S10 upper A-arms

[kossuth]

I' m looking to possibly shave some weight off the front of my S10 and I' m considering possibly installing a set of tubular A-arms. I looked on Air Ride' s website and saw that they are have UCA5000 listed for the S10' s as the upper, but nothing looks like it will work for the lower. I' m not going the bag route (it' s a toy but the LS1 going on is enough as far as I' m concerned plus I drag race it and autocross it alittle) and just looking for something that is alittle stronger and definately lighter than the stock stamped steel unit. Is the UCA5000 a direct replacement or is it alittle shorter or have a modified balljoint angle than the stock A-arm? Also, anything else associated with the A-arm that I should know about? Truck uses 2" blazer dropped spindles (which is about 1 1/2 inches lower than a stock truck spindle) and a set of slightly cut ZQ8 springs which makes it about a 2.5" spring drop. If the balljoint angle is altered on these balljoints would the angle be satisfactory with a static spring drop of 2.5 inches Thanks a ton.

[SpArX]

Hey I' ve seen your name before, maybe on S10 forum or S-Series forum? Anyhow, I have the arms and they bolt right on no problem. You should be fine with the upper control as they don' t have a lower control arm to hold your spring in place. I' d have to say though, might as well and get a suspension setup like mine. I' m not afraid to drive my truck as hard as I did when it was stock and it handles just as good if not better than stock due to the fact you can change your bag pressures independantly, and you can' t change your spring weight so easily! I would have to say I believe that the whole setup weighs no more than the stock suspension. Even though I ended up having to ditch the rear sway bar my truck lays flat in the corners with the 4 corner valve setup. I had 2" Beltech drop spindles on and everything was fine at the ride height you' d have your setup at. But don' t forget, if that engine your putting in is any heavier which it very may be, your gonna go lower than you used to be! So you might need to find new uncut ZQ8 springs to hold it up to the original planned height you once had. With an airspring this wouldn' t even be a thought, you' d just bump up that corner a couple more PSI! Gotta luv air! Ahhhhh

[kossuth]

Actually believe it or not the LS1 is about 90 lbs lighter than the V6. LS1 is aluminum block, aluminum heads, and a composite (plastic) intake manifold. The block only weighs 90 lbs LOL. V6 uses cast iron heads, aluminum intake, and cast iron block. Even though it' s two cylinders smaller it weighs a chunk more. So the Air Ride uppers are ok then. I have found a set of lowers for the stock coil spring (Spohn make them) but they aren' t listing uppers. http://www.spohn.net/product.cfm?productid=1525 Thanks for your help. Anybody else have any input on the Air Ride a-arms? Also are they mild steel or chrome moly? Also powder coated or painted? Thanks guys.

[SpArX]

Hey, how was the T56 install, you do it on the V6 first? I was thinking the LS1 was aluminum, but still doubted it could be lighter, especially that much! Good to know though.... Enjoy your upper arms.... But I' d wait for Darrent to let you know how they' ll work just uppers alone without the lowers, just to be safe....

[kossuth]

Yeah, I did it on the V6 first, and it was the best thing I could have done to the truck. Truck made about 173 rwhp with the stock 5 speed and the stock ypipe and all with a turn down on a 2.5 flowmaster muffler, shorty headers, modified airbox, power pulleys, TB spacer, and probiably a few other things. Only things I changed is I put in the 6 speed and a full 3" exhaust and the truck made 192 rwhp. In Arizona it went from running 15.9' s to running 15.3' s and that was with 3.42' s in the rear which honestly was too much gear for the V6 because of the tall first gear in the T56. I was in the military and PCS' d to Washington DC. Ran it at a local track here and it ran 15.2-15.1. Swapped the gears out for 4.10' s and truck instantly ran low 14.90' s with a 2.19 short time. Sticky tires would have netted me a 14.7-14.6 but I was done with the V6. Motor was stock internally with just bolt-ons like headers and such so I was really happy with how the truck performed. Basically it was making about 220 on the crank or so assuming 15% driveline loss which is really good for that motor being it was only rated to 180 at the factory which is about a 18% gain.

Yeah, I really need to speak to one of the chassis guys from Air Ride about this because I don' t want to mess up the camber of the truck. Plus I don' t want to put undue stresses on the ball joints if the angles are altered slightly from stock for the airbag setup. If the angles are too radical I' m sure you know as well as the majority of the folks on here that too extreme angles will quickly cause a balljoint to fail and possibly fail completely. Anybody else have any input on these A-arms?

[SpArX]

I' ve been wanting to do the T56 swap for some time, really wondering how hard the install would be, saving it for next year, since I have a fresh tranny in the truck right now anyhow. Just put 3.73' s in it with a locker, hoping that' d be good enough for the T56 down the road? I' ll be putting in a Turbo here soon and I know that NV3500 ain' t going to cut it with the extra HP, just been trying to get as much info as possible for the swap so it goes as easy as it should. The hardest part I understand right now is cutting a new whole in the floor?

Those arms are made for better balljoint angles at a lowered height such as yours. So it definitely won' t put undue stress on the components. It' s actually designed to be cycle through a further motion than what you' ll ever put on it with a static drop, so I doubt you could ever cause damage on it in the worst senario. I just hate speaking for Darren or BJ when they designed the arms themselves and may have some input to say on the matter that I may have missed or don' t fully understand myself. They are designed to prevent binding that the stock suspension can be known for on a lowered setup with and without aftermarket spindles.

[SpArX]

If you really need to find this info out quilckly just give them a call. These guys are even better over the phone than you can ever imagine for service even though they should have a response here shortly since it was just the weekend.

[darren@ridetech.com]

We did the camber change in the lower arm. The only thing that we did to the upper is correct the ball joint angle.