[Spridgets] Front Springs

[Bob Spruck]

Jim:

Now that Frank is gone, I plan to campaign for the presidency of the 
We Tight Club. I don't like to pay someone to do something I can do 
(or learn to do) myself or fabricate myself. Seems like you received 
no serious answers to your wanting to lower your rear end.

When I built my '67 vintage racer 20 years ago, I used hand-me-down 
SCCA coils in front. They were shorter than stock but tested out to 
be 585 foot/pounds which is what I wanted.  I needed to lower the 
rear so the car was level for handling and center of gravity 
purposes. My solution should work for anybody. I found some metal of 
various thicknesses that was the same width as the springs and cut it 
into four inch long pieces. With 150 lbs in the driver's seat (three 
cement bags) to replicate my weight, two 1/8 th inch and two 3/16 th 
inch thick spacers on the right side  brought the car to level, i.e. 
equal heights left to right when measured at the bottom of the rocker 
panels. Two additional 1/8 th inch spacers on each side then brought 
the rear down to the same height as the front, measured at the front 
and rear, left and right of the bottom of the rocker panels. The 
spacers mount between the flat boss on the axle housing and the top 
of the leaf. I bought two U-bolts that were long enough to 
accommodate the new dimensions, and cut off the excess threaded ends 
after I reinstalled the stock plates and rubber insulators.

Of course, since the '67 has square wheel arches, I also added a 
Panhard bar, pushed out the outer fender as far as I could with a 
bottle jack, rolled the inner lip, and am using offset leaf springs - 
all to allow the 5.5" wheels and A70 tires. This arrangement has been 
in place for the 20 years I have been racing the car and I have 
experienced no problems with inside or outside rubbing. Lowering the 
rear also gave me better rear visibility because the sheet metal that 
accommodates the convertible top on this year model adds almost 2 
inches in line with the rear view mirror.

Spend some time studying the way the springs are mounted on the axle 
and where to add the spacers, and the job becomes clear and straight 
forward. Fabrication is also simple and straight forward, other than 
acquiring enough metal of the correct width and thickness. I'd be 
glad to send you digital photos if it would help.

Safety Fast,
Bob Spruck





At 04:26 PM 5/17/2011, Jim Johnson wrote:
>Speaking of lowering Spridgets....   I'm wanting to lower the butt end of my
>MKIII Midget. Anyone have any suggestions on an easy way to do this without
>using the Mo$$ kit?
>
>Cheers!!
>Jim
>
>On Tue, May 17, 2011 at 2:59 PM, David Lieb <72spridget at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > Is there an expected life span for standard springs for a road going
> > Sprite?
> >
> > Just as eventually every Jaguar E-Type becomes a lightweight Jag,
> > Every Spridget eventually becomes a lowered Spridget...
> > David L
>_______________________________________________