OLD CROW 3V Mustang: Suspension and Brake Upgrade and Test Drive!

 What a transformation!!! I'm so excited to share pictures of Old Crow all finished up! First, a beauty shot!

The car looks killerrrrrr!!!!! I just love it! It's exactly what I was hoping for and what I imagined in my head it could look like! The Vapor Silver is contrasted by the Gloss Graphite SVE R357 wheels and Gloss Black Front NuGeon (Brembo replacement calipers from Rockauto.com) 4 piston calipers with the 14" steel blank rotors (also from Rockauto). The brakes were fitted with PowerStop stainless steel brake lines which have a nice teflon outer layer that is a cool red textured color filled with Dot4 fluid and PowerStop "Track Day" pads up front. All of the brake parts were purchased from Rockauto.com, or as I like to call it, "Rockauto Speed Shop"! Ok, I'm getting ahead of ourselves...

Let's start by showing where we started with the front suspension.

So, we started with a 16 year old (2008) totally stock OEM front suspension and brake set up with 131,700 miles. The stock GT brakes are 2 piston calipers with 12.5" diameter rotors. 

Day #1 of the front end project was Wednesday March 6. We put in about 3 hours of work and we were able to essentially remove everything from both sides of the front end, including the front sway bar.

Day #2 was Thursday and again another 3 hours. We installed all the suspension, which included assembling the Koni single adjustable shocks to the Maximum Motorsports lowering springs from their "Road and Track Grip" kit to their MM caster/camber plates. We set the camber to the most negative setting that the OEM top strut opening would allow which ended being about -2.1 degrees. Caster was set towards the rear of the opening as far as we could go without affecting camber. We also installed the Eibach 36mm front sway bar with polyurethane bushings and GT500 lower control arms with poly bushing and upgraded (larger diameter) ball joint. 

Day #3 was Friday and we spent 4 hours installing new Ford Performance front hubs with ARP extended studs (which Corey painted with some black etching primer for rust protection during his lunch break), the full brake set up from Rockauto that I noted above in the intro. We installed the front SVE R357 wheels and Continental ECF tires for the first time and stood back and enjoyed the new view! To fit the 19x11 +50mm wheels upfront, I use a 19mm Cortex Racing black anodized wheel spacer. We then flushed/bled the brake system with the Dot4 fluid. We did a quick tape measure front toe alignment set at 0. 

Here are some great shots of the finished set up from behind the action and from the outside view. We set the bump steer kit so that the steering rod was parallel with the control arm. 

Here's the outside view of the set up. I do have to point out that the yellow and red parts go with the theme of P-51D "Old Crow" which had a yellow/red checkered nose livery. Perfect! I do have the idea to paint some lettering on the calipers that says "OLD CROW" but in "BREMBO" font, which you can download off the internet by the way. Future project haha

Here we are in the middle of bleeding brakes. Corey was in the car pushing the brake pedal, while I opened and closed the brake bleeder nut to allow brake fluid to empty into the collection baggy. 

Here was the first few minutes after we got the car all put together and on the ground. Corey's 2 post lift was incredibly valuable during the 4 day project. We had the car up and down many times, especially when dialing in the alignment.

Day #4 was on Saturday and we put another 2 hours in. In total we put in 12 hours each, or about 24 total hours between the 4 days. Corey and his brother bought a string alignment set up as Corey's brother is building a 1992 Chevy Camaro resto-mod and are doing much of the work themselves. While I was enjoying baseball games on Saturday, Corey was setting up the string equipment. Before doing the final alignment, stickaxlegang guru Ashley (Tribar Racing social media handle) pointed out to me that the passenger side flag bolt for the panhard bar was on the wrong side. After measuring, we need to move the rear end like 2-3mm toward the passenger side. So, we unbolted the panahard bar, moved it just a little. It needed one more round of adjustment and we had it centered up at ride height perfectly, within probably 1/2 a mm or less. It was almost perfect. We torqued up the mounting bolt, on the correct side this time and moved on to the front alignment.

The most tedious and time consuming part of the string alignment set up is getting the strings centered and level all around the car. Then you take measurements at the front and rear of the front wheels to check toe. We went through multiple iterations, lifting the car up and making minor toe adjustments. We got the toe to be right at 0, within less than 1/2 a mm or less. 

We went for a quick test drive and it drove straight and smooth. There was no rubbing at full lock (I'm really not low enough to be rubbing). The clearance between the inside of the wheels and the struts is very small, maybe 5-10mm or so. 

After confirming no weird noises or vibrations, we did some brake pad bedding. I should have taken a picture of the wheels after I got home. They were VERY dusty haha. The car stops great and the pedal feel was very solid. 

This morning, I couldn't help myself and went out for some beauty shots and a quick drive to Kaysville on the new highway. I felt like I was Lightning McQueen in the "Cars" movie driving on the brand new smooth road in my fully rebuilt Mustang. 

I'm just so happy with the results. The car looks incredible! The driving so far is proving to be very flat and the steering feels very sharp and responsive to inputs. It's going to be a blast at autox and track days! 

I'll wrap this post up with this Before and After. Or as the kids like to say "How it started...How it's going..." 

The difference is night and day visually and performance wise. The S197 Mustang was the last solid rear axle version of the car. After being the same basic suspension design from 1964.5 through 2014, I consider the S197 platform the "Modern Trans Am" Mustang. It has the same look and feel as the 67-70 Mustang Fastbacks but with modern improvements, such as: overhead cam/electronic fuel injected/variable valve timing V8 power and efficiency with a 5 speed (or 6 speed) overdrive transmission, bigger 4 wheel disc brakes (with ABS) and the modern crash safety structure (which improves chassis rigidity and thus handling). I think the 2005-09 Mustang was the best rendition of the late model Mustangs achieving that Retro-Futurism look. They nailed it! 

Stay tuned, because there's more to come. I have the "Hechtspeed Aero" front canards to install. I need to order up the next round of parts, which include Brenspeed JLT V3 Intake and SCT BDX tuner (about $780 total) along with an SVE axle back exhaust (about $300). I need to replace the 3ft long radio antenna with a short stubby version ($20). I want to do an MGW short shifter as well. Then down the road, I'm contemplating a Corbeau bucket seat. That means I'll have to ditch the heated leather seats. It will certainly help me take advantage of the improved grip and handling, but I'll lose the luxury haha.

Future future upgrades will include some kind of front splitter, heat extractor vents in the hood (need to decide if I want to keep the faux hood scoop or not). 1 piece aluminum driveshaft, maybe 3.73 gears (and paint the surface rusted rear axle and maybe get a nice aluminum diff cover). 

I still need to paint the replacement passenger fender and rear bumper I got as well. Corey and I will do that in his garage during warmer months (and after baseball season). 

OLD CROW 3v Mustang: Wheels arrived and Suspension Plans

With wheels and tires purchased, the next step in the modification process is to pick up suspension goodies!

First, before we get to suspension, a few pics of the big boy wheels that showed up this week!

None of these pictures do these wheels justice. They are way more concave and wide in person. 

To actually fit this wide of a wheel and tire up front, there are a few small things we need to do. For a good reference, you need to check out apexwheels.com and find there "Wheel and Tire Fitment Guide" page (click the link to check it out!). They give the basic guidelines for the various widths. The issue is that the inside of the wheel will contact the strut body, so we need to use a spacer to push the wheel away from the strut for clearance. Brent uses a 19mm spacer. That is what was recommended by Ashley (Tribar Racer on Facebook) who has been competing with the S197 since it debuted in 2005. 

To run a spacer, we need to run extended wheel studs. The ARP studs are what most guys run, so that is the plan there. Since the car has 131k miles, a good way to go, which simplifies the install as well is to buy the whole hub assembly that comes with ARP studs from Ford Performance. You can get these all the big Mustang online stores like LMR or AmericanMuscle.

Now that we have clearance for the inside of the "wide bois", we need to clear the fender lip on the outside of the wheel. Here's another 2 birds, 1 stone step. We need to dial in more negative camber. See below for Maximum Motorsports camber plates. By running more aggressive negative camber, this achieves clearance for the fender and wheel/tire but also improves cornering by keeping the tire more flat to the road surface as the suspension is compressed and the front McPherson strut geometry goes through its arc shaped path, it remains more flat. If you stuck with OEM camber settings (-1.0 degree of camber or less), when the the outside tire compresses the suspension, it will actually want to lift the inside of the tire off the ground, losing contact with the road and thus losing grip. 

This increase in negative camber to about -2.7 degrees (as noted in the Apex Wheels Fitment guide) will help the wheel/tire clear the fender and also improve cornering ability. Win win!!

Here's a quick picture of Brent's Red Baron and his front camber. ;)

 Ok, maybe this pic doesn't quite show the front negative camber like I thought it was going to, but daaaaaannngggg, check out this thang! More to follow on Brent's latest changes in the next blog!

Ok, so, camber, spacer, longer wheel studs inside new hubs, check. That is just to fit the wide bois up front and give some more camber. The rest of the suspension is a longer story. 

Luckily, Maximum Motorsports makes a package or kit that gets us 90% the way there on suspension. It's called the "Road & Track Box" (click that link!) and they have it for a few generations of Mustang, including us S197 peeps.

So, here's the parts list:

• Maximum Motorsports Road & Track Spring set (about 2.0" drop, 320-360lb-in Front, 260-380lb-in Rear spring rates)
• Koni shocks and struts (non-adjustable)
• Maximum Motorsports Camber Plates (help dial in more camber)
• Eibach 36mm 3-way adjustable front sway bar
• Maximum Motorsports polished aluminum adjustable panhard bar (spherical rod ends)
• Maximum Motorsports aluminum rear lower control arms
• Maximum Motorsports front and rear bump stops and Ford strut/spindle bolts

This kit costs about $2400. That's as much as I spent on wheels and tires. You gotta pay to play as they say. Ok, there's a couple more parts we want to do for the rear suspension.

As recommended by Ashley, we want to do the rear lower control arm relocation brackets from KennyBrown.com. These are also called "anti-squat" brackets. They lower the roll center (aka pivot point) of the cars rear suspension. Mustangs are known for the nose diving down when under hard braking. This is part of that geometry from the factory. These brackets relocate the rear mounting point of the rear lower control arms and helps reduce dive and improves squat coming out of corners.

One more part needed from the KennyBrown catalog is the rear upper control arm or U-link its also called.

Here is the explanation from the KennyBrown site on what they did with the upper arm, "Kenny lengthened the upper control arm to reduce SVSA (side-view swing arm) instant center migration for more stable and predictable handling, grip and braking."


It's light, strong and improves geometry. The webpage notes: "IMPORTANT: 2005-2010 Mustangs REQUIRE upgraded FORD Upper Control Arm Upper Bolt, part #FOR-W714389S439"


So, we're looking at $180 for the lower brackets, $400 for the upper control car/U-link and $9 for upgraded bolts.
So, we're now up to about $3000 for suspension mods. We'll want to do front bump steer parts ($180 for bump-steer tie rods) as well up front. And Steeda makes an upgraded front lower control arm with bigger ball joints and stiffer bushings, that's $700. Cha-ching!


So, that's the plan! These parts along with the wide wheels and tires and negative camber will transform the handling of the Mustang and drop it about 2". Old Crow will look and handle amazing! Can't wait to hit some autox events this summer/fall in 2024.