On the hoist out in the shop for surgery

[Doug Doty]

Some of you have heard me asking questions about ride height as my car sits very low in the front. I am going to whip this issue while it is down for a few days. I'm still not positive if it has a lowering spring or if someone has cut the rubbers on the bottom of the ride height adjusters excessively. I am going to pull the wheels and tires off the front and swing the control arms down tomorrow to get at everything.

The status so far is that it was so low that the front tires were up in the wheel wells about an inch. I unloaded the spring one end at a time a couple of weeks ago and took advantage of the last 3/8 to 1/2" of remaining available adjustment on the ride height adjuster bolts. On the initial test drive it had picked up about 3/4 to 1" but I heard a pop in both front corners as I steered into a local parking lot with a slight hump at the entrance. After getting under and looking today I see the the right front adjuster has broken under the spring, seemingly from either being extended out to the maximum length or not seating into the proper position or maybe both as I put the weight back onto the car after adjusting them 2 weeks ago. Not completely sure what happened here but either way I have to deal with it.

I'll give updates as they come....Doug...

 

[Stella]

Doug I was wondering does the front spring still have a part number sticker. Was under my and saw that front and rear still have part number's on them. I don't have a v but if you want reference numbers let me know. As for the bumper's mine are a little deformed or angled from the pressures on a angled surface. Would think if yours were like that then spun the different angle and force probably ripped them apart. Would have replaced anyway sense down there. Good luck

 

[Doug Doty]

Doug I was wondering does the front spring still have a part number sticker. Was under my and saw that front and rear still have part number's on them. I don't have a v but if you want reference numbers let me know. As for the bumper's mine are a little deformed or angled from the pressures on a angled surface. Would think if yours were like that then spun the different angle and force probably ripped them apart. Would have replaced anyway sense down there. Good luck

I am seriously thinking it has a lowering spring of some kind, I have been studying the pictures and part #'s of stock springs on ebay. Trying to identify mine as stock or not is my first coarse of action. With the factory adjusters in my spring there is not enough adjustment range to get even near to stock ride height so that should be the place to start. I see no flaws in it so .....hum. I've spotted no part #'s on the under side and will be looking on top with a mirror and flashlight this afternoon.

 

[b_pappy]

I never got out to measure my ride height, but if your tires were under the fender lip that is definitely low. Good luck with getting it fixed.
Bruce

 

[Doug Doty]

We I just got out from under the car doing a little studying and it has a factory GM front spring. Part# 22146483 with a 1-4 code also. I looked on line and this spring is commonly associated with base 99-04 corvettes, what does anyone think. I will get online and try to do some cross referencing. Additionally it is referenced as the soft ride spring of those I can find.

I am more confused now than ever, also by the way it clearly has factory spindles and not some Kind of drop setup. Not sure but might be thinking a weak front spring.

 

[Doug Doty]

Well I give in and ordered a new front spring from the dealer today, if nothing else I'll have good adjuster bolts on each end and will surely fix it.

 

[Doug Doty]

Swapped out the front spring this afternoon and started with the adjuster bolts most of the way in or " lowered " and it still raised the car about 3/4" so my sitting too low in the front issue is now under control. After test driving I think I want it back up within a 1/2" of stock, give or take but I have gotten used to seeing it with this cool looking rake from rear to front. Uggg what to do ???

For those interested in the process, the " home spring swap without the compressor " deal went smooth and took me about 3 hours, the next time might be possible in 1.5 hours, you know how it goes when repeating a job, no studying and all action.

I had to:
#1: disconnect the ride height ball links
#2: pull the bolts out of the bottom of the shocks,
#3: disconnect the sway bar links at the control arms
#4: slightly loosen the lower ball joints to break them free but still restained by thier nuts.
#5: Support the ball joint area of the lower control arms one side at a time with a floor jack at half lift and lower the arm down a couple of additional inches to relax the spring after the ball joint nut is removed the rest of the way.
#6: Leave the inner lower control arm bolts tight so not to loose your alignment, I used a cam buckle strap to draw the control arms together and lower them a little farther by pulling them towards one another. This makes it easier to wiggle the spring out from side to side after removing the 4 saddle bolts.
#7: Slide the new spring into place and just snug the saddle bolts, Seemed to me to be a good idea to put some weight on the spring to flatten it out a little before torqueing these bolts down as the molded rubber isolators on the spring appear a little too close together until the spring flattens out and into place. This just felt right and worked well for me. I reached under and tightened these 4 bolts after lowering the car onto the tires and applying the full weight while it was on some 3" risers to give me access to reach under.
#8: Reverse the order on all the above early steps and your done.

Just a few notes on doing mine but maybe not the best way or necessary.

I additionally unbolted my caliper brackets and laid the assemblies over the upper control arms and rested them on the outter tie rod links. This let me pull the rotors and gain wide open access to the shock and ball joint bolts and just see what I was doing better but it is not really necessary and I think it might of added time to the job. I also noticed when re-assembling that if I jacked the lower control arms up " ONE " side at a time I could put more up pressure on the spring and mate the ball joints more easily than when I tried to lower the car onto a pair of jackstands under the control arms, both at the same time.

Kinda wordy I suppose but was hoping that it might help someone interested in what it takes to do this swap, or for that matter just how to lower down the control arms to make an adjustment to the ride height adjuster bolts. If you try to make adjustments to these bolts while the spring is loaded you can tear the rubber off the bolt heads and ruin the bolt and effectivly the spring too as you cannot buy the correct bolts seperately without buying a spring.

If any of the pros see an issue with my method or want to chime in, please feel free as I am not sensative nor am I always correct but it was just what worked for me and saved a couple of hunderd dollars labor at the dealer.

 

[b_pappy]

Glad you got it fixed, and nice write up, thanks for taking the time to document. Sorry I didn't have any more help about ride height.
Bruce

 

[ChicagoDave]

Great write up, Doug. Thanks for sharing. Glad you have your baby sitting pretty now.