Best way to lower my Buggy!

[Faron]

I am Faron and I live here in San Antonio. I started to build my first Buggy a little over a month ago. I want it to be a street buggy so I am looking to lower it both in the front as well as in the back. I have always wanted to build myself a car, and this is my first attempt to do so. So I am sure that I will have a ton of questions.
Thank you in advance,
Faron

[David O']

I can help with that, I know how all of that is done. You will need to fill in some information so that the answers can be correct. Like which beam do you have in the front, and how low do you think that you want to go. Which type of rear axle set up do you have and how low do you think that you want to go.

[greenmanx]

Faron,
David is right, need more specifics like ball joint or link pin front? Swing axle or IRS rear? There are many ways to lower the front from an adjustable beam to modified spindles. The rear gets a bit more interesting.

By the way, pretty creative name there Dave...HAHA!

[Buggy1]

One thing you should consider is the ride your looking for........if you want to lower the car and then be able to raise it for driving there are now air kits that allow the suspention to be lowered and raised.

I have a adjustable front end I got fron Aircooled Parts at a great price, but due to health reasons I have had no luck in the installation. I would definately remember that if your planning on driving your car. Some bugs have been lowered so much that they can not even jack em up to fix a flat.


I have plans for a lot of changes to the F1 over the next year or so.........lots of surprizes!

[Faron]

It has a Ball joint front end with a IRS Rear end. I want to drive it so... REALLY low is out of the question. Im looking to put 16 inch by 6 inch rims on the front, and 18 inch by 12 inch on the rear. Thanks for the help!

[David O']

If you get the lowered spindles for the front, you end up with two and 1/2 inch drop only! With the wheels you are choosing, this will probably be too much. I would recomend the adjustable beam so you can set the front end to the height that you want. As far as the rear end goes, you can set the height by changing the position of the spring plate to the torsion bar. One notch on the outer end of the torsion bar is equal to about 1 3/4 inches. The rear end can be set in about 1/2 inch amounts if you move the arm and the bar. I would be REALLY CAREFUL about undoing the spring plate from the stop that it set on. The force is strong enough to break the head off of a hammer while you hold it in the air with your hand. (personal experience!!!) Oh, it really helps if you measure the setting of the spring plate (off of the stop) before you start moving things.

[Faron]

Am I thinking to large for Rims? I dont want it to look all BLING BLING!

[David O']

Rims are a personal matter, however, I do know that the really low profile tires that are normally used with these types of wheels ride like a solid concrete tire. Your buggy will be light weight, and therefore bounce all over the place if you are thinking about using that type of tire!
Normally 15" rims are large enough to make the car look right and drive right. Really tall tires will also affect the final drive ratio and change the way that the speedometer reads. Just something to think about. Ask F1 hawk what his beetle rode like when a tire store talked him into putting lower profile tires on his beetle. He will be glad to tell you about the ride quality of those types of tires. (and bearing losses!)

[Faron]

I totally understand what you mean with the low profile tires.....My Daily Driver is a 2005 MINI Cooper S JCW with the 18" rims...the profile of the tire is about an inch and a half. It has a very solid ride.....but it handles like it is on rails. However my wife does not care to much for the ride. On top of that 15 inch rims are a lot less $$$$ Did you do 15" both front & Back?

[David O']

I have always used the 15" or the 14" wheels, and put taller tires on my cars, it is less expensive and rides softer!

[GregR]

I run 15x8 rear 275x60-15 and 15x6 front 205x60-15
Plenty of room if I ever want to drop it.

[Buggy1]

I am using 15 inch rims on my F1 and prefer the ride a lot better than when some stupid tire store talked me into low profile tires. They do look great and the trend now is to have alot of wheel little rubber. One thing people do not mention is that with big rims and really low profile tires is that you have only 2 degrees of slip when cornering. In order for a car to go where you point it it must have a way to bend the rubber on the tire to take the side load of the Buggy or Car. My son find this out when he slid into a light pole at 75 miles an hour and nearly died in the wreck. I had told him about this but He said freinds knew better - yeah right, lost his car, broke his neck, and had mutiple injuries from the darn seat belt which only holds the body in the car. But those things hurt too. Go with common thinking and have a safe ride, what may be the look these days can kill ya - sure the tire and wheel companies want to sell you a hot item ( they make money on that ) but they never tell ya that you can ruin a fancy wheel by just hitting a pot hole ( my son replaced I don't know how many wheels before He gave up and went back to steel wheels on his second car).

I don't mean to preach, but you can have a lot of better things to spend your hard earned money on and safety is the most important thing.
You can change your cool look by adding a larger tire to the rear. I did that on my F1 and I like the way she rides and stands, when I get the selec a drop front beam on, I will be able to lower the front end if I want.

[carlos del carpio]

Remember also the steering geometry of lowered spindles, such as the ones offered by CB performance..I initially got 15's, porsche, for the buggy, and they fit great with stock spindles and a lowered beam...but, as soon as I got the lowered spindles, the bottom of the spindle rubbed on the wheel! I had to upgrade to 16's.. just some info..

[bobaganoosh]

i only wanted a little drop so I frankensteined my front end by putting 2001 harley sportster coilover shocks on the front end, but the interesting part is they have to go on upside down.

we'll see how it rides when I get it on the road. it did lower about 1.5 inches.

mike

[MURZ]

Faron, really dropped spindles are the way to go, but they do add track width. I wish I would have narrowed my beam when i put in the adjusters. Right now the ball joints are at full extension and I am still not as low as I would want. I will locate a beam and narrow it and install trailing arms when I get a chance. For the rear, pull the spring plates, reinstall at level to the ground and you should be good to go.

[carlos del carpio]

Hmmm..I didn't think of this before, but maybe this will work..

Alright, remove your shocks. Note where your suspension 'sits'. Stand on your front beam, any difference?

Since you want to only drop 'a little', it may be a simple removal/cut of your front torsion springs. They are set up for stock vehicle weight, which is a VW beetle, not a buggy...

The bad part is finding out how many you need to cut for your ride, and you also have two tubes to deal with.

The good part is once you find the right height, it will also have softer ride..if the ride is toooo soft, you can always beef up the front shocks to absorb the over-easy travel of the suspension...

Hopefully it will be that easy for ya, cause if it works, it is a ZERO dollar solution!!!