took this past week off work to rebuild the front end on my 89 CV. In the process of the front end rebuild, I swapped all the parts over to upgrade to 1998+ big front brakes and installed a late model steering gear box from a 1999 PI car.
New coil springs are 2000-2002 Town car limo prep springs, which are tad softer than the PI front springs. I also got some PI front shocks and I got a front PI sway bar from a 97 PI car.
The entire process took a little longer than I expected, only because I ran into some parts issues. one being I got a poly bushing kit for a civilian car and my salvage upper control arms came from a PI car, so the upper bushings were different. to solve this I ended up using one poly bushing and one rubber bushing. my other issue was Napa sold me 2 left brake hoses and for some reason the RF brake hose on a 98+ car is near impossible to find, Napa ended up having the correct hose after I did some research in the paper catalog at the Napa store.
Some of the other, minor issues that I had expected was the PS pressure hose and the steering shaft connecting to the new gear box. luckily the guy at the Napa machine shop makes hoses and I had the correct ends already, so he made me a new hose in about 10 mins for $40. on the steering shaft, I had pulled a lower shaft off a 97 PI car previously. I cut both shafts about 1" above the rag joint and welded the new style joint on to my old shaft, it worked very well.
Ned Nuss gave me some alignment specs for this type of set up. He recommended as much postive caster as you can get with out a 5/10 split, toe out 1/16" and negative .5 degrees camber.
I was lucky to get an old timer at the alignment shop I went to, he nailed the alignment settings perfectly. to my surprise he got 9 degrees of postive caster with out any split.
This is the RF. everything is on, except the correct brake hose is missing. Note the old caliper still hanging there, so I don't leak brake fluid all over the place.
New coil springs are 2000-2002 Town car limo prep springs, which are tad softer than the PI front springs. I also got some PI front shocks and I got a front PI sway bar from a 97 PI car.
The entire process took a little longer than I expected, only because I ran into some parts issues. one being I got a poly bushing kit for a civilian car and my salvage upper control arms came from a PI car, so the upper bushings were different. to solve this I ended up using one poly bushing and one rubber bushing. my other issue was Napa sold me 2 left brake hoses and for some reason the RF brake hose on a 98+ car is near impossible to find, Napa ended up having the correct hose after I did some research in the paper catalog at the Napa store.
Some of the other, minor issues that I had expected was the PS pressure hose and the steering shaft connecting to the new gear box. luckily the guy at the Napa machine shop makes hoses and I had the correct ends already, so he made me a new hose in about 10 mins for $40. on the steering shaft, I had pulled a lower shaft off a 97 PI car previously. I cut both shafts about 1" above the rag joint and welded the new style joint on to my old shaft, it worked very well.
Ned Nuss gave me some alignment specs for this type of set up. He recommended as much postive caster as you can get with out a 5/10 split, toe out 1/16" and negative .5 degrees camber.
I was lucky to get an old timer at the alignment shop I went to, he nailed the alignment settings perfectly. to my surprise he got 9 degrees of postive caster with out any split.
This is the RF. everything is on, except the correct brake hose is missing. Note the old caliper still hanging there, so I don't leak brake fluid all over the place.
Comment