Welding front ball joint torsion arms

[Scott9398]

I realize this may be covered elsewhere but I can't locate it....does anyone have advice, or a procedure for welding extra supports onto the front torsion arms. I am looking at "boxing" in the area around the lower shock mount for extra strength to handle coil overs on the front

[Ol'fogasaurus]

Scott, funny you should ask as I was thinking about the same thing in the last few days.

http://www.blindchickenracing.com/How_t ... ntarms.htm

Blind chicken did a boxing on a K&L trailing arm here but I think there has to be enough similarities that a look at what he did might be worth it. I went out and looked at a pair of arms I have sitting there getting rusty; there us some radius on the shock bung on the casting but the idea of adding a bit more shouldn't be discarded but just remember not to cover the hole in the trailing arm for the spiking of the shock stud (http://www.shoptalkforums.com/viewtopic ... 982#909982). The rest of the supporting that has been added should be pretty close to what a BJ needs. Also remember that the dust covers on the ends of the trailing arms will come off and the end covers that are added will either stop this or replace the need for them.

Don't forget to add hook and post stops in the beam and trailing arms at the same time as with stock sedan suspension the lower ball-joints press in from the wrong side and you can pull them out on hard suspension hits; VW used the shocks on their BJ suspension as stops. I started doing a BJ beam build but made a big mistake and haven't got back to documenting the rest of the build. For what its worth and with all the errors: viewtopic.php?f=28&t=136514&hilit=BJ+beam+build

Lee

[Scott9398]

Thanks For the info Lee. I am actually going in another direction. I should explain. I am building a new ball joint beam for a street car. I had my shock towers cut from 3/8" plate on a plasma table. I'm using 2" and 2-1/4" DOM for tubes. My shock towers will be laterally reinforced with 1/4". I am making my towers to accept double eyelet coil overs. The plan is to run a 7/8" sway bar thru the bottom tube (Formula Vee style) and thru rod in the top tube. I am looking at using RideTech coilovers with a 225lb spring. My new beam will have delrin bushings. My question concerns more about welding to the arm itself to provide a way to strengthen the inside of the shock mount. Has anyone run into problems welding their torsion arms? If so what kinds?

[buildabiggerboxer]

Scott, The torsion arms can be weld with MIG or TIG with no problems other than the need to know about welding, formula vee's use relocated shock mounts and new ARB pick ups welded to the arms, external ARB's are used for adjusting purposes. you realize that running a through rod will also act as an ARB anyway unless the ends have pivots incorporated into the ends of them? otherwise you will effectively have two ARB's in torsion during roll, and you wont be able to set them up other than altering the dia of them?