adjustable bottom arms

[hayesey]

had my wheel alignment sorted out the other day at RE Performance in Bury.  

The main bloke there is called Ken who has been setting up rally cars for years, he's proper old school, old boy, mechanic.  Anyway he was saying that he couldn't properly sort my camber out because there is such a small amount of adjustment in the salzmann top mounts I've got.  He also said the design of them is pretty poor as it cocks the castor angle up as you adjust the camber which is kind of obvious by the way they work.

Anyway he said I'd be much better off with some top mounts that slide from side to side instead but then I mentioned that I had been considering getting/making some adjustable bottom arms which he said was by far the best way forward if possible.  Have a locked in place top mount and adjustable arms.

I do remember seeing such a thing for sale once, can't remember where though.  Has anyone seen anything like that or know of something that could be modified to work?

[Robin]

a few weeks ago there was a pair of G40 bottom arsm on ebay which had joints on it so that it could be adjusted so you could set the camber, don't know who made them but they only went for like £30!

[PeteG40]

g-ladersiete do them with with adjustable centre bush.

[hayesey]

yeah I've seen those pete but they don't look like there's much adjustment there.  Shame I missed that ebay auction robin, did they look ok?

[Andy]

No, they were shafted!

Yoof and I were going to get some made up once our man's finished the mammouth subframe orders. Think Yoof's going for custom top-mounts though.

[hayesey]

this guy seemed to think adjustable bottom arms would be better than adjustable top mounts.  Although I guess they'd both give the correct results as long as the top mounts aren't eccentric ones.

I've seen lots of bottom arms for things like mk2 escorts, capris, sierras and stuff.  Some are manufactured from scratch but some are modified standard ones, although they look a lot meatier than polo ones so I'm not sure if there;'s enough metal part way down a standard one to weld to strongly enough.  There certainly isn't enough to drill and tap into which some of those ones looked like. 

Looking at pictures of some of them I'm wondering if sierra ones would just fit with the right bearings.

[Yoof]

From my past geeking sessions the ball joint is too small in the Ford ones, I think it's 17mm for the Polo items... and they look a little short.

Our subframe man has quite a few mockups for different designs (all tacked together, nothing substantial) but we've not got any on our cars or tested them yet. He's very much into his Mk2 Escorts, so I think if there was an easy alternative he'd have got it 

As you know the ultimate set-up involves a stage 3 frame, adjustable bottom arm and adjustable top mounts 

[hayesey]

I suspect the ball joint is in the wrong location and/or angle too.