How much did all those lowering springs actually lower? SN95 question

bennylava · Aug 23, 2022

About 5 years ago I bought some lowering springs for my 94 Gt from Late Model Resto. They claimed to lower the car 2", in reality it was 1" at most. But upon closer inspection, when running 18" wheels, the 94-98 cars look like they really should be lowered somewhere around 3 inches. Maybe it's 3.5", because you need to account for raising the car up an inch with the bigger rims. Do you agree? How low do you think the car should go if I still want it to be somewhat streetable? Remember, it gets raised a whole inch by the 18" wheels. I prefer not to sacrifice any tire height.

I like the car to be very low, but still above "slammed". I'm hoping someone here knows the right set of springs to accomplish this. I don't think it's the obligatory Eibach Pro kit. IIRC those only lowered the car something like 1.5". Not nearly enough.

Thanks!

Essn95 · Aug 23, 2022

Coilovers will get you where you need to be. To look good imo you need H&R springs with no isos which yields the biggest drop of the springs

bird_dog0347 · Aug 23, 2022

The size of the rim doesn't raise or lower the car, you need to pay attention to the overall diameter of the tires. If you want a ride height at a specific place or have the ability to adjust it easily, you'd be better off with a Coil Over setup.

Mustang5L5 · Aug 23, 2022

It’s not that these cars sit too high, but more that the fender gaps are just so large that the car needs to drop that far just to close up the gaps. There are drawbacks to lowering the car too much on stock suspension parts in terms of handling and practicality (speed bumps for example).

Did you install new isolators with the springs? Were they poly by any chance? That will lift the car up 1/4" or so more than if you use rubber isos.

mustystang · Aug 23, 2022

I agree with the above. Stock suspension is best and not as rough a ride. Get some bigger tires that fill up the wells. If money is no object then maybe a lowered setup would be doable. There's better performance parts I would be spending my money on though. I get enough rocks and road tar as is, no way would I consider lowering something that didn't come lowered from factory.

bennylava · Aug 24, 2022

Mustang5L5 said:
It’s not that these cars sit too high, but more that the fender gaps are just so large that the car needs to drop that far just to close up the gaps. There are drawbacks to lowering the car too much on stock suspension parts in terms of handling and practicality (speed bumps for example)

Yeah that's the real issue, sucking up that gap. Speed bumps used to give me trouble in my old car. Maybe an air suspension could help with that while giving a better ride. Raise it just a bit for parking lots. There's some air suspension racing company so I don't think handling would suffer too much by going that route. But I'm not going road racing, so taking corners at high speed isn't a huge concern.

WhiteCobra95 · Aug 24, 2022

The FR C-springs lowered my car the exact amounts quoted in the catalog.

bennylava · Aug 25, 2022

mustystang said:
I knew someone who had adjustable air suspension on a VW. He also had those slanted tires that look ridiculous so..
Here's a good article on tilted tires. https://www.hotcars.com/tilted-wheels-explained-and-if-its-useful/
I am a disbeliever in tilted tires. Increased inner tire wear, which is important. Now unless you are driving in circles I can't see any practicality unless you need that crutch to take corners and keep up. I bet they would fail at some point unpredictably as well. I also wouldn't trust air suspension to hold up on some of my corners. You may need new wheels or spacers to get what you want, but there can be benefits to not being so tight as well. I personally run square and as wide and big as possible without adjusting stock wheels. Newer gen mustangs can go significantly wider than what I run though. At some point I may consider slightly wider in the rears. I may have slight rubbing in the front at full lock currently.

WhiteCobra95 said:
The FR C-springs lowered my car the exact amounts quoted in the catalog.

When did you buy them though? I bought the early models, before they changed them. Didn't feel like getting some kind of refund and redoing all the work since the car is mainly a garage queen. But when I go to working on it again and driving it again, their springs gotta go.

bennylava · Aug 25, 2022

mustystang said:
I knew someone who had adjustable air suspension on a VW. He also had those slanted tires that look ridiculous so..
Here's a good article on tilted tires. https://www.hotcars.com/tilted-wheels-explained-and-if-its-useful/
I am a disbeliever in tilted tires. Increased inner tire wear, which is important. Now unless you are driving in circles I can't see any practicality unless you need that crutch to take corners and keep up. I bet they would fail at some point unpredictably as well. I also wouldn't trust air suspension to hold up on some of my corners. You may need new wheels or spacers to get what you want, but there can be benefits to not being so tight as well. I personally run square and as wide and big as possible without adjusting stock wheels. Newer gen mustangs can go significantly wider than what I run though. At some point I may consider slightly wider in the rears. I may have slight rubbing in the front at full lock currently.

Yeah but I don't think tilting the tires is actually necessary if you have air suspension. I believe you could put in an air suspension system that didn't actually do that. The accomplish it on all those squarebody trucks, raising and lowing the truck 6-8". Also I'll try to find that air suspension racing company... can't remember where I saw that. It may have been on My Classic Car. They had some old camaro (among a few others) that they'd road race on their air suspension. They wanted to prove to everyone that handling doesn't die just because you went with the soft cushy air ride. This was probably 8 years ago though. Been a while.

bennylava · Aug 25, 2022

Your 4 minute editing time royally sucks, admin. I'd change it. Just going through and correcting a few spelling and grammar errors takes longer than that.

bennylava · Aug 25, 2022

Either that or some people will just make a lot more posts I guess.

WhiteCobra95 · Aug 25, 2022

bennylava said:
When did you buy them though? I bought the early models, before they changed them. Didn't feel like getting some kind of refund and redoing all the work since the car is mainly a garage queen. But when I go to working on it again and driving it again, their springs gotta go.

I installed mine in 2009. They were purchased a year or two before that. You make a good point, some parts can change over time if they get re-sourced. I would hope that FR quality control would keep the same general specifications and performance. However, there are no guarantees with aftermarket parts. I can only give you the limited information I have based on the experience with my mostly stock car.

I think the other guys make some good points. You have to choose your suspension parts to fit the driving characteristic you're looking for. Then select a wheel and tire combination to fit the wheel wells and performance goal as needed. Using springs to extend or retract the suspension too far from stock is going to compromise the performance and in some cases have serious adverse effects on how it drives. This why some companies like Steeda offer offset balljoints to maintain correct suspension geometry while lowering the wheel position and body at the same time. (I've never used them and can't comment on how well they work.)

Essn95 · Aug 25, 2022

Here is me on B springs with no isolators. 275/35/18 tires on 18x9 wheel

General karthief · Aug 25, 2022

bennylava said:
Your 4 minute editing time royally sucks, admin. I'd change it. Just going through and correcting a few spelling and grammar errors takes longer than that.

What are you talking about?

TIGGER · Aug 26, 2022

I lowered my wife’s old beater 96gt last summer with H&R springs and fox struts. I thought the stance looked good and it rode nice. I always hated the wheels though but they were 18’s.

bennylava · Aug 30, 2022

Essn95 said:
Coilovers will get you where you need to be. To look good imo you need H&R springs with no isos which yields the biggest drop of the springs

Well my question has pretty much been answered. So I might as well ask you - What's the story on those two-top cobras? Was that a Ford factory deal? Or was it some aftermarket company? I always wanted to install some kind of removable hard top on my car. Even if I had to pay some engineering company to do it... or something.

Essn95 · Aug 30, 2022

bennylava said:
Well my question has pretty much been answered. So I might as well ask you - What's the story on those two-top cobras? Was that a Ford factory deal? Or was it some aftermarket company? I always wanted to install some kind of removable hard top on my car. Even if I had to pay some engineering company to do it... or something.

It was a factory ford option in 1995 only. They produced 499 with the removable hardtop out of the 1003 convertibles from that year. I have seen someone install the Ford Hardtop on a normal vert with minimal modification. However, it is nearly impossible to find the hardtops. There is an aftermarket company called smooth line that makes hardtops for convertibles as well.

Smoothline.com

www.smoothline.com

BlakeusMaximus · Aug 30, 2022

My buddy's dad had a black one too, years ago. I didn't know what to think when I first saw that car.

How much did all those lowering springs actually lower? SN95 question

bennylava

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Essn95

bird_dog0347

still married haven't seen testicles in years

Mustang5L5

That is…until I whipped out my Bissell

mustystang

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bennylava

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WhiteCobra95

bennylava

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bennylava

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bennylava

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Essn95

General karthief

wonder how much it would cost to ship you a pair

TIGGER

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Still got to try a little lube on my speedo head

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How much did all those lowering springs actually lower? SN95 question

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wonder how much it would cost to ship you a pair

Attachments

Member

Still got to try a little lube on my speedo head

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