Was considering tubular front end until...

[john.thompson068]

I realized Magnum Force was going to charge me $5,250 for a setup without any brakes. That is too much for me. Looks like I will just rebuild the original front end with some quality parts, and spend the thousands I save on some better brakes and other things I need. Plus I emailed them a question which I could not find the answer to on the website and was emailed a link to their website and basically told to look at the website thanks.

 

[Kern Dog]

Part of me thinks that the reason for these high prices for the aftermarket front suspension is for a SLUSH fund for attorney fees when the lawsuits start coming in.
The current trend of rapidly changing technology has many people thinking that they HAVE to get all the newest stuff. Now I know that this will sound like the ramblings of an old fart, but.... NEWER is not always BETTER. The basic design of the factory torsion bar suspension is fine. By adding a carefully selected list of quality aftermarket components, you can have modern handling for less than half the cost of the Magnum Force kit. The traditional steering chuck can be rebuilt to better than new. Urethane bushings, Larger sway and torsion bars, larger brakes will all improve the feel. Frame connectors, torque boxes, HD leaf springs.....
I have nothing against moving forward, but the factory Mopar setup works great with a little massaging.
Finally...... For a company to be so LAZY as to direct you to their website INSTEAD of speaking to you personally...? That is the height of disrespecting your customer base. Its the equivalent of shutting the door in your face. When I was shopping for a rear disc brake kit in 2006, their guy on the phone seemed frazzled and unable to answer a few basic questions. The next call was to Dr Diff in Montana. THAT guy knows his stuff and will bend your ear for an hour detailing the how/what/when and where of everything he sells.

 

[john.thompson068]

Perhaps the first unit they designed cost them $5,200 to build. I would think they would be able to have more reasonable prices. Perhaps they should take a graduate level economics course on elasticity, and supply and demand. They may discover that if, for example, they lower their price by half they will sell three times as many units, thereby increasing their bottom line by a significant margin. It is a lot more complicated than that but that is a basic example. As far as the stock front end goes, I am with Gregory on that. I still remember the Green Brick.

I think the idea of the tubular front end is good. I would want to get rid of the torsion bars which have been a major hassle when working on my car because they are constantly in the way. The rack and pinion option clears a lot of room for headers so I wouldn't need $1000 TTI's to clear power steering. And it would be cool to shave a 150 lbs off of the front of the car.

 

[Kern Dog]

Torsion bars ARE always in the way. I agree totally on that. I've cussed and bitched for years because of them. When a car is equipped with stock type exhaust, it it not as bad. Still, the pinch and bend of a left exhaust pipe in a 340 equipped A body is a joke. The torsion bar is in the direct CENTER of the space between the starter and the frame rail.
I could get behind one of these aftermarket designs if the front frame rails were further supported. In the instance of cars with a roll cage, there could be a tube from the frame rail back to the cage inside the car. Add a "Monte carlo" brace and all bases would be covered. You may still have a net weight loss too.

 

[john.thompson068]

Torsion bars ARE always in the way. I agree totally on that. I've cussed and bitched for years because of them. When a car is equipped with stock type exhaust, it it not as bad. Still, the pinch and bend of a left exhaust pipe in a 340 equipped A body is a joke. The torsion bar is in the direct CENTER of the space between the starter and the frame rail.
I could get behind one of these aftermarket designs if the front frame rails were further supported. In the instance of cars with a roll cage, there could be a tube from the frame rail back to the cage inside the car. Add a "Monte carlo" brace and all bases would be covered. You may still have a net weight loss too.

Not sure where you are going with the front rails not supported theory. The tubular front end bolts up to the factory frame rails exactly as the K member did. Only it is lighter and stronger because it is made of tubing. Seems like it would be at just as much of a disadvantage as the factory K member. If you can add more details to support this claim, that would be awesome.


Maybe if we all gripe enough, they will lower their prices. I can't imagine too many people who would drop $6500 on a front end with brakes even if they could afford it. The cost benefit analysis of this is coming up negative for me. It would be like paying $6000 for a Jerico transmission to have overdrive. If you have one of these front ends more power to you. I would go for one too, but simply cannot justify the costs with my meager pay.

 

[Kern Dog]

Not sure where you are going with the front rails not supported theory. The tubular front end bolts up to the factory frame rails exactly as the K member did. Only it is lighter and stronger because it is made of tubing. Seems like it would be at just as much of a disadvantage as the factory K member. If you can add more details to support this claim, that would be awesome.

I wrote about this in better detail in a Moparts post regarding the RMS Alterkation kit. Please keep in mind that this is only my opinion:

In the case of a factory longitudinal Torsion bar car, the suspension loads are divided between the frame rails and the torsion bar crossmember. Because of this, the front frame rails didn't have to be very thick. I've parted out and cut up several 64-76 A body cars and determined that the strength of the unibody platform is that it is designed to work as a unit. Stresses push and pull while each component work together to resist it. In the late 90s I was making a home movie with some ameture car stunts. I jumped a 74 Dart Sport 6 times and personally witnessed the stretching and tearing of the frame structure, the fender aprons, the floor pans and frame rails. The car still ran and drove after the first 5 jumps. The jumps were all between 40 and 88 feet with a max height of 11 feet in the final stunt. The K member was bent and flattened, the distributor cap broke against the firewall when the engine was pushed up and rearward, and the center link was crammed against the oil pan.
The point? Well, the stunt car was UNsupported in the frame rails, but no single component failed. Everything worked together. These coil over kits now concentrate ALL of the suspension loads into the frame rails instead of dividing them between the frame rails and the torsion bar crossmember. NONE of these coil-over kits have the 100,000 mile durability of a OEM factory design. EVERY one of them comes with a warranty & liability disclaimer. The aftermarket stuff is flashy, shiny and pretty, but the factory design, while not totally perfect, is very hard to beat.

 

[Kern Dog]

Another point: The tubular designs offer little resistance to parralellogram deflection. Look at a wall with studs in it. Add a sheet of 3/8" plywood and the wall is now very hard to knock out of plumb. The tubular K member designs can't compete with the stock unit for resisting fore/aft deflection.