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.

OLD CROW 3V Mustang orders up Wheels (19x11 SVE R357) and Tires (Continental ECF 295/30/19)

When you get a new car, we all know first things first, you get some wheels and tires. I did some research for which wheels and tires I wanted to do. I won't say I spent hours and hours. It helps to have a brother who you are simply copying to know what parts to buy. I did end up buying the same exact set up that Brent has on his RED BARON 3v Mustang. The goal for the car is to be a fun street car that can do Autox and HDPE track days. I've purchased many sets of wheels in my car history. This is the 7th set of wheels I've bought. That doesn't include the aftermarket wheels that my first Mustang had or the 2 sets my last WRX had. 

Before I get to some pictures, I'll give some insight into why I copied Brent. 

I did talk to other 3v/S197 "stick axle gang" members about their wheel and tire set ups and their opinions. One comment that I heard more than once was that 18's have better tire options and are typically lighter weight. While I would normally agree with both of those concepts, what I found was not quite that clear cut when comparing to the 19's I bought.

The wheels I ordered are the SVE R357 in 19x11 and +50mm offset in the Gloss Graphite color. Here's some pics.

Here's a screenshot from LMR.com's website. The SVE brand of wheels is an exclusive brand only through Late Model Restoration, or LMR.

 

The R357 costs $305/ea and the 19x11 size weighs in at 22.8lbs. This is the biggest wheel I've ever owned! The last set of wheels I bought myself was the 15x7" wheels for my Civic which weighed just under 12 lbs each haha

The biggest wheel I've had in my past was the 18x9.5" Enkei NT-03M+ wheels that are on the WRX that I just sold. I think those weighed about 18-19lbs per wheel. They are a fairly light wheel for that size.

Hot off the press pic here of Red Baron and its new big track wing! Here's a view looking into the sun of the R357 wheel. Looks killer!

Again, here is the wheel on Brent's 2005 REB BARON. One cool thing about this wheel is the way it can look bright or dark depending on light and angle. I did initially think about getting either the black or bronze color. Black has always been a no for me because you just can't see the spoke design. Bronze would be cool and I did consider it for a bit. The only small hesitation on the Gloss Graphite color is that it could be too much grey with the Vapor Silver color of my Mustang. But, it comes off much darker than the silver so it should give a nice contrast with a dark wheel. The gloss finish on the Graphite color really shows off the spoke design in different ways depending on light. I'm happy with the choice and think it will look great on the car!

The only other wheel I was seriously considering was the APEX EC7 in 18x11 or 19x11. The 18x11 weighs 22.6lbs, only 0.2lbs lighter. The 18x11 cost was $414/ea. That's over $100 more per wheel. APEX has a nice deal where you can get a replacement wheel for 50% the cost if damaged on track. By going with the SVE wheel though, I saved $400 total for the set, which would cover the purchase of another wheel if damaged.

For tires, I ordered the Continental Extreme Contact Force (ECF) in 295/30/19 from trackdaytire.com. Thanks to Nico for the discount code! Buy 3, get 1 free is a W!

What a great looking tire! Some may not consider the tire tread design part of the look of a performance car but you are Oh So Wrong! They most certainly are part of the look and I think these look aggressive!

The Continental ECF is a 200 treadwear tire meant for track duty. The description details actually say it was designed for endurance racing. So, this will make this tire longer lasting, which for a street car and a 200tw tire is one of my biggest priorities. Without the discount code, I'm not sure I would have done this tire or any 200tw tire, but it was too hard to pass up. I did research quite a few other tire options and sizes. I really want to run a 305 wide tire, but Continental doesn't make a 305 for the ECF. They have a 295 or a 315. Brent and I weren't sure 315 would fit well enough up front to be worth the step up. As it is, to get this 295 to fit will require longer wheel studs with a 19mm spacer and big camber, at least about 2.5-2.7 degrees. The pics of Brent's car above also have this same tire, so it gives me an idea of fitment and look. 

Due to living in Utah and that this is my "daily driver", I will end up getting some stock wheels with all season tires for next winter. For this winter, I can run the stock 17's with the all seasons on it until I put the big brakes on it. 

I'm stoked for these to get on the car! Next up, we'll talk suspension modifications!