67 chevy shortbed resurection

[lolife99]

Michael,... are those a-arms considered a "stock replacement" a-arm?
Or are they considered a "dropped" a-arm?

With the straight tubing design, the look like a dropped pocket design in the pictures.
They also look like the the spring pocket would contact the ground before the wheel, in case of a flat.
(I know you are still running 15" wheels in these pics)

I was just concerned with scrubline issues.
I like using Performance On Line for a source for parts.
The have fast service and have always sent me the correct parts the first time.

Just wondered your thought on the combination of these arms and drop spindles?

[michaelnolimit]

To finish up the front suspension and steering ill be installing a Retro fit Ididit steering column. Unbolt the old column and bolt in the new. Comes with wiring adapter to plug column into stock harness.

[michaelnolimit]

Yes the control arm hitting the ground during a flat is a concern of mine as well. when the vehicle is finished i will let all of the air out of one tire to see if it does hit the ground. I also have a concern with the steering stop on the spindle. With the tires off the ground AKA full droop when you turn the wheel the spindle stop hits the tube on the arm stopping it from making a full turn. This wont happen with the vehicle on the ground but lets say you hit a big bump in a hard right or left turn. If the vehicle rolls enough that stop could hit the arm and prevent you from making a correction or cuase a loss of steering. So i will be grinding about 1/4 to 3/8 of an inch off the bottom side of the steering stop to see if i can get it to stop hitting the arm at full droop. In the Performance Online catolog it states the arm is a stock replacement NOT a drop arm or drop pocketed arm. The reason im doing this build and forum. Is because i want to make sure the products we advertise and sell work like they state. If something doesnt work i will be able to notify the customer before hand.

[michaelnolimit]

Rear disc brake kit from Performance online. The kit is a pretty nice kit but there were a couple of headaches. The Holes on the caliper bracket did not line up with the holes on the housing. No problem I drilled them out a little bigger and the bolts went right in no problem. I put the rotor on a put two lug nuts on it so it sat square on the axle. But when i put the caliper on it hit the caliper bracket. this is because the spacers on the caliper bracket were to thick. I took a measurement and cut the old spacers off and made new 1/4 inch spacers. bolted everything back together and the caliper went right on. But the pads were so tight on the rotor it wouldnt allow the axle to rotate. I thought the piston in the caliper might have been sticking out a little to far so i removed it and screwed the piston in all the way. To my suprise the piston was already in as far as it would go. So ill show you how i fixed that on the next post. Just to let you guys know in the picture i have the caliper in the front of the axle it actually goes in the back of the axle. I took that picture after i drilled out the holes to make sure they lined up. You will also see that i cut the backing plate off rather than take the housing cover off and remove the c clips. It saves about two hours time and i have better things to do than change the oil in this rearend. customer can do that and it saves him lots of money.

[michaelnolimit]

well the caliper fit really tight and wouldnt allow the axle to spin. The rotors designed for this calipers are only supposed to be One inch thick. These rotors being made in china were they use the metric system were just a hair to thick. 1.045 is what they measured out to be. Now you could take these to pep boys and have them turned for about 40 dollars. Instead of doing that i went over to the 24 inch disc sander and kissed each pads surface for a second. This removed enough material so that the axles were able to spin when the caliper is bolted up nice and tight. I was concerned about the customer replaceing the pads in the future and haveing a problem with the new pads fitting to tight. But im hoping that after a couple years of use the rotors will wear down 0.045 enough so that new pads wont be so tight. Other than these minor setbacks the rear disc kit worked great.

[michaelnolimit]

alright almost done. Next up are the e brake cables. start by installing them on the calipers and then into the tabs on the trailing arms. Disconnecct the cable coming from the handle under the cab. Hook new cables into clevis and reconnect cable coming from handle make neccessary adjusments so the cables have proper tension. I welded the tabs were they wouldnt inerfere with the axle and where brake line plumbing would be easiest.

[VA72C10]

Nice detailed writeup for those that haven't done this

[lolife99]

X2
Thanks for taking the time to document all your work for us.

[robnolimit]

Michael is doing a great job on this project. Attention to detail and safety makes all the differance.

[19seventeeCustom]

great write up, thanks for sharing this. keep em coming!!

[basemodel67]

Following this one... easier and cheaper than seeing progress with my mess of a truck.

[1956cameo]

Thanks for the write up. Very helpful to those of us who have never done this.

[michaelnolimit]

ok sorry ive been building parts for a few days. Well i wrapped up the 67 project and I am very pleased with the way the vehicle handles. Totally different vehicle. Before i wouldnt want to drive the vehicle to the local harware store. Now i wouldnt mind taking it to a show out of state.
I did have to grind alot of the steering stop off of the spindle so it would stop contacting the lower arm when we did not want it to. Brake bleeding is always a headache. Make sure you bench bleed the master cylinder and if you have access to a vacume bleeder it makes life much easier. I have bleed the brakes about five times now and everytime i do the brakes get better. I might do them one more time just to be safe. Remember when you bleed brakes you need lots of fluid to go through the system. If your not putting a gallon of fluid through each caliper your not bleeding enough. The brakes are not the best feeling. they will lock up when pressed far enough but there is alot of pedal travel. A small pedal ratio change may make this a firmer pedal that travels less. Other than that im very pleased with all of the brakes steering and control arm products we used on this project.

[67cheby]

nice work

[michaelnolimit]

I forgot to post pics of the rear sway bar so here they are. The directions stated to line the rubber frame mounts up on the bottom of the trailing arm drill to holes in the trailing arm and bolt in. The problem with that is one bolt is very close to the edge of the i beam and the other comes out in the middle of the C channles welded together to create the I beam. So what i did was make this little angled bracket that I welded to the bottom of the trailing arm wich was alot easier than drilling a hole in the middle of the trailing arm. I then took a piece of 3/16's by 2 inches and made a triangle gusset that goes from the top of the arm to the side of my new sway bar bracket just to keep the bracket from flexing up under a load. Heres a couple of dimesions to compare to the originals. Not much difference because the springs were heated so badly. Like I stated earlier it drives like a brand new truck. If there are any questions I would be more then happy to answer them for you. If not happy cruising.

[Kidd-7]

Sweet; I'm watching this...

[ol_skool_chevy]

How long are your shocks when full closed?

[10.5stang]

Great write up! Thank you for taking the time to detail the build. Matt
Posted via Mobile Device

[robnolimit]

Today I drove this truck, and it's pretty nice. It is very predictable, and rides and handles good. The tires rub a bit, but the owner is getting new wheels/tires. The shocks feel good. A lot of the body is not completely bolted together, so it squeeks and rattles a bit. About a half mile from the shop, there are some RR tracks, they cross the road at about 30 deg off square, and are raised up a bit. It's a good test to drive over them at about 40 mph, no gas or brake, and let go of the wheel. It can be a scary test in some cars. This C-10 now crosses the tracks straight and smooth. Thanks Mike for putting this up for everyone to see.

[dan76]

Originally Posted by michaelnolimit

. Remember when you bleed brakes you need lots of fluid to go through the system. If your not putting a gallon of fluid through each caliper your not bleeding enough.

Great write up.........though the above comment is interesting. Using a pressurized bleeding system, I've not had to use this much fluid. I've also found after the initial bleeding, go for a short drive, operate the brakes several times (in a controlled environment such as a parking lot) and then let the vehicle sit overnight. Usually a bleeding the next day takes care of any issues.

Nice work.

[michaelnolimit]

1 gallon was a bit of an exageration. I sometimes get tired of people complaining about there brakes not bleeding. One of the questions i ask alot is how much brake fluid have you bled from the system. 90% of the time the person will tell me a couple of ounces. A couple of ounces is not enough to bleed the brake system. so to get my point across i will exagerate and tell them not to quite bleeding untill they get a gallon of fluid through the system. Usually the next day they call back and say the brakes work just fine. So theres not an excact amount of fluid required to bleed the brakes. But it is the brake system so a little over kill never hurt anyone. I also ask myself questions like do I want to drive at 70 mph next to the guy that only bled his brakes once. Or would i feel more comfortable riding next to the guy that went through a whole gallon of fluid just to make sure.

[michaelnolimit]

fully closed are 9 inches sorry it took so long to reply to your question ol school chevy.

[bigguy69]

awesome!!!

[michaelnolimit]

Just wanted to give you guys a little update. the customer was very pleased with his truck after he recieved it. He drove it around for about two weeks and brought it back concerned with the brake pedal travel. He said it stops fine but the pedal travels about 10 inches. He said is there any way we can stiffen up the pedal and make it travel a little less. So i told him i would take a look at and see what we could do. After a little research i found that the pedal ratio was about 8-1 wich is perfect for manual brakes. Unfortunatly we have upgraded to power brakes. with power brakes were looking for a ration of about 6-1. So I made this little adapter that bolts to the booster input shaft and drops it down about 1.5 inches. I had to take the pedal out so that i could drill a new hole to bolt my adapter to. put the pedal back in. bolt up the adapter to the booster and then conect it to the pedal as i have done in the pic. The brake pedal feels way better. It travels about half as less and has more pedal feel. The customer came down test drove the vehicle and was on his mary way. So if you guys out there with a power brake kit are experiencing the same soft pedal here is a quick and easy fix. Happy cruising.