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Team Z produces a set of upper and lower control arms that are available standalone in their catalog, however, the Fab 9 housing requires a unique upper control arm due to the use of the serrated bracket, and so both of the control arms are supplied when you purchase the housing.
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The face plate of the housing is made of 5/8-inch, 1018 steel, while the axle tubes are 3-inch 4130 chrome-moly, creating what Team Z believes is a superior, high-strength housing able to cope with the demands of today’s high-power racing machinery. For example, if you feel your instant center would work better if it was only two inches shorter, you can literally move just the uppers or the lowers, whereas on a true 4-link, you may have to move all four bars to a different combination of holes to get that fine tuning.” “This way, you can fine-tune and adjust in between that traditional 7/8 of an inch. So you can make very fine adjustment,” Zimmerman explains. – Dave Zimmerman “On the lower control arms, we have them figured out that three teeth (serrations) equates to a 10 percent anti-squat or specific length, depending on whether it’s the upper or lower control arm that the instant center moves. On the lower control arms, we have them figured out that three teeth (serrations) equates to a 10 percent anti-squat or specific length, depending on whether its the upper or lower control arm that the instant center moves. At right, you can see the serrated design that Team z has instituted, allowing for very fine instant center and anti-squat adjustments - much moreso than a standard 4-link bracket. 125-inches to achieve the needed instant center and anti-squat for the conditions.Īt left is the short triangulated upper control arm, which is specific to the Fab 9 Team Z housing. Through the use of a special locking washer, the control arm is held firmly in place, but can be adjusted up and down in the aforementioned. While typical rearend housings feature brackets with control arm mounting eyelets that measure about 1/2-inch and are staggered somewhere in the neighborhood of 7/8-inch apart, the Team Z Fab 9 instead has a free-floating slot with locking serrations spaced out vertically every. This is Team Z’s all-out race offering and has been into the three-second zone on Brad Edwards’s radial tire Mustang. The complete Team Z Fab 9 housing assembly, including the upper and lower control arms and shock mount brackets. While a feature-packed part in and of itself that serves as their top-of-the-line housing, the defining highlight is the infinitely adjustable upper and lower control arm mounting brackets that Team Z’s Dave Zimmerman and his crew developed. The central component, of course, in the suspension setup in Evil 8.5 is the rearend housing, and we’ve sourced a killer piece from Team Z to fill that void: the company’s beefy Fab 9, Ford 9-inch housing. Let’s take a look at what’s under the fenders of Evil 8.5 … When you consider that Team Z-sponsored racer Brad Edwards shattered the three-second barrier on drag radials with stock suspension using some of the very same components we are, any perception that the stock-style setup can’t handle big power is definitely not reality. Fortunately, the Fox-body Mustangs were equipped with more-than-adequate (for drag racing) triangular 4-links from the factory, which presents an excellent platform for our needs it’s also one of the reasons why Fox-bodies are so common in drag racing. The NMCA WEST’s Outlaw 8.5 class, which is where we’ll primarily be running the new car out here on the West Coast, mandates the use of stock-style suspension and mounting points. For that very reason, we’ve teamed up (no pun intended) with the crew at Team Z Motorsports to assemble a top-notch suspension setup for our Project Evil 8.5 Mustang and paired it with bulletproof driveline components from Strange Engineering to ensure we can quickly, and reliably, get hooked-up and moving when we hit the track this spring. In all reality, Outlaw 8.5 is a tuners’ game, and the better equipped with the knowledge and proven, quality parts you are, the greater chance of consistently outrunning the other guy.
#Team z instant center upper and lower control and Patch
Now, that isn’t to suggest that horsepower isn’t mandatory, but with so little contact patch on the racing surface, if you can’t navigate the first sixty feet, what happens beyond that point is largely irrelevant.įor this reason the suspension system - and the tuning of such - is key to any racer that wants to win in these categories.
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When you’re limited by tire size, as competitors in Outlaw 8.5 and 235 radial-style categories are, pure, unbridled horsepower becomes slightly less vital to success than other parts and pieces on a racecar.
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