In a message dated 2000-06-10 9:33:06 AM Pacific Daylight Time,
ccrobins@ktc.com writes:
<< Sounds like you spent a bundle on those lever shocks. That's racing,
I guess.
I had a client do them, so they cost me less, but he was charging something
like $100 Can.for the fronts - about what you'd pay for new ones back then.
Finding the competition valve bodies was fun, though!
<< My B came with the tube shock conversion in front that has the shock
mounted behind the A frame. I thought at the time that I first saw the
installation that it must apply torsional forces to the A frame.
Nothing seems to be twisted tho and the car corners well with the right
tire pressures. I will probably put in some rebuilt lever shocks as soon as
the tube
shocks start to leak.>>
Eventually the A frame warps. The main point though is that the conversions
(aside from being flawed in terms of that sort of offset, at least the kits
that mount on one side) are not any better than the Armstrongs (assuming that
they are new and valved properly).
I have used many types of shock (I run Konis in my daily driver) on many
types of car. As far as I can see, the lure of the tube shock kits is
twofold. Many people can't find good new ones or a rebuilder to refurbish
them better than new. Many others are taken by the 'racing' aura of tube
shocks, whether or not they are any better - look at the same thing with
those miserable downdraft Webers, many purchased based on the name in spite
of the fact that they make no improvement over (a pair of ) SUs.
The nice thing about Armstrongs is that maintained they last a long time; the
bad part is that most people don't maintain them. I remember a girl with a
TR6 saying to a shop I was visiting that she never knew the shocks needed to
be checked (this with 80,000 miles on the car). Of course OEM tube shocks
were normally toasted at about 20,000 miles, so she got her money's worth
anyway.
Bill
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