

Old fogie stogie
I cut the springs in the front of my 128 SL (2 coils), lowering it 1.5", which looks perfect to me now. I did it while the front wheels were on the car! Just jacked it up, made 2 cuts with the dremel, done in 30 minutes!

Before:

before_slammed.jpg


before_slammed1.jpg


After:

slammed2.jpg


slammed.jpg


Now the rear isn't going to be so easy. I've read on Courtney's page (http://www.mirafiori.com/~courtney/128/tech/128susp.html), but I'm not the best with "fabricating" metal things.. Does anyone Sell a kit to add lowering blocks to the rear of a 128?
 
looks easy enough to me, but I've done this kinda thing before with Subarus to give them lift :D

I'd go with replacing the studs with new high tensile bolts and drilled blocks or tubes to support the spring. You might be able to get your local metal working shop to cut some thick walled tube to go around the bolts, at the length you want to lower the suspension, or get a couple of sets made of different heights.
 
Pretty easy....

You have two options. The control arms are captured under the transverse leaf spring by a pair of perches which attach to the control arms over studs that are welded to the control arm. These perches sit at the very ends of the leaf spring and have at least 1" of vulcanized rubber on them. Carefully slice the rubber off leaving 1/4" or so remaining. Then use a couple of shim washers between the perch and the control arm to drop the perch a little further. That will probably do it, and you can get at least 1" of drop doing this.

The alternative is to drill new holes in the control arm and mount the perches so that they make contact farther up the arc of the spring. This will lower the car as well and offers the added bonus of a stiffer spring rate, as the perches are not acting on the ends of the spring but farther up the arc. You will need to use brackets to stiffen the control arm where the new mounting points are. The only downside to this approach is that when the rear end is lifted up a much greater amount positive camber is allowed.

Good luck!

-M
 
Cutting the front springs will leave you with an "open" wind on the coil... the trouble is that this won't sit well on the stock spring perch, and it can slide off, often burying itself into the tyre sidewall....

That's why the usual method is to remove the spring when cutting, and then bending the "open" end down so it sits flat against the next coil (rather like the stock spring did)

SteveC
 
Thanks for the warning Steve. This is really a temporary solution as I plan to install X rear shocks/springs in the front eventually. However I have a plan to clamp down the spring to the perch so it won't shift. I wanted to do this first because it gives me a baseline on how low I want it to be. I believe the X rear springs may make it too low. Plus I get to see if it stiffens the front of the car. When I had my scorpion, the springs were cut on that and it actually rode and handled better with less coils.
 
Matt, you were right. I took one of the perches off today (putting a floor jack under the spring to hold it up), shaved the rubber as you mentioned (which was a pain, I ended up using a jigsaw to saw it off after trying a few menthods that failed) and added some shims which dropped the spring down a little over 1/2 inch. That translated to almost an inch drop of the rear suspension on that side. I still have to do the other side to see the final result, but it was a great way to do it with minimal modification and no cost (just a couple of washers) . I'll keep you posted on the final result.
 
Tom... I was able to heat and bed my springs...

... using a PROPANE torch...

It was on HIGH of course... but using a bit of pressure and forcing it DOWN on a wood block... I was able to control the bend quite easily... and then using a bench grinder... fit the new cut end into the socket just like FACTORY!

(I heated it 180 degrees opposite the cut)
 
Maybe I shoulda said ya needed an Oxy-Acetylene rig...

... and then you could find an excuse to go out and buy one of those!

HA!

I thought I needed one to meet the higher temperature requirements... but thought I'd give my propane torch a try and it worked!
 
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