Dropped my '56 off at Cnut's today

[hutchenc]

That's pretty badass! Can't wait to see it in person. When you get the GTO wheels back on it snap a few more.

[JT56]

I became leery of Ridetech when I saw their 100% bolt in 4 bar kit. Not something I'd trust.[/QUOTE]

Rick, I have their kit on my car and it has worked very well. I was not sure at first, but after talking with Big Daddy Rat, who had one behind is 598 cid and had no issues. I did weld do some spot welds on them just for my peace of mind. Each year I look under it and dont see any movement. I will say if you plan on putting power to it...get the heim joints

[JT56]

Very Nice! So how much weight difference from the old vs new?

[hutchenc]

Not sure JT...I'd have to ask Lazlo to weigh in on that one (no pun intended), but I seem to remember that he's guessed about 100lbs vs. stock. I could be wrong there so don't quote me on that.

The aluminum suspension has to be significantly lighter for sure. I put that stock stuff on just to move the car and couldn't believe how heavy it all was...I'm guessing the control arms, spindles, and drums were 50lbs/ per side or in that ball park. The brakes...dunno, maybe a wash because those big C5 rotors are, well, big. Can't say whether the rack vs the box is lighter...really don't know but it's definitely more evenly distributed across the front end. Not sure about the frame, but there's definitely less material vs. stock around the control arms.

[chevynut]

A bare full C4 conversion frame that I weighed was 263 pounds versus a stock bare frame at 275 pounds. I've only weighed one of each so I don't know how much that varies. We remove all the stock spring mount brackets in the rear and we add a heavy shock bar that's included that weight. No shock bar was in the stock frame weight.

A C4 clip weighs about 103 pounds....I just weighed one this past week to ship it. I'll have to weigh the stock one I cut off Chad's frame to see what the difference is.

Some time ago I weighed all the C4 front suspension parts and all the stock parts and came up with a 66 pound weight reduction for the components, not including the C4 swaybar since the stock front end didn't have one and I wanted to compare apples to apples. That was with coilovers on the C4 front end. It might be a tad lighter with the stock composite spring instead of the coilover springs, but I'm not sure.

The stock upper and lower a-arms, spindles, and brakes are almost 60 pounds per side and the same C4 stuff is 46 pounds per side with stock brakes. The rack weighs 16.5 pounds and the stock box is 23, but then there's 14.5 more pounds in the stock steering linkage. The stock coil springs weigh quite a bit more than coilover springs...a stock shock and spring is 19 pounds and a coilover with spring is around 10. The early C4 brakes are a little lighter than the late ones because of the smaller size....I think I weighed late ones.

The rear is a little harder to compare because it depends on whether you have 4 or 5 leaf stock springs, and whether the C4 differential is a Dana 36 or 44 plus whether it's an early or late rear. So there's a lot of variables.

[hutchenc]

Going to pick her up in the AM

[chevynut]

Here's a couple more pics of Chad's car back on the ground a week and a half ago. There are wheel spacers on the hubs because the GTO wheels are slightly too small bore to fit over the C4 hubs. We also set up his steering column and lengthened it slightly for Borgeson u-joints.

[JT56]

Great Job! Always looking at a better way to get some weight reduction especially off the nose!

[567chevys]

Looks Great ,

Good job Laszlo , What's that gas Bottle in the back drop standing there all by it's self

Sid

[chevynut]

What's that gas Bottle in the back drop standing there all by it's self

What bottle? If you mean the argon bottle it's attached to my TIG welder.