I purchased a set of Hotchkis 1901F’s and installed in my Chevelle. The ride height looks a little high, I am wondering if I need to cut the coil or re-clocking it will help.
If you see the above picture, the end of the coil should be at the 9 o’clock position, but it’s at 5 o-clock.
To install I used the following mechanism.
- Unbolted lower shock, but left it in.
- Chained the coil to the frame (big-a$$ chain)
- Jacked car and put on stands.
- Put floor jack under lower control arm.
- Jacked it up.
- Removed spindle bolts.
- SLOWLY lowered lower control arm.
Of course cutting re-clocking means another alignment… Arr…
Update 1. I reindexed the right front coil to the correct position and guess what, the car is about an inch higher in the front after moving to the correct position. Hopefully driving it around will fix it a little, if I remember it settled about an 3/4″ after a few months. I’ll probably do this again next spring and cut a coil to lower the front.
Update 2. Learned about spring seating. Here’s how it’s seated.
Here’s how it looks from the top, and it looks like it needs to move over a bit, because it looks like it’s on the lip.
Update 3: I ended up cutting a third off the right spring. I know sounds crazy, but it actually leveled the car. I drove it and it seems fine though the right camber is a little off and I’ll need to shim it again (but not this year). Next year I’ll lower it a little more and even them out. p.s. Hotchkis Actually Recommends Cutting Their Springs.
