A body tall spindles

[jake72ss]

Back 8 years ago I built the suspension on my 72 ss chevelle, I used global west negative roll front upper control arms and b body spindles. Now I would like to change a few things, I would like to use some sort of tall spindle that more closely resembles the stock spindles. In a perfect world I would replace everything on the front with either DSE or SC&C stuff, and sell my current a arms and spindles. But for now before I waist anymore $ I would like to know if either the new L&H, or Ride Tech 2" drop spindles will work with my global west upper a arms. I'm not totally sure if this is correct or not but I think I remember Marcus at sc&c telling me that the ball joints in my upper a arms were vega lower ball joints, which seems right the ball joints are neither screw in or bolt in so I assume they are press in. I'm not sure if the upper ball joint taper for the b body spindles will interchange with the upper bj taper on the stock or aftermarket spindles. Another option I've thought of would consist of cutting the upper bj cup off of my GW a arms and replacing them with screw in sleeves that I could use the Howe tall upper ball joints with and use some drum spindles with. Any help/ or suggestions appreciated.

Thanks, Jake

[Blake Foster]

for starters the King pin angle of the B body spindle is different that the first gen spindle. that is why the upper control arms are specific to the spindle swap, the upper ball jounts are different as are the lowers.

you will have to replace eveything or nothing. including the outer tie rod ends.

[lhkustoms]

Jake, the king pin angle (kpi) on a stock spindle and ours as well is 8 deg and the B body kpi is 10 deg which makes your upper a arm 1/2" too short. We do offer the 10deg taper ball joint inserts as an option but you will need to replace the upper A arm. We do offer the Gen II uca for $299 including stock ball joints and we can install the stock taper upper inserts and the b body 10 deg taper lowers in the spindles to fit your application if needed. We offer the Gen II upper & lowers for $800 as well. Here is a pic of the Gen II uca.
http://i370.photobucket.com/albums/oo141/lhkustoms/chevelle/AbodyUCA.jpg
I would stay away from 2" drop spindles if you are wanting to really improve the handling as you would want to install our non drop spindle and then lower the car with springs to get the lbj pivot level with the mounting bolts and the car will be too low to do this if using drop spindles. Feel free to give me a call if you have any questions.

[jake72ss]

I didn't realize that the kpi was different between the two spindles. Blake, as far as the AFX spindles go I thought I remember that Tyler had designed the tall versions to be used to replace the b body spindles on A body cars. I may be dreaming I just thought I remembered that. The biggest thing is that I hate to lose the $ I already have invested or that I will have a hard time selling what I have due to everyone knowing that the B body stuff is inferior to just about all of the new options.

Jake

[Blake Foster]

the "B" body spindle and the "A" body spindle have different KPI angles, so the issue is if you do the "B" body swap then the upper control arm is a different length to make the swap work. so then to go back to a "A" body spindle you also need to change the upper contrlo arm, as well because the lower ball joint taper on the "B" spindle is different than the "A" you now need to change the lower arm. we have AFX spindles with both Ball joint tapers "A and B" but the KPI angle is the same on both.
we have recently built a UCA for the Second gen camaro to be able to use the AFX spindle with the original ball joints but you need to change the uppers and lowers to make it work. and you are in the same boat you need to use someones complete system.

i will confirm with Tyler what the combination for the B spindlees he was using and post it here.

[jake72ss]

thanks, it just sucks doing something expensive to your car only to find out it's not as great as you thought.

[Blake Foster]

hense all the information here and on other forums. just have to remember that not all the information is "Good" or Correct.

The B body spindle conversion is really not the best solution even from the outset. it is an old fix for a problem that the aftermarket has now fixed with much better parts. yes you get the taller spindle, but you also get more unsprung weight less brake options and need the custom arms that do not let you do any other conversion down the road..

if you used the stock spindles, or any of the aftermarket "tall spindles" most of which also have a 2" drop which is not recomended, (See sticky in this forum) or the ATS spindle then you can forgo all the weird arms combinations and just stick with the basics even the stock spindle with a tall ball joint is a better option IMO

if i were you i would try and sell what you have and then formulate a plan based on what your planning on doing with the car and bite the bullet and go for it.

[jake72ss]

I did this conversion without being properly educated, this was before the ATS spindles were available, in fact when I did this the a bodies in the Car Craft RSE at the Bristol Bash all used the B body stuff.

[Vince@Meanstreets]

yep I remember, 8 years ago that set up was the cats meow but as time went on keen suspension guys found that it truly wasnt the optimum set up although it did "feel" better over the stock set up.

I believe that was mainly due to the alignment set up change that went along with the swap.