Lateral Dynamics 3 link. Won 1st Ultimate Street car challenge against other 4link setups mentioned in this thread. That tell you enough about it?

Tyler

Yeah and you got to experiance it first hand....that had to be kisk ass!!

I don't know that I would quite put all the titles weight on the rear suspension. Pretty complete package in Penny. From the drivers seat to the rubber.

Are they still in business?

The drivers had a LOT to do with that, but that is a really good 3 link. If you put the same driver in all the cars, the result would have been very much different all the way around.

from what i hear he is still in "business"...

I was very impressed with the Lateral Dynamics 3 link on Bad Penny, this system would have to be rated at the top right now.

It's not like you really notice "wow, this rear suspension is really working". It's more like you don't notice any instability or bumps upsetting the rear, often getting something right just takes it away from the driver's perception of it. I also found that the case with the Bilstein shocks on Penny, there just wasn't an issue raised with the shocks. My hat's off to Steve's Bilstein guy.

The car did everything I asked of it and was very easy to drive, yes we had understeer, but other than that, the whole package just flat worked very well. A large part of my getting good results in the car was how easy it was to just hop in and drive the snot out of it! :thumbsup: The rear did NOTHING funny, put the power down VERY well from standing start to 95mph curves at 1.2g's :unibrow:

I'm a big fan of leaf springs, I think the only drawback they have is higher unsprung weight, this makes them less ideal for ride characteristics. You can put spherical bearings in them like GW cat 5, but those springs are very stiff and you feel the bumps much more through the bearings. Stock rubber front bushings are better riding but I'm sure you lose a little bit of directional stability.

Hopefully I will be working hard on my 67 Camaro this winter, and am now trying to choose what rear suspension I will use. I am torn between just throwing the Hotchkis leafs on it that I already have and suspect will be a tad soft, or going whole hog on the LD 3 link. With a roll bar in the car, I doubt I'll ever put a passenger in the back seat, it would be suicide. It's just that this was my first car, and I will be keeping it fairly stock looking inside, without the usual PT bling, I actually LIKE the factory gauges, -but it will be kinda serious in the engine and suspension dept.

I see a lot of value in the DSE quadralink, G bar/Air bar, Speed Tech torque arm or Alston rear. I doubt anyone driving on the street would need more, not to say they would not work on a track at all, there is no reason they should not work great. It's hard for me to comment on them since I haven't driven cars with them.

Lap time wise, I doubt there is a big difference between any of them, but for the highest driver confidence / comfort level, and tuneability, I'd lean towards the Lateral Dynamics 3 link. The things I don't like about it are the extra tubing/bracing/linkage for the bellcrank. I'd like to use a 12 bolt rear axle, but access to the rear cover would be tough. I think I'd have to switch to a Ford 9" rear.
David

Jakes Rod Shop Torque arm
 

Check the Torqe arm out in action..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDGgbCm0HcQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhE4q...eature=related

I went to the track to see it first hand. It carves!

Matt,
Did you have some final driving impressions between your 3-link and the 4-link set up on your car? I believe you were still comparing a month or so ago if I recall correctly. Differences, feel, etc?

Thanks

I think for the money the 3 link is way over priced its atleast 1 grand higher then everything out plus you have to use a 9" so account for another 2gs on that aswell. G bar looks easy to install and great for the money leafs of course are the cheap way but on the street they get the job done.

My 2 cents

Sorry I ignored this post above and didn't address it before.

The Cat 5 spring has a rate of 240 lbs/inch and has metal spherical bearings on each end, most other tuner springs are 175 and come with rubber front eye bushings. Any of those leaf springs will ride better than the Cat5. On my wife's 73 Camaro we removed Hotchkis leafs and installed the Cat5. Much rougher ride. tires make a big difference in ride quality too. With our race tires the car rode terrible on the Cat5's, with street rubber it was tolerable, still stiff but not as harsh.

David

I have replaced a couple sets of those Cat 5s for complaining customers (harsh ride) and replaced them with Hotchkis or DSE (lower rate and rubber bushings). There is a point where you get way to solid and stiff with leafs, especially for a street car.

Those are sensible words... too much desk top engineering will usually send teh build in a direction that might not be what you really want in the end.... id listen to frank and do a prodogy rear bar or what ever he calls it now :D :D

i agree that its a lot more money, but the 9" is included. its close to a grand from the other companies. if you dont need the 9", youll still spend 15+ hours cutting off the old brackets and welding on all those new brackets in the right place. the 9" is well worth the price from any of the vendors in my opinion.

Tim

independent rear suspension ! like a c6

I finally have soem installed pics of the new Chassisworks G-Link for you guys to take a gander at. They`re not great pics and these are pre production parts so the final welding and surface finishe aren`t done but it gives you a good idea of where they`ve made changes and improvements. Check out how roomy it is now, exhaust should be a piece of cake. TrueCenter greasable delrin pivots at all 8 points. Note all the adj. holes to tune anti squat, IC location and roll steer. The LCA mounts even incorperate integral trailer tie down loops. I think that`s a really neat touch. They saved additional weight by eliminating a lot of the old tubular upper structure. The new upper mounting structure directly reinforces the unibody rails.The adj. rate swaybar is frame mounted,making it sprung weight and it`s geometry allows it to generate high rates with a small OD and less mass. It`s all very clean engineering and extremely lightweight. Note that there is still NO cutting involved at all. We`ll have better pics in a week or so. The G-Link will also be shipping by then so the pre-order pricing will be over. There`s still a little time to save a few hundred bucks. Mark SC&C

http://i158.photobucket.com/albums/t...o_g-Bar_01.jpg

http://i158.photobucket.com/albums/t...o_g-Bar_03.jpg

Actually, that is a production Chassisworks piece...those are the production finishes.
Tim

Also there are weld on lower brackets option available for a cleaner / non adapted look.

We have a few one order and will be putting one in my personal car in the next couple weeks. Cannot wait.

Tim,
If I want to use my existing 12 bolt and not use the u-bolts provided, what provisions are there for weld on housing brackets for the lower arms?

Chris

We already sold a couple kits with weld on brackets. $50 more for weld on brackets.

Mopar E-body please.........

I second the E-body.

Thanks Tim, straight from the horses mouth. Poor wording on my part, I meant to say that the welding and surface finishes of the install (including the car ie. rusty parts) weren`t done yet. ;)

The weld on brackets are a great option for a cleaner look. They`re almost elegant.
You can also get the swaybar mounts (either style) for $50 without the bar if you want to leave your options open but don`t want to cough up the extra for the whole bar now. Personally I love that adj. rate bar! The axle mounted bar with its billet arms is really pretty and functional too but tuning options make me all warm and fuzzy. :yes:

Maybe Tim can give some more info on other applications but last I talked to Chris there are plans to do a G-Link for all of the G-Bar applications so E-Body should be coming. Knowing how long this stuff takes to do right I suspect it may be a while though. In the mean time the existing G-Bar for those cars is a darn good system in it`s own right and we`ll be offering billet/greasable pivot ball double adj. arms for them like those on the G-Link. We have a Hellwig adj. rate rear swaybar for them as well. That gets you pretty close to a G-Link. Mark SC&C

Just a quick update on the G-Link. They`re shipping which is very cool! We also just became aware of a clearance issue when using the bolt on G-Link LCA brackets in mini tubbed applications. Some big mini tubb only wheel dia. and backspace combinations may not clear the lower coil over mounting bracket. The arms and brackets are much more beefy and they added additional adjustment holes so the brackets are a bit larger than the original G-Bar. If you want to run minitubbs just select the weld on lower arm mounts. They can be installed further inboard for clearance and Chassisworks is already working on instructions and an offset bushing kit for the front of the lower arms to preserve the correct geometry. The upper coilover mounts have plenty of holes for adjustment so no changes will be required there at all. CW will be doing at least one narrowed rear swaybar for minitubb applications and the adj. rate Hellwig rear bars should work as well. Thanks to Frank at Prodigy who`s helping Chassisworks with the fittment details on his mini tubbed cars. Mark SC&C

http://www.ridetech.com/products/Chr...es-824-75.html

Here's a guy with lots of actual competitive autocross and road racing experiance. And he's a hands on guy that works on his own stuff to boot.

And it's like everyone just blew right by this post.

Thanks for reposting that. ^^^^^ It has a ton of really good insight in there. I know I blew past it the first time I went through this thread. I should have paid attention. :cheers:

Thats where I'm at, is the Quadri or G-link "THAT" much better to justify the cost or is it the bling? If your not racing what good is tuneality? Once its set for the street, doubtful it will ever be readjusted again. What I'm looking for is a wider rear tire, but again at what expense and is the worth, what, 2"?
I'm just trying to better hook up my LS7, and who knows I may be looking at it all wrong? I have Hotchkis now for rear springs with a set of Cat 5's sitting on a shelf. What gains do you really get with mini tubs, wider tires before I get a serious pushing effect? I mean how wide before I experiance new problems? I also love Lateral Dynamics rear suspension, but where are they now? Last I heard it was not shipping. So now its DSE's Quadri, which I heard is a pain for the exhaust, and the G-link, which I know nothing about.

Here is a G link istall we just finished. Pretty cool stuff and a easy install. The adjustability is especially nice if you are dual purposing the car. The ride of any good four link compared to performance leafs is reason enough to run a 4 link. Tire wise, you can mini tub and run 335s with leafs or four links. But doing a mini tub leaf spring car today is a pure welcome to 1999 set up. The net cost of components difference between a mini tub G link or Quadra Link kit and a mini tub leaf spring kit is about $1500. Easily recovered in added value of the finished car.


http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u...s/DSC_8130.jpg

http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u...s/DSC_8095.jpg

http://i169.photobucket.com/albums/u...s/DSC_7475.jpg

awesome car, you've got some skill frank

Frank--is this at the lowest setting? It looks like it from the shocks being spun down all way---perhaps that was just the install---Just wondering if you could go lower with it.

Who's car?
 

Who does this beauty belong to? Don't see it in the members section

We just finished it and sent it home to California.

As for ride height, we set it up that way, customer did not want it to low. it would go lower thoough

thats pretty under the rear:thumbsup: :unibrow:

Looks great looking to do this over winter can't wait to see the ride difference from springs.

Looks looks a solid setup.. I like the all in one bracket. Looks stout and frees up some room for exhaust.

I was looking at it for height too. The pics of the bracket? Are they with the suspension at full droop? Was wondering cause the sway bar arm is pointed way up from the looks of it. Any more compression on the suspension looks like it will push the sway bar's arm link pretty far forward. Id prolly like to see a longer link and have the arm a lil more level with the ground. Might just be the pics giving the look that the arm is pointing up alot.

But I like the ride height of the car on the side shot, looks good.

Everything looks good. Cept Id like to see a longer sway bar end link. Looks kinda short with the arm pointed up. JR

this thread was started on: 03-31-2008, 03:39 AM ... what did he end up going with?

Pulling The Trigger???
 

I think at the bottom of the first page he said something like pulling the trigger. Either he :faint: offed himself or i guess went with the lateral dynamics.

After getting sidetraked twice, than Lateral Dynamics back log/woes, I'm going to go Speed Tech:thumbsup: now that the Christmas bleeding of the accounts:wow: is over:woot:

good choice! :thumbsup: