These are the radius arm brackets I replaced, they just need to be welded.
Thank you Chris (Pilotbird) for cutting these out and sending them to me.

Believe it or not these are from the same frame I cut up when I did my sons FL350R, just shows you never know when that junk laying there will come in handy.

Moving on to the front.

I have looked this thing over and over, took me until about 2 weeks ago when I started back on the front to notice this.

See if you can spot the obvious problem here.

Different ball joint installed on the right front.
Oh my gosh this was a pain, every time I tack welded it the darn thing would move and just a little means a lot. I spent a good amount of time and it is set darn near perfect now.

Ok I will take a stab at it.. the left front upper heim is screwed out about an inch farther than the others leading me to think the arm was made short on that side.

Pictures.

You are correct sir but take a look at the top shock mount bolts. I will explain here in a bit what happened to cause this.

Glad to see your making some progress on ol' girl

Are they twisted or drilled crooked?

Thank you Sir, my eyes have been opened but still lots to do.



The left front is drilled crooked yes but the big thing is take a look at the heights.

Oh ok I see it now.

This is where I am at on my front end.

The upper shock mounts were set at different heights because the right front lower control arm is 1/2 inch. longer then the left, this is not because of my ball joint replacement I set the ball joint to the exact distance as the left from the ball joint to the shock mount bar. The arm is longer because when I went and got these there were no weld in bungs and when the weld in bungs were installed the lengths ended up different.
The shock top mounts were set by lower control arm angle, because of the longer arm the shock set further from the frame on the right front and ended up being mounted lower, this as far as I can tell will cause a different leverage on the shock to arm ratio (not that I know much about this, just using common sense) and thus cause different pressures from side to side, also the left front has 11 inches of travel to the shock bumper, the right front only has 10 5/8 to the shock bumper.

I think this is what I am going to do to fix it, all of this taking in to consideration caster and camber. For caster, adnoh was kind enough to give me instructions on how to set the machine up for center front to rear, I appreciate it very much. Thank you. I am lazy so this is what I did for caster, I took my wife's pilot to my shop and set the front to rear angle the same as my pilot, I made a piece that sets on both ball joints and checked her caster at full droop with the shock on, I also checked her camber.

I am setting up at +3.3* to +3.5* caster at full droop shock on, the camber I have learned was setup to have more negative camber then the stock setup, I am setting up camber at -1.0* full droop shock on.

I have asked a couple of people for what there's is set up at, it would be nice to have a comparison so if anyone has this information I would very much appreciate it.

With the right front arm being longer I had to decide whether or not I wanted to shorten it or lengthen the other side, since lengthening is not easy I decided to split the difference, I lengthened the left front out 1/4 and I cut the right front 5/16 shorter. I did 5/16 to give a little room for adjustment. Running the left front out does leave the heims extended a bit but they have more then enough thread to be safe, I wanted to go the full 1/2 inch but that was to far out. I am going to this trouble because I get way more free travel on the right front now, because the ball joint is more proper but also because of the length difference.

The other thing that I am going to do to get more travel is changing the shock angle ( moving it further from the wheel ), I have made a custom shock (window squeegee cut down) and I am playing with where I am going to set another bar and lower mount in place. I have been able to get 12 3/4 of travel to the shock bumper on the left front after extending the arms 1/4 inch. and changing the shock angle.

My goal is to achieve 30 to 34* shock on lower control arm down angle and still be able to fit the shock under the front fender.

I am getting the arms setup first and then will deal with shock mounting.

Last picture for now, this is the left front adjusted where it will be. I think.

Camber at full droop is the last thing to worry about. Are you steering at full droop? Not really.

0 at full droop and progressing from there to full bump would be good.

Not sure I would move the lower mounts just yet. You want the shock to be 90 deg to the lower arm at full bump, this keeps it progressive. This is more important that gaining every last 1/4" of travel. Take the spring off and check it.

Obviously the lower shock mount have to be relatively the same distance from the frame pivots.

I have the camber range #'s at work but on my wife's pilot camber full down through the travel range would go from 0 to +1.0 and then back to 0. Of course after the travel range camber did drastic negative changes the further up you go.
I can not remember the #'s on mine but I will get them.
I did try and set the camber at 0* but this limits travel (the ball joints do not like it there as much). I read on Dave's post where he ran -2.0* camber, so I tried it and the ball joints seem to like it there. I think this is how he set it up but I am not sure.

90*, I did not know this. Thank you. Should I have 90* or less? Do I check the shock angle itself at full bump?

Thank you for your help, this is all very new but I am slowly seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.

Awesome! So glad to see it progressing. Keep up the good work.

Thank you Rich.

I would try to copy/do what Dave suggests. I know it didn't go so good for you, but he really does know his stuff with offroad cars. The proper camber would probably be better than gaining every last inch of travel. On such a small light car, you wont notice plus or minus an inch or two of travel.

Yes, 90deg between the shock and the lower arm at full bump. Again, not the end of the world on a small car, but if you can, might as well do it right. I would start with what Dave put for a lower shock mount. Get the lower arms as close as you can lengthwise.

Hello bullnerd, here are a couple of pictures of it a full bump.
This is not where it will be just an example, it is approximately 2 1/4 in on the lower shock bolt.

I do not have a protractor ( I am going to get one) but I would guess this angle is about 70* or so.

I do not know how long all the arms were made exactly but I do know that the nuts were cut off of mine and bungs added, I think my arms ended up longer which moved the lower shock mount out giving less travel, I think my lower shock mount bars will need to come in at least 1 1/4 inch and then play with tab angles from there.

My buddy has had to work late all week so I am going over today I hope to get some things welded, I plan to get the front arm caster & camber set before I go further with the shocks.

Thank you bullnerd and everyone for taking the time, very much appreciated.

While waiting to get some things welded I started on the steering, I do not know what to say but this is just not ending.

The power steering upper bracket was welded on to low and crooked, once I unbolted the power steering it popped up on one side.
It is also almost 2 inches taller then stock height and the upper shaft is not straight, the angle on the column itself was also off.
I bolted in a stock column to checked angle and height.

Pliers were used on my brand new ps splines and my perfect upper shaft splines, I knew about the upper shaft splines last year but just found the ps splines this week when I took it apart. The column and shaft I sent were in perfect almost like new condition, I installed brand new oem lower bushing, washer and o-ring before sending the column, I also installed a grease zert before shipping.

I have cut off the upper mount, I also installed a seat to play with wheel height I may leave it a little taller then stock but probably not 2 inches. The upper shaft is not straight so it has to be cut back apart anyway, I will shorten it then.

Couple more pictures.

Looks like it is coming along well. I am sorry you have had such an ordeal.
Keep the info pictures and progress coming.
Regards
Steve

Hello Stephen, Thank you Sir. Very much appreciated.

Here are some pictures of my progress.

Some more.

More.