I am looking at changing the rear shock orientation on my 49 with the lowered 9 inch rear. It should end up being lowered by a good 4 inches. The F-1 stock orientation of the shock is angled front to back which Ford changed at some point (starting with 53?) to being angled side to side. With the lowering of the rear , using the stock upper shock mount the angle gets kind of steep and looks a little strange. The shock does less and less absorbing as the angle increases. In the gallerys it looks like some of you have changed to the later orientation. At this point I have to fab or weld on shock mounts on the rear. Adding a new upper mount for the shocks is straight forward. I have considered using air assisted shocks (Gabrials ?) on the rear after removing several leaves in the interest of getting back hitch weight capability for towing. On a previous thread there was reference to somebody's buddy doing that which I thought was a good idea. That means beefier shock mounts since they would see more load if aired up. What have others done?

 

Gracie has air shocks on the rear for towing. You don't need a great deal of extra capacity, because no trailer should ever have more than 500# tongue weight, and any with more than a couple hundred # should use a load transfer hitch. I'd extend the bottom mounts or use shorter shocks rather than leaning the shocks in at more than about 25-30 degrees.

 

I changed my rear suspension to ladder bar and coil over configuration,so I mounted my shocks almost vertical.I fabbed my own mounts where they needed to be.I realize I use my truck in a totally different way than you , but the principal is the same.I welded a moly round bar across frame at the top,and positioned the bottom where there was no interferance with any other parts.You can buy mounting tabs from JEGS if you choose to do it this way.Hope this is some help...

 

AX, I think that the angle is close to 40 degrees in the stock F-1 truck. That is why I do not like the looks of the original mounts with the truck rear lowered another 4 or 5 inches. What did you use for rear shocks on Gracie? I had thought about using F2 lower shock mounts with the 3 inch diameter tube on my 9 inch. That brings the lower shock mount at about the evevation of the underside of the axle tube. Are you considerably lower that that?

 

Mine came on the truck, I haven't gotten to the back of the truck yet so I can't tell you a whole lot about it, right now the front wheels are up on run-up blocks so the rear bumper is just a couple inches off the ground, too low to check. I can give you more info in a couple weeks when they finish my garage and I can get her inside.

 

AX, that will work for me. Thanks.

Incidentally I just reversed the arch on a junk leaf from a rear spring. This was my practice piece. I did it on my small (built it myserlf years ago out of 3 inch channel) bench press that uses a 12 ton jack. I worked it in about 1 1/2 inch increments. Took about 10 minutes. It would be nice if I had a press with a pressure gage, I have to judge the force by jack handle pressure. It turns out that on my test leaf I was just a little too heavy handed so my arch was just a little high. I will back off a little reversing the eyes on my original main leafs. It worked slick. I did it in two passes. A little too light on the first pass and a little too heavy on the second pass. I think that I now have my right arm calibrated.

 

Yep, best to sneak up on it. Back in the 70's the trend in drag racing was to put a beam axle under the front of cars for weight reduction and jack them way up in the air for weight transfer. I re arched a number of leaf spring to raise up the suspension with just a hand maul and a piece of I beam.

 

Explain that just a little more Ax,I think I need to do something like that on mine...

 

I mounted my shocks side to side and although 25-30 degress is optimum, the angle on mine were dictated by the lower shock mount. I just tightened the bottom bolts and fabricated an upper mount at the top where they ended up. It turned out to be more like 45 degrees. However, I will be running a rear anti-sway bar which will limit side-to-side motion so I think the 45 degree angle will work okay.

Vern

 

The lower the angle the stiffer the shock needs to be to have the same damping effect. At too shallow an angle (>45 from vertical) you stop getting in and out motion needed for damping and the shock starts swinging like a solid link instead. Because it isn't solid it has no effective action so at that point is just along for the ride. On an extremely lowered truck, a belcrank system could be engineered to mount the shock horizontally (caution! most shocks will not work properly on their side, contact your favorite shock manufacturer's tech services for advice if contemplating this type setup!).

 

That makes sense. I didn't measure the angle on the donor car but since that angle is built-in to the OEM shock bracket which I am using, I assume the 45 degree angle was also used in the donor car.

Vern

 

How do you do what you're talking about here , Ax ?

 

Lay a section of I beam on it's side, lay the spring leaf across the two flanges. Give it a whack with a 4# hand maul (short handled sledge hammer) in the center. Move the spring an inch along it's length and whack it again. Keep working the spring like this back and forth from end to end until you have created the arch you want. Each shorter leaf should have a slightly higher arch so it's ends touch the leaf above while leaving a gap in the center.

 

As I indicated in my post, it can also be done readily on a small hydraulic press. I worked it the same way about 1-1 1/2 inches at a time. That is how most spring shops would do it, however for the younger members in the group (swinging a maul verses the jack), AX's method works well and does not require a press. Either way it is not a big deal. It will take you longer to take it to a spring shop and pick it up than to just do it yourself. (And it is free!)

 

So , do you think with the front end ,say 6" higher than the rear,do you think I can get it to hook up once I get the ladder bars adjusted ?