I've finally decided that I want my 88 to be an all around performance truck. I want it to handle well on turns without having a bouncy ride. I want it lower, but nothing extreme. I DO NOT want something that will mess up my alignment. I'm thinking about ways to reduce weight like running just bed side skins in the back, fender skins in the front, take everything off the wheel wells and cutting out as much metal in the front as I can. Does anybody have any recommendations for suspension in the front and rear? I can fabricate just about anything, so welding and custom parts are not a problem. Any ideas?
coil overs front and rear. new sway bars front and rear move the batt to the rear passenger corner bob the bed w58 tranny from a 82-85 celica or 82-88-ish supra supra 7.5 lsd or... get a 82-85 celica gts parts car and swap the whole suspension over, they have IRS and once you have the rear carrier in you can swap to the supra rear end for lsd and disk brakes. or... static drop jus a lil bit with some blocks and cranking the torsion bars, fully poly/graphite bushing swap and some better/stiffer shocks and a rear sway bar. there are quite a few different ways to do this, think auto-x and remember that a pickup is really a load carrying pre-85 celica with different suspension.
This kinda sound like what I'll be doing. Now what about drop spindles? Do they effect your alignment at all? What shocks would be good for driving like 80mph?
stock shocks are fine for 80mph in a straight line, not really sure whats availible for a 2wd as a street type upgrade. but again id say build it like a celica, tokiko blues or kyb shocks are a nice choice. the best gains you will get handling wise will be: rim and tire choice poly/graphite bushings much bigger sway bars (stiff shocks are a cheater method for weak sway bars) do your best to get a 50/50 wheight distribution. go to www.celica-gts.com and go to the suspension section there is a sticky there for "SRA comprehensive tuning" or something simmalar. use that as a "bible" unless google yeilds a auto-x type of site for pickups.
Drop spindles help with the alignment on a dropped truck. The wheels won't camber in as much with drop spindles.
Shonuff has got the right ideas for ya. I've always wanted to built a V8 pro touring mini. Sounds fun. I'd love to pair up a race between a little Toyota truck and a Porsche.
Some good ideas so far, thats pretty kewl ! I totally agree with the 2" drop spindles, it doesnt hamper performance and it saves tires and costly alignments/tires/etc instead of cranking torsions, by doing this you lower the drag force therefore increasing mpg, I gained about 2 -3 by lowering my truck & the handling in turns was noticably improved. Lose some wieght by putting on some lighter rim/tire combo without severly affecting height of combo and rpm's - hence alloys instead of steel: Fiberglass body panels where budget and practicality allow: rear bumper into a rollpan or none at all: I like the idea of the inner bedpanels being removed: Depending on practicality and your own opinion, that spare tire is heavy, for that matter the tire carrier is basically useless if you dont use it ( except for the fact that it also acts as a brace for the back end - swap it out )( Crap knew a guy once that never knew there was a spare tire under there ). The most important thing like ShoNuff said is wieght distribution, if its to light, it can become unstable in driving. Also, if its too light, Ide pray that I never meet any crosswinds or strong storms that'll take ya to OZ! Lots of things to loss and balance out, ya just gotta weigh out the results of your actions and put em to the ultimate test " build it !" Goodluck !
quote= I DO NOT want something that will mess up my alignment. Drop spindles will help with camber and less strain on suspension parts. Wheel alignments are not that expensive and should always be done after modifying or changing front suspension parts such as installaton of drop spindles and changing tie rods.
from my exp! DO NOT take metal out from the back!!! the truck is to lieght already as it is in the back. the front holds all your weight. CUT out from the front now REAR. i done this and all i got was NON STICK TIRES! no matter what tire i tried. so i have to end up welding heavy metal steel to the rear to get more traction out of it. Before i put weight on the back i had a bad spin out and thats what caused my truck to spin and spin and spin. the back was so leight the front just made it more of a tornado like spin. once it goes its hard to stop. i was luckily to hit a saftey barrier.
What ever weight I take out of the back will also be taken out of the front. Basically I'm going to take the weight out of the front first and match the rear. Thanks for all of the great ideas everyone!
Built my truck to handle & perform, that was & is foremost with me: Beltech 2" spindles work great,no alignment problems! All bushings are Energy Suspension Quickior sway bars front & rear( have to have the front one remade) now that I have CanDo tubular a-arms & bags Dosetch shocks The rear is forward tri-4linked Nitto NT-555 tires225/40ZR18's Engine ,LC Pro Street 22RE EFI Ride height is 4 1/2" Weight ?? ( need to put on a scale)! This truck handles very well,rides smooth,will cruse all day @ 80,will pull from any speed, will top around 140 (have not gone there) 106 very easy Holds in corners great,into on & off ramps 70+ Gary/Truck Action
