Control arms: Caravan vs Omni

BTW...The Caravan (S-body) control arm should be an upgrade for any TD; L-bodies up to '90 and K-based vehicles up to '88.

Also notice there are actually two braces welded onto the bottom side. The big one that extends from behind the ball joint towards the rear stub, and another small brace that extends from under the front pivot bushing to the bottom side.

That's pretty neat, sounds like your car should be destroying some exotics through the twisties when your done!

There is a regional auto-x that sometimes has an event set up at the local high school. I can't wait to see what she can do! Another thing I did with these control arms was I had the bushing sleeves and new ball joints secured with additional spot welds to be sure they wouldn't move around under extreme conditions.

I also upgraded the K-frame which should help out quite a bit with the chassis flex. I had it seam welded, bushing cups reinforced, and painted everything with POR-15, but I'll save that stuff for another thread.

what year(s) caravan lower control arms are appropriate for this swap ? (into L body)

on my shelby charger I used 1985 caravan lower control arms and spindles then used K-car brakes. why????? because in racing, the caravan arms and hub bearings are a lot stronger never had a failure, the k-car brakes were small enough to fit inside the 13" wheels I was required to run but provided much better breaking than the solid stock rotors on the NA cars. additionally I had to mill the spindle where the strut attaches because the van was wider than the L body.

detobias said:

what year(s) caravan lower control arms are appropriate for this swap ? (into L body)

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I believe that up to 89' the caravans came with those control arms.

up to 90

FWIW, I'm using '86 Caravan control arms on my Omni GLH Turbo.

allmotor said:

on my shelby charger I used 1985 caravan lower control arms and spindles then used K-car brakes. why????? because in racing, the caravan arms and hub bearings are a lot stronger never had a failure, the k-car brakes were small enough to fit inside the 13" wheels I was required to run but provided much better breaking than the solid stock rotors on the NA cars. additionally I had to mill the spindle where the strut attaches because the van was wider than the L body.

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Maybe stupid question... How much did you have to mill, and did you take it off one side or both? Just wondering if it would be enough to throw out caster at all, I can't picture it though. Will L body knuckles work with the mini arms to eliminate the need for the milling?

william

Threads like this need to become stickies. I wish I would have seen this a couple months ago. ~~Heath