Advice needed for centering Fox body rear axle and pinion angle

MustangRacer

MustangRacer

Forum Member
Looking for advice/suggestions on squaring and centering rear axle in a fox as far as points of reference. Also pinion angle. Thanks in advance
 
Uppers do side to side and lowers front to back. Pinion angle depends on set up and bushings type if any.
 
Best way is to put in on a alignment machine.Once you get everything saured up you can adjust the pinion angle.
 
Ive got single adjustable Team Z lowers on my car, whats the best way to adjust these things when theyre on the car? It seems like itd be a huge bitch to drop the axle everytime I wanted to make an adjustment. Seems like getting it centered would take forever
 
cjmatt said:
Ive got single adjustable Team Z lowers on my car, whats the best way to adjust these things when theyre on the car? It seems like itd be a huge bitch to drop the axle everytime I wanted to make an adjustment. Seems like getting it centered would take forever
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It realy doesnt, specially on an alignment rack. Do a four corner alignment and get the thrust angle right, and then center the rear in teh car with the upper. If everything is installed properly you can usually adjust the uppers by hand, do it half turn at a time bounce car check centerline. Dave does this with measurements, and can probly do it in his sleep now. The lowers aren't as bad as they sound either. Just drop one at a time with a jack under the arm, lower it out of the torque box make your adjustment and jack it back up. Might need a pry bar or something to help get the lower back in but it's not that hard really. I did mine in my driveway with tape measures, and i've been low 1.4x in teh 60 and never had to steer the car.

Most things like this sound intimidating untill you just get under the car and do it.
 
Billydroveit said:
It realy doesnt, specially on an alignment rack. Do a four corner alignment and get the thrust angle right, and then center the rear in teh car with the upper. If everything is installed properly you can usually adjust the uppers by hand, do it half turn at a time bounce car check centerline. Dave does this with measurements, and can probly do it in his sleep now. The lowers aren't as bad as they sound either. Just drop one at a time with a jack under the arm, lower it out of the torque box make your adjustment and jack it back up. Might need a pry bar or something to help get the lower back in but it's not that hard really. I did mine in my driveway with tape measures, and i've been low 1.4x in teh 60 and never had to steer the car.

Most things like this sound intimidating untill you just get under the car and do it.
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Yeah I can give the jack idea a try. Ive got a while until the car is even at weight and sitting right. Ill prob just bring it up to Team Z once its all together and let them align it and dial it in for me
 
cjmatt said:
Yeah I can give the jack idea a try. Ive got a while until the car is even at weight and sitting right. Ill prob just bring it up to Team Z once its all together and let them align it and dial it in for me
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To be honest, that's a good idea. I think the last tme we took a car to have that done it was 20 minutes for him...which is an hour labor which is 60 bucks well spent. Cuz it's not easy to get the car leveled off and work around the jackstand on teh axle. But i'm poor and had plenty of resources to do it myself.
 
pinion angle... what has worked for me ( 1-2 negative degree for soild bushings and around 3-3.5 negative for poly or rubber) im no chassis guy but those numbers have worked for my cars. good luck. Depending on who you ask the pinion angle is the angle of the pinion relative to the Crankshaft Centerline OR the Driveshaft. I prefer the Crankshaft but I have explained both procedures below. this is off baseline website

To measure it, you will need an angle finder that has a 360degree face and uses gravity to pull the needle. These usually come with a magnetic base and are about 3-4" in diameter.

~If all the control arms have Factory bushings: Set Pinion Angle 3 degrees to 4 degrees downward.
~If all the control arms have Poly bushings: Set Pinion Angle 2 1/2 degrees to 3 degrees downward.
~If all the control arms have Solid bushings: Set Pinion Angle 1 degrees to 1 ½ degrees downward.
 
matt keep your car on the ground take a tape measure from the center of the back rim or axle to a point on the car that will be the same on both sides...what ever the difference is on one side to the other you can adjust the lower to correct it..on a fox i think the stock length is 17-5/8 so that is a good start point...also try to keep the springs out of the pockets and just fab up some wood to put in the pockets it makes it alot easier to take the lowers off and on...good luck bud. like i said before im no pro but the fun of doing this stuff is figuring it out.
 
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