Quote:
Originally Posted by tuzzio
You know, you almost lost me when you said "the cold winters". I woke up this morning and it was 1* in New England. hahaha.
Awesome content. So much style and clearly shredding that NA KA. Good stuff man. At first I was like man, should've kept the car white! But the wheel choices and aero made the black look good. Good thread.
|
thanks man! I know that shit don't compare to the winters up north but fuck I'm used to living near the equator
Quote:
Originally Posted by Touge_Monster
Killer build and great thread. Thanks for sharing your progression!
|
thank you sir!
So now that it was almost time to take the hatch back out, I needed to address that busted knuckle bushing issue. no point in fixing the quarter only to roast it again.
When the rear of the car was jacked up, I could grab the wheel and move it a couple millimeters in any direction. Further analysis revealed that the hub had some play, the arms had play, and the axle had play. I spent a few days reviewing my options, and concluded that if the whole rear suspension requires an overhaul to repair these issues, there?s no point in re-installing the OEM knuckle with crusty old bushings (or new bushings, for that matter). I?ve thought about rear drop knuckles for quite some time, but I never did much research to understand how they work or how they would help alleviate some of my issues. I already have solid subframe risers, and the subframe sits as high as it can get without making SERIOUS modifications to the body and subframe.
I went back and forth between a lot of drop knuckle options and settled on Driftworks. The 50mm correction, rubber bushings, and keeping the hubs in the stock location sealed the deal. While I was at it, I grabbed new RUCAs and traction rods:
Old crusty parts out:
In 2018, I broke a RUCA heim after the joint kept smashing into the frame from the ride height:
same with the other side:
traction rods also hit:
Given that the knuckles are almost entirely custom made and not re-iterations of a factory knuckle, I expected some minor fitment issues. The large cut-out for the bearing carrier to sit in was slightly too tight, and required shaving off 1-2 mm for the carrier to slide in flush. The two mounts for the brake caliper were not perfectly linear with each other, and came a little bent. Those needed to be hammered back straight so the caliper bracket sat perfectly centered on the knuckle in relation to the rotor. Again, these were just minor issues, and I assume fitment varies some across applications given that this was a fully custom part. Despite the minor issues, everything tied together nicely:
The knuckles are THICK and well-reinforced throughout. I was pretty happy with the construction of the units.
Note below my suspension geometry prior to the Driftworks Geomaster II knuckles. I?m no engineer, but those arms look ready for takeoff Apollo 11-spec. You can also see the jam nut on the RUCA making contact with the frame in a resting position (imagine the forces those things took under load while transitioning). The P2M angled toe rods which are designed to provide clearance against hitting the subframe bushing STILL make contact under load.
And below, my new corrected angles with the Geomaster II knuckles:
For the height the car is at, I'm VERY pleased with the amount of roll-center correction these knuckles gave me. I wasn't expecting to obtain fully functional flat angles with maximum grip and decreased-camber-upon-compression type setup. I really just wanted my arms to behave themselves and stop hitting my car.
For reference, here?s the height of the car when the above photo was taken, just to emphasize the amount of correction one can expect to obtain from these knuckles:
Final thoughts:
These knuckles achieved the desired result for me. For you nerds that love function, they also zeroed out my camber quite a bit, even after I pre-set my new RUCA and traction rod to the EXACT same lengths as my previous setup. Obviously I had no desire to change my car's setup, so a few adjustments from a string alignment brought me back to my old setup. I highly recommend these knuckles to anyone seeking to retain some functionality with a lowered car. The GKTech arms also worked well with this application and had a large amount of adjustability. I had to raise the coilovers 50mm to compensate for the drop from the drop knuckles, and when I lowered the car the frame hit the floor before the wheels did. The Broadway Static coilovers are actually at their highest safely-permissible setting at the moment, with 25mm of the shock body threaded into the coilover body. If I wanted to raise the car any more, I'd need to purchase longer coilover body mounts!