Fletch

After mounting the RCC rear end control are and MacPherson strut, I asked Andy Bujtas to take a look at this at to tell me what he thought of this design.

Andy Bujtas wrote:

The (MacPherson) strut is really designed for front suspensions. No one uses this design for rear suspensions - especially if you are using an engine of any significant power. Even the old factory racing Fiero's didn't use it. They used unequal-length arms, which I'm recommending. The reason why it exists in the Fiero in the first place was that is was a cheap solution to get a mid-engine car that would pass the bean counters and be acceptable to GM management: "Yeah, we can build a mid-engine car by taking the front end of an existing GM model, turn it around and put it in the rear. Walla, mid-engine."

The best thing I can recommend to you at this point is to call or talk to guys like Dale Van Blokland, who have completed their build using this rear suspension and are using a V8. Ask them what their experiences are with the car under heavy acceleration.

All the stress of acceleration and torque would be applied to the strut, which could bend under high load. Plus the disadvantage of the original design in general. The design I was proposing would eliminate bump steer, torque steer and would allow you finer tuning of rear wheel camber and toe. The design also uses your current lower control arm, but with a reservation that if the current set up doesn't give you the correct track width, then a new control arm would be recommended.

The upper control arm I'm suggesting would not be difficult to make, as a matter of fact, it would be somewhat easier to make than making your wing flap function. The only thing I see is that you may be a bit nervous about doing something like this. And that is understandable since a suspension can be associated with car safety - and who wants to mess around with that? But others are doing it (e.g. Dale) and they are no better than you are. It's really not a big deal. But does require good planning and measurement.