Pinion snubbers.......thankful for this forum

mommasGN

Active Member
Joined
May 22, 2013
I have been having tons of trouble hooking at the track. It would bite great off the line then a few feet out would blow the tires off. (prep, no-prep, new tires, all kinds of shock settings) Searching around on here i found a couple post about pinion snubbers and people having the same issue. Hell i forgot i even installed a new extended one 12+ years ago.

I took mine off, drove straight to the track and POOF....no spinning. I changed nothing else.

Im glad those posts didn't dissapear when the site crashed.

Thanks everyone!
 
I have been having tons of trouble hooking at the track. It would bite great off the line then a few feet out would blow the tires off. (prep, no-prep, new tires, all kinds of shock settings) Searching around on here i found a couple post about pinion snubbers and people having the same issue. Hell i forgot i even installed a new extended one 12+ years ago.

I took mine off, drove straight to the track and POOF....no spinning. I changed nothing else.

Im glad those posts didn't dissapear when the site crashed.

Thanks everyone!

Posts we should be good back to the beginning of time. It was just attachments that were lost.
 
I think guys should learn more about how suspensions should work for the tire and conditions they race on.
Problem is several vendors and Buick gurus were recommending (and selling)them back in the day. No issues on the street with street tires. Drag radials came out. Didn’t take long to figure out something was up. Looked under there and it was beat up. Put sticker back on and no more unloading.
 
That snubber "science" came about with the Ramchargers and the Detroit Hemi race cars...
My 6T5 Hemi car didn't have one. I used SS Mopar springs and 6 cyl torsion bars.
 
Problem is several vendors and Buick gurus were recommending (and selling)them back in the day. No issues on the street with street tires. Drag radials came out. Didn’t take long to figure out something was up. Looked under there and it was beat up. Put sticker back on and no more unloading.
The problem is people dont do their homework or experiment on their own
 
Not many chassis gurus around anymore. Just the fast guys and they aren't talking. Most of the guys that I raced with on the junk1960s and 70s tires are dead. I don't share much with the locals, but when I get the new motor in my Turbo coupe Ltd. and see how much I remember, I'll share. Don't wanna lead anyone astray....
Although I ran a 1972 Big Block street driven chevelle in the 9s on street tires back in the 1990s, and it has essentially the same rear suspension.....
P/S, P/B, A/C, quiet mufflers, all steel, and about 10" to a foot of air under the front tires! I believe Turbo T guy said he saw it run back then.
I haven't done a Monte SS or GN suspension in about 15 years. We'll see how much I remember.... It should be easier to hook a 6, mebbie.....
TIMINATOR
 
Not many chassis gurus around anymore. Just the fast guys and they aren't talking. Most of the guys that I raced with on the junk1960s and 70s tires are dead. I don't share much with the locals, but when I get the new motor in my Turbo coupe Ltd. and see how much I remember, I'll share. Don't wanna lead anyone astray....
Although I ran a 1972 Big Block street driven chevelle in the 9s on street tires back in the 1990s, and it has essentially the same rear suspension.....
P/S, P/B, A/C, quiet mufflers, all steel, and about 10" to a foot of air under the front tires! I believe Turbo T guy said he saw it run back then.
I haven't done a Monte SS or GN suspension in about 15 years. We'll see how much I remember.... It should be easier to hook a 6, mebbie.....
TIMINATOR
P.S. pinion snubbers worked well for the leaf spring Mopars in the 60s because they pushed the axle down when the leaf springs wrapped up. The only reason they would do much for a G body is because the suspension instant center causes rear squat on launch. Cure that and you are good to go! The guy I got my TC from didn't have a clue, it had super stiff rear shocks and springs, instead of fixing the root cause of the problem. I am going a different direction.
TIMINATOR
 
The problem is people dont do their homework or experiment on their own
Steve Wood told me awhile back there's a chassis book out. I can't remember the name of it or the author though. I'll do some digging through old posts when I get a chance. Currently busy looking for a Harley to add to my bike collection.:cool:
 
The only reason they would do much for a G body is because the suspension instant center causes rear squat on launch.
Madman, a well-known chassis guy: "Girls squat, race cars don't".
We made TR rear control arms for quite some time.
We also made F body torque arms.
Then our lawyer bud suggested we get about $20M in liability ins.
The rest of the story is obvious.
 
Madman, a well-known chassis guy: "Girls squat, race cars don't".
We made TR rear control arms for quite some time.
We also made F body torque arms.
Then our lawyer bud suggested we get about $20M in liability ins.
The rest of the story is obvious.
I read a post from another old fart a long time ago about you making chassis stuff...came with high praise.:cool:
 
If any of you guys are having a tough time getting your car to launch, this is what I did. Got a friend to video me from the drivers side rear quarter when I launched. Played it back in slow motion and found out what was going on. Made the correction and all was good.
 
Not many chassis gurus around anymore. Just the fast guys and they aren't talking
Chassis are better now than ever along with the shock/sensor teck.
The suspension needs to be setup differently depending on tire and power being applied.
You can have complete control over the suspension now with full tuning.
Big difference between a radial car setup and slick setup.
 
The weight distribution of the car and paying attention to the instant center and control how the front end works will yield to just about any result one could want.
 
The weight distribution of the car and paying attention to the instant center and control how the front end works will yield to just about any result one could want.
In yrs past I had a set of scales. LOTS of issues uncovered just using them and a tape measure.
I watched some "interesting" application of scales @ BG. Not a clue. Same with actual chassis construction.
Broken welds, crooked components, bound up joints. The list goes on and on. :rolleyes:
 
Dave Morgan's Chassis Tuners Handbook, is the Bible you seek!
It came out after we had figured out chassis tech by trial, error, and drawing a BUNCH of diagrams of a factory 4 link setup. We initially figured chassis tech out on the leaf spring cars that we all had first. It wasn't very difficult for a couple of us analytical sorts that raced out of my shop to figure out. HINT, one day while sitting next to a bobtail semi truck, and watching the rear leaf springs work while he went thru the gears, and watching the rear end lift every time the clutch came out, it came to me! I took a pic (with FILM!) and spent a lot of time trying to analyze why it happened, and why the engineers wanted it to. Later on, the MOPAR BIBLE (chassis) came out and explained what we knew. A leaf spring car is pushed, (and the body lifted, if setup correctly) by the front spring eye. Raise that point, and the rearend of the car lifts, driving the tires into the track, creating an instant inertial "weight" that aids traction. That point is easy to modify on the mopars, as the front spring hanger bolts on to the frame. By slotting the 4 mounting holes, you can install the bracket upside down, raising the front spring eye about an inch and a quarter. A noticeable improvement in traction! If some is good, then more is better! I welded up and redrilled the eye bolt hole higher, and it worked better, next step was to have a new main leaf made at a spring shop, we had them use heavier material for it so it would be stronger, the owner said, no, turn the next leafs around to the front to strengthen it, and remove the rear spring clamps to allow more lift. I had him make a stock material main leaf that relocated the axle about an inch and a half foward,(altered wheelbase!) and he rolled the front spring eye around the bolt, rather than a big rubber bushing, which allowed me to raise the bracket hole even higher without the spring eye hitting the floor.
WOW!!!! That car would "hook" in a car wash! Low 12s and high 11s on G-60 Street tires, with the front end about 2-3" in the air! I still have pics!
The rear and the front raised on the launch, then an old MOPAR guy came by and said "ya got good chassis separation Goin on there!" First time I heard that term. I have used it a lot since.
Then when I got my first coil spring car, a 69 GTO, we spent quite a bit of time trying to correlate what we knew about leaf spring cars to coil spring cars. I had some large quarter ruled graph paper and made a scale drawing of the factory 4 link suspension. It didn't take long to correlate what was going on once I realized that if I extended the imaginary length of the links, they were just an imaginary ladder bar suspension. Shorten the bar, lifts the back of the car, lengthen it raises the front, squatting the back, BAD!
Once we figured out how, the next step was to figure out where we wanted to lift the car from.
Then Dave Morgan's book came out, and we learned terms like: instant center, center of gravity, rise line, and percentage of rise.
Short answer: lower the front of the upper link mount 2" (make it adjustable with multiple holes in the plate), or buy a bolt in 9" because the rear upper link mounts are raised due to the larger housing diameter. It works out the same if you graph it. They used to make bolt on "no hop bars" that did the same thing, but were ugly, and everybody knew you had them. Enough for now. When I learn how to post pics, I will.
TIMINATOR
 
Sorry about 'jacking the thread!
Back to pinion snubbers as they relate to GNs: if it is adjusted about an inch or less from the floor, when the back of the car squats, it puts instant inertial weight directly on the axle when the body hits it, helping traction. Once down track, and the squat diminishes, then the snubber is away from the floor and does nothing. They were useful back in the day on stick shift leaf spring Mopar cars because they were factory installed and you just put a cheap, taller bumper on, not so much on other systems, although they can still be a useful band aid until one figures out a better way to create traction.
TIMINATOR
 
Later on, the MOPAR BIBLE (chassis) came out and explained what we knew.
I think I still have the papers that Mopar put out. :cool:
I had a Dave Morgan book and a Chris Alston book, along with several writeups from NAtl Dragster.
Gave them to a friend with a GN.
If you know of anyone that might like to copy them, I'd be willing to share for them to copy.
 
Top