Trailing Arm Alignment

[metros]

I've been working around this issue for awhile now and haven't been able to figure out how to adjust everything to get it synced up correctly. I have the VCP trailing arms to allow for wider wheels. The connection to the bottom of the knuckle seems really off. What am I doing wrong and what do I need to adjust?

Pics:


Trouble spot

[D Clary]

You might ask Wayne about this one. I had the same problem I ended up not using them. It seem that the only solution is cutting the end off and welding it on at the proper angle. I tried re-drilling the holes to align it but it came out to short. I didn't want the hiem extended that far.

[Erik W. Treves]

you need to put it all at ride height before you tighten everything up.

[metros]

This kind of came about because I was getting ready to finish the suspension. Yesterday I adjusted the koni and was getting ready to bolt them up in the rear. They don't want to bolt in because of the twisting that happens due to getting the trailing arm to play with the bottom of the knuckle.

Any in depth recommendations would be greatly appreciated.

D Clary - I emailed Wayne a link to this thread. Maybe this will help someone else in the future as well.

[Wayne Presley]

The ears will be pulled into position when you tighten the bolt. Put the bolt through and then put the front rod end in.

[Hindsight]

These are my VCP rear arms installed with the bolt tightened. As Wayne mentioned, tightening the bolt brings the tabs in, but also you may have the lateral links adjusted all the way out which just magnifies the issue before the bolt is tightened.

[metros]

So I should tighten the knuckle end 100% before putting into the chassis side?

Hopefully tomorrow I'll be able to give that a shot. Hoping to get a snow day from the few inches we're projected. NoVA snow chaos lulz.

<---Upstate NY Native

[Hindsight]

I don't think the order matters personally. I have installed everything, then removed just the trailing arms in order to tweak their length adjustment, then put them back in. If I had to choose an order, I would say bolt the trailing arms to the knuckle first, then install the lateral links.

[Wayne Presley]

Hindsight, you know you can adjust the without removing the arms/bolts right?

[Hindsight]

Yeah i did that to help the arm install. It needed an amount of toe in or out to line up best to tighten the bolt.

[metros]

So I'm just getting back to the garage. Sick kids suck and no snow days means no time for the garage.

I pulled the front of the trailing arm out of the chassis and tightened the knuckle side down, which looks fine. But then reinstalling the front of the trailing arm is near impossible. If I force it then it's going to put a ton of stress on the lower bushing. I have the whiteline adjustable lateral links. Regardless of how much toe in I try to adjust it still doesn't line up nicely. Even if it did then adjusting the toe back to where I want it would go back to putting stress on the lower bushing.

Help?
Front uninstalled


As it sits at rest with knuckle side tightened down.


Pulling it where it needs to go with a fair amount of force. Still has at least another inch before it's close to installing.


The passenger side is in a much better place. Although I haven't gotten the shock bolted up just yet.

[Frank818]

I have the same problem. Ended up bending the tabs on the lower spindle bushing, which caused the polyurethane bushings to squeeze on their ends. I don't like that at all. I am not at ride height.

[Samiam1017]

unhook the top shock mount so the suspension moves free might drop in place when it's not at full droop.
Also a good practice to just be able to check the full movement of all corners.

[metros]

unhook (Hook up?) the top shock mount so the suspension moves free might drop in place when it's not at full droop.
Also a good practice to just be able to check the full movement of all corners.

I'm assuming you meant to say hook up the top shock mount? That's kind of why I'm addressing this now. I went to hook up the shocks and the knuckle was slightly twisted forward to accommodate the poor alignment of the trailing arm.

[Samiam1017]

I ment to unhook it. So the arms arms are free to move around more without the shock and spring holding the arms in a position that makes it more difficult to align the bolt and mounts. It will also allow you to run the suspension up and down from full droop to full compression to see if everything moves freely and nothing else is actually in the way. My lower shock mount appeared twisted in full droop and was hard to get the shocks mounted (I know not the same problem you have but it worked for me)

[metros]

Kind of the same problem then. I decided to address this now as I couldn't hook up the driver side rear shock due to the poor alignment of the trailing arm. As it sits right now and in the pictures everything is at full droop.

The passenger side everything looks good. I have since adjusted all my driver side lengths to match the passenger side.

Any more tips or recommendations?

[Samiam1017]

here's my lengths. all measurements bolt center to bolt center I don't have the lengths of the FFR supplied arms but I can get them for you they aren't set to anything yet so its kinda useless
but here's the factory length's I used trailing arms 20 3/8 lateral/toe links 16 1/8
im not far enough along to align it yet so that's where I started

[metros]

Any other ideas? Should I take the trailing arm off and try to bend the tabs a touch?

Anybody else with the wide trailing arms have this problem?

[svanlare]

I have everything mounted and yes, the tabs look like they do in your first post. I haven't "pulled them tight yet" as I'm planning on getting more of the car together to see how it all shakes out, but I expect that will bend the tabs over nicely. To get it all together, I connected the trailing arm first and then bolted on the rest of the control arms and finally the shocks. The trailing arm was the only part that seemed "mod-to-fit" so I started with it and it all went together fine.

[metros]

You have your axles installed yet?

[svanlare]

I installed the driver side to see how it fits and had no issues with it. I disconnected the shock and the upper control arms. Inserted the axel and put it back together.

The other side has to wait until I pull the car out of the garage and turn it around :-) Page 3 of my blog has the photos of both the same issue you had and and above picture with the axel installed (post #115)

As things stand now, I was waiting to tighten the trailing arms when after I do a rough pass at alignment before a first drive.

[metros]

Still looking for some help here fellas.

Wayne?

[STiPWRD]

Still looking for some help here fellas.

Wayne?

Have you tried slotting the holes on the spindle end of the trailing arm? A combination of that and bending the tabs seems like the only way to get it to line up. If you're uncomfortable with slotting the holes we can weld on some plates to the tabs once we find the right positions for the holes.

[Wayne Presley]

If you want to send them back I'll adjust them

[metros]

Got this taken care of today. I anticipated the tabs on the spindle end being difficult to bend. But they were really quite easy to adjust to where they needed to be. Put one tab in the vice at a time and used the trailing arm for leverage. Everything is all bolted up and looks much better now. Thanks for all the tips and replies guys.

[Frank818]

Any pix yet?

[dougkirkbride]

Metros
are your arms these?
link arms.JPG

has anyone tried these arms?
I have stock right now and am not liking the fact that there is not much adjustment (almost none) and the cam on the one arm only moves that arm about 3/8 of an inch. My stock arms took some muscle to get in but I got them. the 245$ these arms cost may be a good investment in trying to get everything, wheels, clearances, alignment to go.

[metros]

Mine are from Wayne @ VCP. It looks like identical trailing arms, just the spindle end has been cut off and welded offset to provide additional wheel clearance.

[idf]

Mine look identical, but weren't from Godspeed. I paid about $180. I cut the unneeded brackets off. All of the rod ends needed to be cut down to fit, but once done they fit fine and are easily adjustable.

[STiPWRD]

rear suspension.jpg
I also got a set of these aftermarket arms from deep stage garage (ebay). It went together fairly well and I didn't have to cut any rod ends. Here's an older pic:

IMAG0596.jpg
I ended up cutting off the sway bar brackets later.

[dougkirkbride]

thanks all for the feedback; stipwrd- the arms look great.
stipwrd & IDF,
have you fit up your wheels and tires yet? just wondering what size you decided on and if I should just stick with the recommended sizes with these arms.

Thanks, Doug

[STiPWRD]

thanks all for the feedback; stipwrd- the arms look great.
stipwrd & IDF,
have you fit up your wheels and tires yet? just wondering what size you decided on and if I should just stick with the recommended sizes with these arms.

Thanks, Doug

I did a quick test fit and it was very close at the trailing arms and upper links. There may have been an interference when I snugged down the lug nuts but I can't remember. I'm running rear wheels with a higher offset (18x9.5 with 38mm offset). I ended up buying some ARP extended studs and 10mm spacers but havent installed them on yet. I thought about getting Wayne's trailing arms but I would have still had the low clearance by the upper link and also I think the spacers will help fill the rear fenders better.

[metros]

^^What wheels are you running? IIRC my rear wheels are the same specs. Wondering if we'll match.

I'm hoping to pick up my wheels tomorrow. Depends if the shop gets a chance to mount the tires that just arrived today.

[STiPWRD]

I got the Drag DR31s
IMAG1046.jpgIMAG1044.jpgIMAG1045.jpg
The last pic is the clearance with the 10mm spacers

[idf]

thanks all for the feedback; stipwrd- the arms look great.
stipwrd & IDF,
have you fit up your wheels and tires yet? just wondering what size you decided on and if I should just stick with the recommended sizes with these arms.

Thanks, Doug

My wheels are XXR 530 18X8.75, 33MM offset with Federal 595, 255 35 18 tires. The tires clear the trailing arms by about 1/4 inch. I'm trying to decide if this is adequate,but may add a spacer.

[metros]

Nice looking wheels. I'm using the Mach V wheels. I just realized mine are 18x9.5 +42 offset. I'll probably need a 5 mm spacer, using the offset trailing arms to provide a touch more clearance.