Lowering the rear, clearance needed?

I called a local shop about lowering the rear of my flared CMC. This is really not a job I want to do myself. I noticed that my rear swing arm has the long "snout" on the coverplate for the torsion arms. Since the body has no holes and plugs over this area will I have enough room to pull those off to adjust the rear? Looks like 5 - 5 1/2" or so of clearance but the snout looks a bit longer.

Anyone do this on a flared body?

Tony

Tony...

Do a search on suspension /torsion bar lowering...
recently Gordon Nichols did a detailed write up on how to do the rear suspension lowering. Even though this is the one thing on a speedster I haven't done , Gordon was able to explain it in a way that makes the job seem like something that can be done in a home garage.

Alan,
I read that a few times as well as two great threads on the Samba.....all convinced me NOT to do it at home!

I understand the method but just don't know if the clearance is enough to get the cover plate off. that never occured to me until I spoke with a mechanic today. his concern was that without the access plate on the body there may not be enough room.

Tony

There absolutely IS enough room to pull the cover plate out far enough to disengage the splines.

Indeed, it does NOT have enough room to be completely removed, but there is enough room to pull it out, make the adjustments and then re-assemble it (with maybe an inch to spare).

I did all my adjustments on a CMC with no body holes.

I also found that getting the spring plate off the perch is harder than making the spline adjustments! Getting the plate back into position is easy - just jack it up.

Gordon

Gordon,
Thanks. Just got pretty much the same response on the Samba list. Room to adjust, no room to remove.

Now I need to see if the tires will clear if I lower it a little. 225R60 15 rear, 215R60 15 front. Still looks like room to spare as both front and back are still within the wheel well a good 1" to 1.5" inside of the inner lip or more. I was going to make a template for the front wheels, raise it 2" into the wheel well on both inside and outside of the tire at full lock each way to check clearances first.

f all looks good I will go with drop spindles front and then lower the rear to match.

Thanks guy...as always.

Tony

Tony:

I'm running 205-55 X 16's front and 225-55 X 16's rear and I clear OK on a flared CMC. I'm not sitting down in the weeds, but it's low enough for the well lip to overlap the tire a bit. See before and after below.

Considering that the spring rates are set up for a somewhat heavier Beetle Sedan body, it should be reasonably stiff...so having 2" of wheel clearance should be OK, even on the rear - the wheels don't move a whole lot up and down, and I think a couple of inches is probably about max.

Not like the dune buggie versions with 16" of wheel travel!!

Gord; you have an IRS pan, right? I would like to lower my car (swingaxle) a bit to mimic the stance of the originals (which were fairly low in the back). I noticed that the springplates have some sort of an adjustment screw (I know for a fact that Kirk retrofitted those to make adjustments easier, since they're not stock VW). How do you go about adjusting those? Thanks!

Ricardo:

If they are adjustable spring plates on a swing-axle rear, then simply loosen the locking nut on the adjusting bolt, and turn the bolt such that the plate lowers the body on that side.

Note how much you turn the first bolt, and do the same for the other side.

Once you get it down about where you want it, measure from the ground to the center of the top of the wheel well and adjust one side to make both sides the same height. Re-tighten the lock nuts.

That's it. gn

Thank you Gord!

Be careful how much you lower your cars. I run two CMC-Cs. I had them both slammed. I've raised them both up. It definatly improved the drivability of the cars. I was always banging the 1.5 qt sumps and even bottoming out the tires inside the wheels. If you look at Cal look cars, you will notice that they have the front's down, but keep the rear at full factory height. There is an experience reason for this. I do like the slammed look, but it just was not practical. BTW, it took me about 3.5 hours to do the first one and just over an hour and a half to do the second one. There are a bunch of web sites that provide detailed instructions. I did price having it done, and a local shop wanted 4 hours labor to do it.

3.5 hours to 1 hour, huh?

Sounds like the first time my wife and I hung wall paper - first sheet took about 45 minutes, including the 20 minutes of standing there looking at how nice it looked once hung. Next one was about 30 minutes and so on.

Now, 30 years later, we whip those things up in less than five minutes apiece!

Before lowering anything I was wondering just how close to the ground the sump is on other peoples cars. Anyone care to measure?

I don't want to go too low but little would make her look even better.

Tony

Just a suggestion. I wouldnt measure off of the body once you lower a car for the simple fact that these are fiberglass molded bodies and they warp and when prepped for paint we round out the square ridge under there. So its not a real accurate place to measure from. Also make sure you are on level ground- You would be suprised to see how uneven most pavment is. Then measure to points on the suspension.

Tony:

Mine's up on jack stands tonight, while I finish re-installing the engine.

Sometime tomorrow I'll have it back down and measure to the bottom of the sump for you.

gn

Gordon,
Thanks. Yours looks a reasonable height from the photos. Mine looks distinctly higher.
I chose the sump as my reference point as it is likely the first thing to hit a driveway or apron and is not influenced by maker or body style or mounting. My headers/extractors mount slightly lower but the sump will give me an idea of whre I stand (or crouch) depending on car height.
Hopefully I can squeeze out a few more weekends of play before it really gets cold.
Tony

Tony, I'll post the height of my car later, but if you want it LOW you might consider not running a sump.


Eddie

Eddie,
I don't need it slammed but anything so it does not look like a Baja Bug would be nice ! 7 3/4" under the sump right now. I am thinking a set of dropped spindles up front ( 2 1/2" ) then lower the back a bit to look good with the front. If I go 2" in the back it will match the 5 1/2" to 5 3/4" other seem to have.
Tony

Have you seen how low (and how cool) some of the outlaws look, especially in the back? I imagine they also have problems with ground clearance....

Ricardo,
I love the Outlaw look. My car is slowly developing the Outlaw / Competition look even though there is a lowel 1600 under the deck.
I frequest Bruce Clement's 356 Otlaw site and would love to see more examples.
Tony

Anthony,

Have you been to Parts Obsolete's website? There are some pretty slick comp/outlaws that Gary and his guys have put together.

One thing we might consider is that 99% of all racing 356's have steel sump guards. I really like low cars, and I like running a sump, I wonder if someone makes a sump guard for VW's?

Eddie