Spyhunter!....Update on rear lowering spring?

[Guest MauiWowee]

How's it coming? <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

[DTakas]

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Edited January 2, 2019 by DTakas (see edit history)

[Guest spyhunter2k]

Well I'll definitely know something tomorrow. Here's where I left it the last time I posted:

My mechanic had said that he could heat just one coil at the end of the spring and collapse it down into the adjacent coil. After going to pick up the car, they showed me the FUBAR'd result. They said the spring twisted into a contorted shape as it cooled. I looked at it closely and saw heat points on every coil, so they had obviously not just tried to heat one coil.

They replaced the coils for free with used ones and cut one coil from them. So far it has lowered the front about 3/4", not enough to match the 1.75" drop in back. I finally gave in and ordered a lowering spring kit for the mid-90's Cadillac Eldorado/Seville, which use the same front spring as the Reatta. I had been reluctant to do this in the past because I wasn't sure if it would interchange, the manufacturer wasn't willing to sell just the front two springs in the kit, and the overall price of the kit was significant(almost $400).

After verifying that the Eldorado, Seville, and Reatta do use the same front spring and finding a couple of places that sell the kit for around $220, I went ahead and ordered the kit. It arrived yesterday and my car is scheduled to go into the shop tomorrow to have the front springs swapped.

It is an Intrax lowering kit--quality stuff. The springs are of a progressive rate and there is a projected 2" drop for the front an Eldorado or Seville. With the 400 lb. less curb-weight of the Reatta, the final drop will hopefully not quite be 2" and will be closer to the 1.75" I'm after. I'll let you all know as soon as I pick up the car. I will post final info/pics/links to the products used and such. A camber adjustment kit may also be needed--I'll find that out after tomorrow as well.

'Till then--

Seth

[Guest spyhunter2k]

On the body work--I still have a nose-less car! I ordered an aftermarket nose and cut it into six pieces to reassemble and re-glass on the front of the Reatta. But I couldn't quite make it look right--I just recently gave up.

So right now, the lower front will be going back on and I will be going back to my original plan of stretching fabric over the moulding-less front bumper and glassing it over to achieve a more streamlined and clean shape. I am also adding a small front spoiler to the bottom of the front nose piece to balance the look.

My last struggle has been to decide whether to pursue a full wide-body conversion (extending the wheel arches out by about 3") or just moulding in aftermarket flares that extend them half of that. I really like the look of the 17" 99 Mustang wheels that F14 posted a while back, but they protruded a bit from the wells. That's not a big deal when you have 3-4" inches of clearance, but on a lowered car a small bump could cause the tire to hit the fender. I would love to do the full wide-body but that will be very difficult on a daily-driver car.

Seth

[Guest F14CRAZY]

Interesting progress.

I think replicating something like this would be pretty sweet too. The round fog lamp holes are hott, but I think they were used for air intake. But hey, round fog lamps would be hott

[Guest spyhunter2k]

I'm actually going for a look very similar to that. The round lamp openings wouldn't be that hard to do... I do love that pic--one of my favorites.

[Guest spyhunter2k]

Wish I could post great news, but it's a no-go as of now. It seems the lowering springs I bought from Intrax for 91-97 Eldorados only fit the Northstar/STS version and not the rest. I saw the mention to this on the web page but didn't think these options were available 91-97, so didn't think it meant that they fit the Northstar/STS optioned cars only. The spring coil diamter is too small at the top compared to the normal Reatta/Eldorado spring. Needless to say, I was more than a bit disappointed when I got the call from the mechanic.

While they had the factory springs out, they went ahead and cut a bit more off (more than they said they sould have), and it ended up lowering the front by another .5", still .5" shy of matching the rear. At least it's so close it doesn't look goofy, but I do notice a decrease in ride quality now.

Sprint also makes lowering springs for the Eldorado. I will be returning the Intrax set and will call Sprint to see if theirs is only for the Northstar Eldorado. If not, I'll order their kit and try again. It is only projected to lower the front of an Eldorado by 1.7", so I'm not sure if it will lower the Reatta enough to match the rear drop even if it does fit.

This is getting expensive, but I'm not giving up.

[Guest spyhunter2k]

I did more research and it turns out that all models of 92-99 Eldorado (and also the older generation Eldorado as well!) use the same spring. Also, both models of Cadillac Seville of the 90s years (STS and SLS) used the same spring. The final suspension setups were indeed different but this was due to differences in other suspension components and also was achieved electronically.

I asked the Intrax tech to check out Eibach's site where they show their Eldorado/Seville springs fit all models. He finally admitted that this was correct. I gave him the inside and outside diamters of my factory spring and the ones sent by Intrax. He says his book shows that the Intrax spring should have the same ID/OD as my factory one and can't explain why the ones I was shipped are smaller. They are pulling other springs from the same batch to verify the suspicion that it was a production error.

If so, it will be a simple matter of shipping another set of springs that have been verified to have the correct measurements, and we're back on! Fingers crossed...

[Guest F14CRAZY]

Sweet. Keep us updated. I'd like to do this someday to compliment mah rims

[Guest spyhunter2k]

Intrax did finally figure out that a bad batch of 90's Eldorado/CTS springs had been made. It then took them several weeks to send me a replacement pair, which I now have. I have verified that the top fits--now it's just a matter of getting the car back into the shop to have them swapped in and see the final lowering result.

As for the smoothing, the front bumper is encased in fiberglass, but I need to remove the front cornering lights to sand properly. The service manual shows screws coming out from underneath, but the pic isn't clear as to how many are removed. Could someone help out here? They're a PITA to get to and I don't want to waste time taking out the wrong ones.

Thanks.

[Guest MauiWowee]

Kewl.....progress. Looking fwd to pics and details! <img src="http://forums.aaca.org/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />