Trouble fitting new suspension with 03 Cobra wheels

[redsn95gt]

I have UPR coilovers with QA1 springs and Tokico shocks. Also have a UPR k-member with tubular A-arms, fat ebiach sway bar, MM caster plates and adjustable camber bolts. I was running all 4 corners 275/40/17 with OEM 03 cobra wheels for a track setup on stock front suspension (except for Tokicos and ebiach springs) which fit great, but with the coil overs and arms they barley fit, even with the camber bolts maxed and plates adjusted. The A-arms seem to move the wheel about a 1/2" farther out so the wheels do stick out from the fender now. Even with this, I have less than a 1/4" gap between the coil spring and the rim which I don't think is very safe to ride on. I'd like to be able to fit my hand in there at least. The ride height is already pretty high right now, more than I want. If i lower the coil over sleeve any more, the spring hits the rim or tire.

Just wondering if anyone else has run 03 Cobra wheels on a aftermarket suspension setup like this and got it to fit with a decent ride height. It seems like now I need a totally new offset wheel, and I'm not feeling buying a whole new set of wheels. A spacer might solve this but the wheel already sticks out a bit past the fender. I thought maybe of jumping down to a 245 tire but its touching the rim just about so tire size wouldn't help much.

 

[Sharad]

It sounds like your front springs are 14". Typically, if you run 12" front springs, you won't have a tire clearance issue with the spring collar. So that's something we can help you with.

About the width of the control arms, our tubular a-arms are designed to keep the spindle in the factory location (neither wider or narrower on the track width) HOWEVER... we do offer A-arms that are shorter than the factory width, so that might be a good move for you as well.

I ordered a custom set of wheels for my car, and somehow I screwed up my educated guess on the front wheel offset. (the tires stuck out a little) I ordered a set of our 1" shorter a-arms and they are perfect!

Anyway, let us know how we can help you with this. You can reach me through PMs here on Stangnet, or you can reach the shop at 561.588.6630.

 

[redsn95gt]

Hi thanks for the info. I am running 12"-350lb QA1 springs currently. The car is stripped down for racing so I compensated by running a shorter stiffer spring but not too hard so i can still ride on the street. I'm going to fiddle with the casters again today. I feel like i'm not positioning something correct or something.

UPDATE: After a few hours of SN95 suspension research, I discovered the 350's are way too stiff for this setup and is the reason I am hearing them knock when going over bumps. It's probably keeping my ride height over stock height as well. I am going to keep the 12" length under the rule of thumb that you should run the longest spring possible for least wear on the shocks (14"/175lb would be ideal but they won't fit with these wheels) and I will be changing the weight to a 200lb spring. The 12"/200lb spring should drop the ride height a little bit and I will still be able to keep the spring perch directly in the center of the coil over where it should be. I will probably have to run a 1/4" spacer on the wheel to get an acceptable distance from the spring. Later on when I change wheels I can do a proper offset that will make a perfect fit.

 

[redsn95gt]

Update - Ok my new QA1 12"-200lb springs came today (along with my new rear height adjustable LCAs woo woooo!) so I swapped those in and instantly dropped about .5" from the same spot on the collar. Very sweet! But spring needs to be tighter still, collar is low. I was still hitting the rim of course so I got a set of 5/16" spacers cheap at pep-boys. This fixed my spacing problem and I was able to crank up the collar to the center dropping another .25". Collar is in perfect center and ride height is looking slick. Camber adjustment ahoy however. Thankfully i have 4 bolt MMs.

So driver side done I approach the passenger side and find the strangest thing. I have like a whopping 1.75" between the spring and the rim. I'm dumbfounded, this side has so much room it doesn't even need a spacer. So i'm really puzzled how I have no room on one side and too much on the other. I am going to check my tie rod end links but i'm sure those are even. I'm running a steeda bump steer kit on there.

If i ever figure this out i'll have it on here for future reference.