Datsun Roadster Forum-311s.org

I am retired and have little money to spend on my 70 roadster but I do have lots of time. I had the roadster up on my lift yesterday looking at the front spring seats to see if I could lower them myself and how much trouble it would be. Looks to me that the 4 bolts securing said seat could be removed so the seat could be removed, then have, say, 1" individual ears or a continuous lip welded with new holes to drop the seat down at exactly the same angle and everything thus achieving a lowered front end.

Any thoughts? seems like it would be relatively easy.

Scott

Sounds reasonable to me. You could leave the original holes so that it could be returned to stock if desired.

I would go with a continuous lip, which would perform better as a shear web.

A thread on making the perches:
viewtopic.php?f=3&t=24193&p=216461&hili ... es#p216461



Lowered spring perches on Mike Braaten's SR20-powered '70:

Shear web for the win!

I think I'll do it this winter. Will post pics of my method.

Rob Hewitson in Australia did that to a 67 2000 years ago. He had a website with pictures but it is gone.

I had forgotten that I got a bunch of parts when I bought my roadster. Turns out I have two each lower control arms complete so will be able to use the spring seats off of them to modify for this project.

I have to ask why that method? You can buy affordable after market
springs which drop the car 1-1.5” that simply drop in. They have increased spring rate and also improve ride stability.

If you drop it much more than that an use stock springs, the lower a-arm will hit the tie rods
on hard bumps. (Not a good thing) Then you need heim joints. If you don’t do all this correctly, you really mess-up the suspension geometry.

OK. My method costs me nothing, that is the reason for doing it at all. You make a good point, and I am glad you did. I won't do it then. If I win the lottery (which I don't play) I'll come to you for the springs/bilsteins.

Springs themselves are not too expensive and accomplish the lowering objective easily without any disadvantages even if Bil’s are not in the current budget. WAY easier method.

Cheers!

Or you have this option (not lowering as such, but improving the ride)

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=17581&p=243819&hili ... ng#p243819

Thank you CSP311! His mod really shows that small changes in things make big differences. I found this out on my VG powered 510 when playing with spring lengths for the rear end. Good info.