BMR Fabrication GTP arms are in !!!!!!!

[FAST4DR]

ShoGuy93:
Question?? What did u do about the rear brake booster? Where did you mount that at?? And those arms look awesome man!! So it was about 400 bucks for every thing? Looks darn good!!

I put in plugs and disabled the rear brake bias lever. I have 11.6" rear and 13" PBR fronts so no need to cut the fluid flow. The arms were around $380 shipped. I paid about $10 extra for 3 day select ups so that I would have them in time. I asked TCE about his arms but he said he wasn't making any more. I would have rather had his because they fit without the gtp kit, but the BMR arms are very nice and very well made. BMR also was on time with their estimate of when they would be done. So they get a thumbup from me.

Will

 

[Dave Kegel]

Will, They look great. What alignment settings are you shooting for? Did you drill out hte spotwelds on front camber plates yet? Most shops want quite a bit extra to do it. I bought the spotweld dril bit from Eastwood to do mine.

Dave Kegel

 

[Bizzy]

Damn those arms look nice.

 

[FAST4DR]

Dave Kegel:
Will, They look great. What alignment settings are you shooting for? Did you drill out hte spotwelds on front camber plates yet? Most shops want quite a bit extra to do it. I bought the spotweld dril bit from Eastwood to do mine.

Dave Kegel

I told the alignment guy to shoot for -(.6 to .7) up front and -(.2 to .3) in back, Zero toe all around. I didn't mention caster so I guess he will set it at the factory settings.

The car is there right now. I am going to pick it up at 3:00pm. On the way to the alignment shop, which is only 3 miles away from my house, the koni's were set on almost full firm and the ride wasn't too bad.

I drilled out the strut plates myself. I just used a regular drill bit. I drilled down until I could see it when through the plate, then took a chisel and popped them loose. No big deal and I don't think you need a special bit. Even if you just drilled all the way through I can't see why that would matter. Four more little holes isn't going to hurt anything.

Will

 

[Dave Kegel]

I agree, a regular drill bit would work fine. The tool from Eastwood was nice though because it had the center tip (like a wood bit), so you didn't have to dril a pilot hol or use a punch or anything. Not worth the $20 though, IMO.

I'm curious how your alignment turns out. I'll bet they can't hit your front camber numbers.

Dave

 

[yamahaSHO]

How much do those cost?

 

[DeaconBlue]

You are suppose to break the Koni's in correctly by setting them at full soft for the first 500 miles or so, then find the firmness setting best suited to your tastes.

 

[SW SHO]

Hey Will,

I just love reading your post cuz you always offer pics... and why wouldn't you with such great looking arms like those.

Thanks for all this info. I'm putting together all the parts for a suspension overhaul in upcomming months.

I noticed you have a hitch, looks just like mine. Do you use it? I'm taking mine off, but should have removed it when I had my summitt's put on, now I can't get a socket on the drivers side frame bolt. Anyway...

If you ever feel froggy, I'd love to see a list of all your recent suspension mods and what you would do differently if given the chance...like would you buy the koni's again? Given some of the modification needed for fitament?

 

[Lance Cheney]

SHO92 wrote:

Did you turn the **** to firm until it wouldn't turn any more? I've heard from Ben Bently that this can possibly blow the seals. Hes a Chrysler Tech and the Neon ACR comes with konis stock. He said that full firm is 1 full turn from lock at full soft. I don't know if this is true and I've never heard of people blowing Konis from turning it all the way firm till it stops, but I don't know how people are adjusting them either. Just an observation and something I'd like cleared up, if any one else knows if this is true or not.

My Koni instruction manual states that to get to 'GT/Agressive Driving' you should turn the know 1 turn counter-clockwise.
It then states, immediately below it that "ATTENTION: Shock absorbers may never be fully adjusted". I would argue this is horrible english, but that they mean that you should never turn them past one turn.

-Lance

 

[SHOspazz92]

What did the tow hitch do for your handling?

<small>[ May 10, 2003, 02:27 PM: Message edited by: SHOspazz92 ]</small>

 

[3.8Lwagon]

i would suggest going with the front camber adjustment from Specialty Products
that way you do not have to have the strut towes drilled out to adjust the camber.
i also replace the front strut rod bushing at the frame with a TRP Moog replacement so i would have less toe change.

 

[FAST4DR]

Dave Kegel:
I agree, a regular drill bit would work fine. The tool from Eastwood was nice though because it had the center tip (like a wood bit), so you didn't have to dril a pilot hol or use a punch or anything. Not worth the $20 though, IMO.

I'm curious how your alignment turns out. I'll bet they can't hit your front camber numbers.

Dave

I center punched the spot welds then drilled down a little with a small bit then stepped it up to a bit that would get the whole spot weld. Then I took a chisel punch, layed it on the side of the plate and gave a few wacks. Popped loose, very easily.

And the alignment guy did get close to what I wanted. He said he played around with it for a while, but couldn't get 0 toe on the back. I guess because of the fixed locating link.

Here's a pic of the alignment sheet.

<small>[ May 12, 2003, 02:10 PM: Message edited by: FAST4DR ]</small>

 

[FAST4DR]

The figures above are it for the front neg. camber unless you round out the square holes underneath the plate. The bolts sticking up are setting against those holes. I haven't looked yet at how much clearance there is between the spring and the strut tower.

Here is how much the plate got moved.

 

[FAST4DR]

SW SHO:
Hey Will,

I just love reading your post cuz you always offer pics... and why wouldn't you with such great looking arms like those.

Thanks for all this info. I'm putting together all the parts for a suspension overhaul in upcomming months.

I noticed you have a hitch, looks just like mine. Do you use it? I'm taking mine off, but should have removed it when I had my summitt's put on, now I can't get a socket on the drivers side frame bolt. Anyway...

If you ever feel froggy, I'd love to see a list of all your recent suspension mods and what you would do differently if given the chance...like would you buy the koni's again? Given some of the modification needed for fitament?

Lance,

Thanks. I like pictures. Seems to explain things easier.

About the hitch... I have a 4x8 trailer that I used to haul my dirtbike around in and stuff I needed from lowes, etc. but, I bought a truck and don't really use it anymore. If I go to an autocross I use it to take extra tires, jack, tools, etc. I am going to sell my truck soon so it may see some more use in the near future.

I have heard that the trailer hitch ties together the rear subframe at the end, making it stiffer. I don't know how much it really matters. I mean I guess I can see where it would, but to what degree, I guess that's debatable.

My current suspension mod list is...

Intrax springs
Koni Shocks
New strut bearings
(kept the stock 95 rubber strut mounts)
All the suspension points have TPR/Poly with the exception of... The front of the control rod bushing is rubber (is tpr available?)
The ball joint control arm to subframe is the stock rubber and I left the 20.6 front sway bar and the stock rubber bushings to subframe. I was going to put the 24mm swaybar on the front, but after reading a lot about people saying it would cause a lot of wheel spin coming out of sharp turns because it would tend to lift the inside tire, I left it for now. Seemed perfect on the Summit track. Balance was nice and is pretty neutral but you can still hang the back out and is very controllable. Rear has, BMR links, TCE knuckle brace, H-Box brace. I have the shoshop front/rear strut tower braces.

Braided Earls lines - 13" PBR calipers, 11.6" rear 96 rotors, 91 calipers, 91 brackets, and the load limit plugs. The braking is awesome. It will give you a headache and you can pound them over and over and over and over without fade. You would freak out at how late you can brake for stuff. I scared my friends last night on an off ramp. I went off a short off ramp that has a 90 bend at the bottom and I was at over 100mph down the off ramp and you would have been screaming to go home if you knew how late I waited to brake.

Would I buy the koni's again. Depends on how you want to use the car. For my 95, yes definately, but I want to do track events and autocrosses. Even on the softess setting it is pretty firm. Every crack and bump is a big crash throughout the car. So if this is your everyday car and you don't need the absolute in handling then maybe other choices would be wiser. I wouldn't want to drive this setup farther than a couple hours, but everybody has different tolerances to firmness, harshness. I say try and get a ride in one that has what you want to do.

I also need to install the hood lift relocation kit I have because without the hood struts, there is no pressure on the back of the hood and the hinges rattle a good bit with the firmer suspension.

 

[FAST4DR]

Lance,

And to answer your question about installing the koni's....

Well it does take a little longer, but now that I have done them, I would say it is no big deal. If you know how to do them they work fine. It would save a few hours to just have the tokico's to slap back in and not have to fiddle with cutting, drilling, painting, etc.

I wanted the adjustability so that's why I went with the Koni's.

 

[Dave Kegel]

That's pretty good for the front camber. The best we could get with mine was -1.5 (I did not hog out the holes in the strut tower), but mine is pretty low in the front. I have the earlier upper strut mounts (the 94 and '95 mounts make the car sit higher) and I slid the knuckle up the strut a good 1/2" or so as well (Eibachs/Tokicos).

Dave

 

[SW SHO]

Thanks Will and what do you know he posted another pic!

Yeah, I travel to Denver from here about 2 times a year, (350 miles) and my wife would hate it. I probably put like 8-9K miles a year on my car as a daily driver so to me it wouldn't matter, but she wouldn't like it which would make for an upleasant 5 hour trip.

I appriciate the suspension mod list, I've already saved the thread. I may be calling on you for advice since your install is fresh.

Thanks Will.