Monday, February 19, 2024

OLD CROW 3V Mustang: Rear Suspension and Wheels and Tires installed!

 Big update in this post! PanteraCorey and I spent 5 hours Friday night and 3 more hours Saturday morning underneath the Old Crow to install all the rear suspension. Everything went pretty smoothly except for the removal of the upper control arm. When I watched a YouTube video the guy made it look like the upper arm would just come out once unbolted. False! haha After fiddling with it for awhile, we began slowly lowering the gas tank. I found another YouTube video and that guy said you're going to have to lower the tank. So, once we lowered the tank, boom! it came right out and the new Kenny Brown piece went in. 

Big shout out to Corey for allowing me to use his lift, tools and himself! I don't know how long it would have taken me to do that on my own or with my own tools. I know I don't have all the tools so I would have needed to borrow them or go buy some. 

Here it is up on Corey's lift Friday night



Here it is at my house today as I put my new wheels and tires on the rears. I adjusted the lower control arms because the pinion angle was -3 degrees. I adjusted it to -1 degree with shortening up of the LCAs. Corey and I had adjusted them to be longer than OEM on initial install. That was the wrong direction. 

When I test drove the car after initial install I could hear some rear end gear noise. I think that was due to too much angle. After a very brief test drive today, I didn't hear the rear end noise! Boom!

I still need to adjust the panhard bar a little. It's about 1/4" to the driver side. Brent says shortening the panhard bar will move it to the passenger side. I need an 18mm socket to unbolt the panhard bar so that will wait until Corey and I get it up on the lift next week, hopefully. 

Today I went to Harbor Freight and bought a 1/2" drive 50-150 ft-lbs torque wrench, some 1/2" drive extension and some bigger adjustable crescent wrenches so I could adjust control arms and panhard bar.

Luckily I had bought a slimmer 13/16" socket because the oem lug wrench doesn't fit my wheels lug hole openings. I've always tighten lug nuts by feel. I've never torqued them. I'm feeling official!
This is a great beauty shot! I'm purposely not showing the front end because its stock ride height and wheels LOL
This is a cool pic with it jacked up! I think the 2" MM lowering springs will be great for the street and a big improvement over the stock stuff when driving it hard.

And here's the Mullet Mustang shot! LOL 

Overall I'm really loving the look of the car with the new wheels and tires! The blacked out rear trunk panel, the rear spoiler, front lip and future canards look killer!!! I'm loving it so much!!!

I ordered a couple more parts. Corey convinced me to order the control arms and install them with the rest of the suspension. He's 100% right for saying so. I was fully planning on buying them in the future. I guess I was trying to keep the budget down but it just makes more sense to install these while everything, and I mean everything, is apart up front.


And, while I was at it, I threw in these matte black OEM+ looking headlights from LMR.com. I had a 6% discount from reviewing my other parts so I figured I'd get these ordered so they're here and ready when I do the front fender and rear bumper paint.

Stay tuned...


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