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.89 T-bars
rubber LCA bushings, poly upper
poly strut rod bushings
adjustable strut rods
73 steering linkage
1 1/8 sway bar
firm feel stage 3 power steering box
boxed LCA's
KYB shocks
17X8 wheels, tires with a 260 tread wear rating

rear is 340 springs
poly bushings
7/8 rear sway bar
1 inch lowering blocks
kyb shocks



Combo change here if you want to swing it, as it will cost a few bucks. Get some real shocks, like Bilstein or Koni, then step up the t-bars to 1.1 or better, ditch the lowering blocks and move up to flattend springs in the 180# range. However, this isn't exactly a "budget" approach.

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my thoughts are going along the budget route of:
tube UCA's for alignment purposes. and tall upper ball joints.

based on the charts from mopar muscle, i think the tall AFCO ball joints would be a good investment to increase my negative camber gain. they are billed as being .200 taller than stock. the F/M/J spindles are about 1/4 taller than the a-body's, so...
(charts will not copy to the forum, so the link is
http://www.moparmusclemagazine.com/t...dle_specs.html )

it looks like i would get the roll center benefits and negative camber gain, without the bump steer by going to the tall uppers. correct? maybe not quite as much, but with less expense and negative drawbacks.



The FJM spindle is actually 3/8 taller than the A body spindle so your getting more height out of it than you think. Not sure about using the Afco ball joint on the street. They are a rebuildable race piece that require regular maintanence. If you don't mind that and are going to remove and inspect them annually, they may work for you. You will get a slight bit more bump steer at the extremes of travel from the tall spindle, but if you aren't getting the body roll, it won't be a impact. Similarly, lack of body roll will limit the camber gain you get from this change as well. If you're serious about this change up, a custom length upper arm may be in the cards to optimize the gain, but I'd verify what the tire wants with temps across the tread face before going with anything custom.

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on the upper control arm side, i have way too many questions and options.
what geometry benefits are there to be gained from one UCA over another? from what i understand of suspension design, the main purpose of the UCA is to control the spindle. the motion ratio controls the camber gain and caster change. that's about it. if I'm wrong, please tell me.

so, the options available are
CAP
RMS
Magnum force
SPC
Speedway
FFI
control freaks
XV
Hotchkis
just suspension

with prices ranging from 150-600. if there is no real benefit other than alignment specs, why spend more? if there is, is there a way to tell what the geometry improvements will be with one arm over another?

I'm really trying to figure this out before i spend money on the front suspension again, so help me out here.



Geometry gains can vary from subtle to serious, and from what I've seen of their marketing, no one on that list is giving away the secrets to their success ( or lack of). Short of buying one of everything and doing an analysis on it, I don't think anyone else can tell you the subtle differences between a bunch of those choices. The length of the arms, the angle of the mounts, and the angle of the ball joint are all geometrically important functions. Some of those are likely copies of stock geometry in a tubular form. Some have spent some time researching alternatives to the stock angles and have incorporated it in their construction. Which is best, I couldn't tell you. RMS and Hotchkis have spent considerable engineering time in their products. SPCs look like very heavy duty pieces with a wider range of adjustment than others. I don't know how you will get Speedways to work without some custom mounting work.

The upper control arm mounting angle controls anti-dive in the suspension, but short of changing the mounting positions, this is somewhat fixed with the mopar pick up points.

Aside from weight considerations, you can get similar, but not as much, caster/camber gain from the offset arm bushings for $60 compared to most tubular arms.

FJM spindles are a couple of pounds lighter each.