I want to replace the leaf springs and front suspension. How long should this take to complete? on a second gen 81
thanks

 

Is this a complete overhaul? or are you just taking old out and have new ready to put in? Are you using urethane, polygrapihte, aluminum, or rubber bushings? In the shop you'd be lookin at about 7-9 hours. In the garage with no lift and hand tools I've done it in just under two days. On a second gen you WILL need/want a torch set. Don't screw with the shackle bolts, cut em and buy new grade 8's at the local hardware store. Use antisieze on all the shackle bolts this will prevent them from rusting to the bushing sleeve. Don't crank the shackle bolts down tight unless your using factory bushings use locknuts and a dab of threadlock and run em down fairly snug, you may still be able to turn the shackle bolts. Hang everything leave it all loose, lower the car, bounce it front and rear, then tighten everything with vehicles wieght on the suspention, this includes front controll arms, they suck.
A personal service bulletin on Camaro lower ball joints: the replacement ball joints are spec'd for a .005-.007 press fit, over the origional joint, as per Moog. Twice I have found that the replacement joint is more than .025 over the origional joint, which is over what Moog said it should be. I first ran into this issue when we physicly broke a press trying to install the joint. If you manage to force the joint in you will split the arm. Twice we had to turn about .018-.020 off the joint on the lathe. I checked ball joints from other makers and found that they were all about .025-.030 over, so it's not just the Moog joints. Check them before you install them.

 

thanks. In school, I took the rear end out and put a new one in in about 2 periods (90 minutes) if I dont mess around with trying to take the bolts off and just cut them, I should be able to do everything like you said in a couple hours. We have 2 lifts at school so I should be able to do it all there assuming that I can buy the parts. Thanks for all of the help.

Matt Vogt

 

Took me 5 hours to replace the leaf springs, shocks, front control arm bushings, ball joints, and steering