Bob's Track Friends Chat

[Bob Zumbrunnen]

http://www.mustang50magazine.com/howto/37458/

This article says to use the stock uppers. That's a vote in favor of going back to rubber bushings. Heck, I might get lucky and have some old stock upper control arms laying around, too.

http://www.mustang50magazine.com/howto/79219/

I found this paragraph interesting and I don't believe it for a second:

A Panhard rod controls lateral body movement and that’s all. Thus, with a stout Panhard rod installed, the Mustang’s upper control arms can be removed, thereby giving all the fore-and-aft chores to the lower control arms and the lateral forces to the Panhard rod.

I'll have to look more closely at how my panhard works, but I'm pretty darned sure that if I remove my upper control arms completely, the axle will be able to twist an awful lot forward and backward, changing the pinion angle and letting the axle hop like crazy. I don't think my panhard can prevent this without the upper control arms in place.

And I think that's why my racecar has no upper control arms, but not only has a panhard, but also a brace (I can't remember what it's called) that bolts to the pumpkin at one end and has a 3-foot long arm that bolts to a cross-member toward the middle of the car. That brace would be unnecessary if the panhard were enough to stop the axle from rotating.

The reading and confusion continue....

Edit: No way that article's right. I remember now that my first clue that my upper control arm bushings were gone was a loud "thunk" under heavy braking as the axle suddenly rotated forward and slammed the control arms against the bolts.