Installing the New Differential #FairmontProject

[EricTheCarGuy]

Now that the old differential is out, it’s time to install the new one. It wasn’t as bad as I thought.

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[Rereonehundred]

The last “hop up” I was involved with was an older Camaro. We had no idea of our new HP value, but we were very surprised by how the engine torque and driveline torque down through the tires to the road, twisted the entire Camaro’s body in unanticipated ways. We laughed that we might break the car in half!

I think your new engine has much more HP than we did, and I think (guess) that your Fairmont has much less “body” than our Camaro did.

So I worry that even with your assorted monocoque reinforcements, when you eventually drop the hammer on that beast, she’ll prove to be susceptible to being ripped apart. But that’s part of the fun too.

[Mike]

Eric, you mentioned pinion snubbers. I don’t think they’re applicable to your rear suspension. As I understand it, a snubber is used to limit “axle wrap” in weebly old-school leaf spring suspensions. Since your rear axle is located at 4 points by trailing arms, it’d be impossible for the axle to rotate.

With your setup, wheel hop should pretty much be eliminated as well, except for the small amount of squirmy movement provided by the suspension bushings. Are you using stiffer polyurethane bushings, or the less rigid nylon bushings which are closer to OEM specs? The poly bushings on their own should prevent wheel hop, and you probably won’t need those other two links you left off at this point.

[EricTheCarGuy]

Forget everything you saw in this video because I’m completely re-doing the front and rear suspension on this car in future videos. I went a different rout with the rear suspension. I’ll be using a torque arm and panhard bar instead. This will eliminate the problem I had with the upper control arms not fitting properly and also make the car more stable.

[Author]

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