Front end rebuild 1972 Duster
The PST kit came today.
I was already ahead of the game a bit before the stuff arrived. I used some of my new/unused stuff including urethane strut rod bushings, offset upper control arm bushings, lower control arm bushings and upper ball joints.
You may wonder why I’d buy a whole kit when all I really needed was lower ball joints and grease boots. I know, it seems odd but have you tried to find grease boots for ball joints? If there are some available that fit like stock that you can buy without having to buy a ball joint with it, I’d love to know. You can get grease seals for tie rod ends but they are like umbrellas. They do keep dirt out (sort of) but the grease can just weep out as you drive. This means more frequent lube jobs and grease blobs on the underside of the car.
Of course, the upper and lower control arm hardware is still loose and won’t be tightened until the car is on the ground.
I mentioned this front sway bar earlier…
It won’t look familiar. It is from a 1973-87 Chevy 2WD C-30 1 ton truck and it measures 1 1/4”.
In 2000 I was in the early days of tinkering with my ‘70 Charger and looking for ways to improve the handling. I was under my ‘84 Chevy truck and noticed that the shape was similar to the Charger front sway bar. I found that with a little work, the Chevy bar could be modified to fit the car. The ends of the bar had to be cut back and new holes drilled for the end links. The Chevy bar fit but was slightly narrow from end link to end link. The B body chassis is a bit wider than the 67-76 A body so it turns out that the A body is a better fit.
I’ve made 5 of these for myself and friends. One is in my 67 Dart, another in my Jigsaw Charger, another was put in a 71 Challenger.
The end links are just the right width for this car.
I know, aftermarket sway bars are available but cheap upgrades like this are right up my alley. You can get a bar like this at a junkyard for less than $40. I already had bushings and hardware so this setup was cheap. I haven’t seen any aftermarket bars of this size for this car so that is a plus.
This car still has stock .85 torsion bars and parts store shocks. Even with a worn out front end, it rode and handled quite well.
All four ball joints were bad. All the bushings were too. I did use the shorter length strut rods with the coarse threaded ends.
The last thing to do is to slide in the torsion bars. I have a few bad core plugs to replace though. I’m going to have more room to reach them with the bars out of the way.
The PST kit came today.
I was already ahead of the game a bit before the stuff arrived. I used some of my new/unused stuff including urethane strut rod bushings, offset upper control arm bushings, lower control arm bushings and upper ball joints.
You may wonder why I’d buy a whole kit when all I really needed was lower ball joints and grease boots. I know, it seems odd but have you tried to find grease boots for ball joints? If there are some available that fit like stock that you can buy without having to buy a ball joint with it, I’d love to know. You can get grease seals for tie rod ends but they are like umbrellas. They do keep dirt out (sort of) but the grease can just weep out as you drive. This means more frequent lube jobs and grease blobs on the underside of the car.
Of course, the upper and lower control arm hardware is still loose and won’t be tightened until the car is on the ground.
I mentioned this front sway bar earlier…
It won’t look familiar. It is from a 1973-87 Chevy 2WD C-30 1 ton truck and it measures 1 1/4”.
In 2000 I was in the early days of tinkering with my ‘70 Charger and looking for ways to improve the handling. I was under my ‘84 Chevy truck and noticed that the shape was similar to the Charger front sway bar. I found that with a little work, the Chevy bar could be modified to fit the car. The ends of the bar had to be cut back and new holes drilled for the end links. The Chevy bar fit but was slightly narrow from end link to end link. The B body chassis is a bit wider than the 67-76 A body so it turns out that the A body is a better fit.
I’ve made 5 of these for myself and friends. One is in my 67 Dart, another in my Jigsaw Charger, another was put in a 71 Challenger.
The end links are just the right width for this car.
I know, aftermarket sway bars are available but cheap upgrades like this are right up my alley. You can get a bar like this at a junkyard for less than $40. I already had bushings and hardware so this setup was cheap. I haven’t seen any aftermarket bars of this size for this car so that is a plus.
This car still has stock .85 torsion bars and parts store shocks. Even with a worn out front end, it rode and handled quite well.
All four ball joints were bad. All the bushings were too. I did use the shorter length strut rods with the coarse threaded ends.
The last thing to do is to slide in the torsion bars. I have a few bad core plugs to replace though. I’m going to have more room to reach them with the bars out of the way.