build diary

April 6, 2006: I popped the front springs on last night, added some rear wheels and dropped the car down.
Holy cow, those new rear springs are stiff. The front seems a less drastic change. I realised that I needed someone else to help me set up the ride height and I was fresh out of helpers. Nuts. Decision time - do I have the car aligned on the rack to make sure the fundamental setup is good without any wheels pointing off in strange directions even though the corner heights will change, or do I do the cornerweighting first? I know it would be ideal to do the cornerweights first, but that's not going to happen. I decided to go ahead with the alignment anyhow. I did pop the car on the scales though, it's down to 1311 lbs wet. Not bad!

So, out of the garage. The rear end is definitely firm. I might have to back that off a touch. The fronts seem to work well but honestly, driving to work isn't a tough test. I may end up disconnecting the rear sway bar to get a good balance but the rear is actually softer than it was before if you compare it to the front. Trust me, that last sentence makes sense! The rears are 43% stiffer while the fronts are 66% stiffer. There's certainly much less roll on the street.

Obtaining the springs themselves was a bit of a trial. I ordered the fronts directly from Pro Shocks - they showed up three days later, just what I wanted - and ordered the rears from Pit Stop USA. It wasn't until the first box arrived a few days later that I realised I'd ordered Pro Shock springs from both companies. Pit Stop USA was less expensive though. Well, until their package showed up. I wasn't able to track it due to a mis-entered tracking number. This was after I had to determine what the mystery password created for my account was and a long conversation full of comedy with the customer support line. When it did show, the springs were the wrong size. After a couple of days, it was determined that the springs I'd ordered did not exist despite the happy writeup on the website. In fact, Pro Shocks doesn't even make springs in that length and diameter. So they had to ship me some others that were an inch longer. All in all, a pretty messy customer experience and there were some notes on the return label that have me concerned. I'll be watching my credit card statement. Next time I'll go directly to Pro Shocks and spend the extra $20 per spring. Either that or find out how to order some of the 10" Legend springs from various online suppliers.

As a complete contrast to Pit Stop USA's fumbling around, Jim Coveland at Coveland Motorsports managed to find the wiper wheelbox I needed in a 1967 Spitfire. He's sent it my way and is asking only for thanks. It's fairly obvious who's going to get my business in the future. Thanks Jim!

Some fun stuff. I've mentioned this site once before due to the models, but I neglected to look around. Check out some of the links - a visit to Arch Motors with some stunning pictures, some beautiful illustrations and of course, Out-of-a-Box Designs. Worth a few minutes.

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