Southsides Or Boxed Stockers?

[need4speed]

I know with the southsides the pinion angle is changed, but is it that crucial from boxing the stock control arms?

I have heard of people pulling some low 60 foot times with stock suspension. I'd be interested in hearing some feedback on what people have experienced.

 

[blackbuick87]

How fast do you want to go? Stockers are fine for 1.6 sixty feets and 11's in the 1/4

 

[HRpartsNstuff]

I keep hearing long term negative issues with the south sides. Anything from a rough ride, the bolts always coming loose, to actually bashing out the mounting holes on your stk brackets.

You will actually get the most gains from the bushing material & design. With a stiffer (still streetable) polyurethane bushing material, that greatly reduces wheel hop & gains traction & handling. Boxing them in helps a bit more, and a new rectangular boxed arm is the best. We have plenty of cars using our custom replacement bushings & boxing kits on their stock upper & lowers, getting 1.45-1.55 60 ft times. We have a few special features over the normal "poly" bushings:

Heavy duty shell
greaseable design for all locations
custom clearance/tolerance on inner steel spacer

This eliminates the squeaking & binding that is common with standard poly bushings.

If you are only going to do the bushings OR the boxing, do the bushings without a doubt. You will get much more benefit from them. Our setup is basically the same as what is in our new arms, but you can do yourself.

Hope that helped...

 

[scottyb]

I had southsides on my 5.0 mustang. They creaked and moaned, and tore away at the mounts. I had to have a welder patch my car and I put the stockers back on. I know I'm not talking apples and apples here, but I don't think the pro's outweigh the possible cons. As said before, you can cut pretty good 60' times on the stockers, so I'd go with boxed lca's and airbags. I'm a little anal about mainting the stock smoothness, so I'm even gonna keep the rubber bushings when I go around.

 

[BUICKTR]

SSM

I recently upgraded to SSM from stock and it was a great investment on my car. It help my 60 ft time a whole lot. My car is not a daily driver so I can't speak for those putting on SSM and drive their car everyday. The Mustang has a very weak link in the torque boxes. They tear up very easily, but the Full frame car should take it a little better. When I set my pinion angle and weld those SSM I could feel my car BITE alot harder at the track and street.

 

[Gary]

Southside bars will not change pinion angle. Try as you may, not even a little bit. You can jack the pinion up and drill your hole in the plates and bolt it up. When you sit it back down it will be right back where you started, everytime. Why do you think they make "adjustable" bars. This is not to say they want help traction.

Gary

 

[sixgun86gn]

They will if you install the SSM uppers.I know I have the uppers and lowers.Mine is not a daily driver either,but it has gotten me some respectable 60's for a one legged car.Can't wait to get this eaton I have installed.Then I should really see a difference.

 

[azgn]

the stock suspension will work better than the southsides with a little help (as already pointed out) boxed lowers, uppers, and decent bushings will work just fine (a larger rear sway bar also helps)

there is no magic in 60' times...it is mostly power....period

 

[Doug Jacobson]

I have yet to see where a change in pinion angle effects traction. You set the pinion angle to a negative to allow proper driveshaft alignment on launch to accomodate bushing deflection. Not to increase traction. The traction gain that "may" come from Southside bars is from loacting the control arm lower to the ground on the axle, thus giving a band-aid to the poor instant center of the factory suspension. When setting up my car for optimum IC the front of the lower arm actually had to be lowered and not the rear. This is the case with most, but there are other factors that go into the equation.

Myself I use boxed factory lowers with polygraphic bushings, the uppers are boxed with stock 130k mile bushings.

$.02

Doug

 

[HRpartsNstuff]

The SSM lowers can't change the pinion angle by themselves, but because of the lowering brackets that mount to the stk rearend brackets, you can put the pinion angle where you want it (or where you don't want it if you are not careful). Lowering the mounting point actually changes the instant center (where the uppers & lowers meet if you continue their lines forward), which effects how the suspension "hits", which in turn effects traction (as stated above). Depending on where you locate the brackets when mounting them, the pinion can be pointed in about any direction. Some put it right where it was with no change, some point it down a little more (more pinion angle), and some mistakenly just bolt/weld them on thinking things didn't change. You have to set/check the pinion angle when attaching these brackets, or it could be too much or too little.

The downside to setting your pinion angle with the bracket mounting is that it is very hard to get it even side to side. This will make the car track off to one side, wear U-joints faster, and bind suspension. Another downside is that you are actually pushing the lower mounting point back on the car, making the wheelbase longer. Technicaly by shortening the uppers to get a better pinion angle is the better known way to do it, but either give you more angle. Shortening the uppers loses tire clearance & pushes the D-shaft into the trans further, which can cause other problems. We use +1/4" lowers with stk mounting brackets to get some of it, and then adj uppers to get the rest of the pinion angle. This way you have more clearance than by just shortening the uppers, and your wheelbase doesn't get extended to do it like the SSM brackets would do by themselves.

Also, pinion angle can aid in traction slightly, but it does this indirectly. If you have too little pinion angle at launch, the pinion actually points up under WOT & eats up HP to turn the U-joints. With the optimum pinion angle, the pinion & D-shaft are in line under WOT. The down side is that all times OTHER than WOT, the pinion pointing down (optimum for WOT) eats HP & wears the U-joints out faster. Usually we just compromise to get the best of both worlds, depending on each individual situation.