Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle?

Posted By: GY3

Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/03/14 06:46 AM

A couple of us are thinking about building one.

Which one drives better?

Do the A-100 axles have the right width or would a tubular axle from Speedway Motors make more sense?

Posted By: MR_P_BODY

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/03/14 06:58 AM

Quote:

A couple of us are thinking about building one.

Which one drives better?

Do the A-100 axles have the right width or would a tubular axle from Speedway Motors make more sense?

I built my brothers altered with a leading link straight
axle... it runs high 8s with a simple SBC in it...
drives great with 10* caster... I see your talking
altered wheelbase and not a altered... sorry but this
is what I built for him
EDIT
The stock axle in the D-series was really heavy...
you dont need anything like that in a race car

Posted By: Moparmal

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/03/14 10:57 AM

Torsion bars reduce front end lift - kind of defeats the purpose of an AFX...

Posted By: THE GLASS MAN

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/03/14 05:01 PM

Let me know if you need any fiberglass parts. Here at Sled City Fiberglass, we make and sell all the parts for the AWB cars. Plymouth and Dodge.

Posted By: Slingshot383

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/03/14 07:01 PM

The original Chryslers used torsion bars, special long ones, but you could move the rear torsion bar attach fitting forward and use standard length ones.

Posted By: SCATPACK 1

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/03/14 07:34 PM

The original cars used torsion bars from the big Chryslers because they were much longer than the B body torsion bars. To my knowledge none of the true factory altered wheel base cars ever used Straight axles. I have seen several home made versions with the straight axles in it..

Posted By: savoy64

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/03/14 07:37 PM

i heard some use light a-body bars for more action in the front...

Posted By: fed

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/03/14 11:42 PM

I moved the complete frontend inclusive the torision bars 4" forward.

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Posted By: Crizila

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/04/14 12:47 AM

Quote:

A couple of us are thinking about building one.

Which one drives better?

Do the A-100 axles have the right width or would a tubular axle from Speedway Motors make more sense?

Talked to a guy just this Saturday at the track - he was running a Dart with an I beam front end in the 9's. Said it handled great. Got most of his stuff from Speedway. Said it was considerably lighter than the torsion set up. Guess it depends on the look that you want.

Posted By: 1969gtx

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/04/14 03:26 AM

All 11 factory car used torsion bars. there is bar out there that work I have a set 49" long. built one car flashback. will be building one this fall I post some pic. there some build on afxer.com. flashback has had the wheels 3'in the air no straight axl here 10.25 comp. 426 hemi on pump gas.

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Posted By: Crizila

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/04/14 05:10 PM

Quote:

All 11 factory car used torsion bars. there is bar out there that work I have a set 49" long. built one car flashback. will be building one this fall I post some pic. there some build on afxer.com. flashback has had the wheels 3'in the air no straight axl here 10.25 comp. 426 hemi on pump gas.

I'm wichu on the torsion bars for the correct look if you are doing an altered WB car.

Posted By: skicker

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/04/14 07:32 PM

I can't remember off the top of my head but I think its Mancini that sells the 10" longer torsion bars.

I'm in a slow process of building one however I am using the A-100 Van straight axle. It is a little wide but the few I have talked to about this said not to cut it down in width. Many have cut them down and had no issues. I'm using a pair of 4" Anson front runners and the total track width is actually 1" narrower running the skinny rims over the factory K frame front end and 7" wheels that had 3 1/2" b/s.

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Posted By: SNK-EYZ

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/04/14 11:54 PM

This copy of the specs might help with building an AFX Altered.

This link will take you to the pdf file.

http://www.moparmax.com/features/2006/images/05-report/report.pdf

Posted By: GY3

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/05/14 02:33 AM

Quote:

This copy of the specs might help with building an AFX Altered.

This link will take you to the pdf file.

http://www.moparmax.com/features/2006/images/05-report/report.pdf

Yep, already seen that but thanks for posting it.

Leaning towards straight axle for simplicity.

Posted By: RodStRace

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/05/14 03:48 AM

There have been a few built recently.
I'd suggest that you research ALL parts involved. The straight axle swap I've seen requires building a steering system by welding some forged parts together. Let's just say those welds better be RIGHT!
There are aftermarket suspension parts as said, but ask them how to turn the steering wheel input into front wheel movement on your application and see what they say.

Also ask about shock mounts and brake kits, unless you are going to run without front brakes!

Posted By: Moparmal

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/05/14 04:06 AM

Could have sworn Landy's Dodge ran an I beam front...so went and checked.....

Posted By: SNK-EYZ

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/05/14 11:39 AM

I could be wrong, but I believe Clay said his has a coil over shock set up on it.

I'm sure he'd be happy to talk about it if you want to.
I can pm you his contact info if you're interested.

Posted By: THE GLASS MAN

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/05/14 03:33 PM

Quote:

There have been a few built recently.
I'd suggest that you research ALL parts involved. The straight axle swap I've seen requires building a steering system by welding some forged parts together. Let's just say those welds better be RIGHT!
There are aftermarket suspension parts as said, but ask them how to turn the steering wheel input into front wheel movement on your application and see what they say.

Also ask about shock mounts and brake kits, unless you are going to run without front brakes!

RodStRace says there has been a few made lately, and he is right. We have orders on the board for 4 complete fiberglass kits for the AWB cars right now and a guy in Mich. says he will be ordering enough to do 2 more. There is a lot of interest in these cars right now. Just as much now as back in 1965-66.

Posted By: RalphsRapidTrnst

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/05/14 07:50 PM

Maybe in 2015 or ?? we can organize a SuperCar Match Bash ShootOut.

Posted By: hemi-itis

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/08/14 06:42 AM

Can I play?? I promise to stay away from the wallz

Posted By: fullmetaljacket

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/08/14 07:07 PM

I promise not to paint the walls, though they could use a good hint of art on the sound back wall by the starting line.
What Altered egos we have. LOL

Posted By: RalphsRapidTrnst

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/12/14 02:54 AM

Quote:

Can I play?? I promise to stay away from the wallz

Why not.

Posted By: Cab_Burge

Re: Altered Wheelbase car: Torsion bars or straight axle? - 02/12/14 05:40 AM

If you want it to look real like the originals factory sponsored racer cars the factory sponsored racers made you have to move the K member forward and also use the 1965/1966 C body torsion bars

I don't remember a lot of those cars crashing back in the day until they started exceeding 150 + MPH when they went to injection and switch to alcholol with a little "pop" in the tank