1976 Chevrolet Camaro - Project g/28 Part 2

The PST lowering spring kit for '70-'81 F-Bodies contains front coil and rear leaf springs. These lower the car 2 and 1.5 inches respectively. We tried in vain to research the spring rates, but ran into a brick wall; all we can say for sure is that they work as good as more expensive adjustable coil-over set-ups. The lowering spring kit from PST runs $559.

It doesn't look like much, but this is what we're running for front suspension: PST polygraphite control arm bushings, PST drop spring kit (2-inch front, 1.5-inch rear), PST G-Max front swaybar kit (1.125-inch dia.), new PST ball joints, PST idler arm, PST tie-rod ends (inner, outer, and adjusting sleeves), KYB shocks, and Global West upper control arms. Most of these items were contained in the PST Super Front End kit for $309.

Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words. The new spring shackles and bushings from PST added stiffness without extra noise or harshness, and added to our confidence level. When you're doing donuts on the skidpad in front of a photographer, a life can literally hang in the balance.

A lot has been said about shock absorbers, some of it in an attempt to educate consumers, some of it in an effort to convince consumers into thinking they need a lot more than they really do. We're not going to pass judgment here, but these new KYB shocks run $129 for the entire set of four-that's less than one-quarter of the cost for a high-end coil-over system. The results speak for themselves.

The assembled rear suspension includes the previously mentioned 1.5-inch drop springs, PST polygraphite leaf spring pads, new axle u-bolts, polygraphite spring bushings, and KYB shocks. It's painful to look at the stock drum brakes, open 2.73 rearend, and rusty exhaust, but those will be dealt with in time.

The body bushings in our '76 Camaro were pretty worn out, so we figured this would be a good time to replace those as well. Unfortunately, this is a much more difficult job than we thought. Plan on taking more time on this job than all the other stuff combined-maybe three times as long.

Some of the body bushings are captured inside closed frame rails. This requires the rails to be cut open to gain access to the hardware inside (note the channel which has been cut, then bent back into place). If you cut open the rails, plan on welding them back up when you're done.

When we were done with the suspension install, we drove it around to let things settle. We thought it would settle more and came to the conclusion that it was still too high in front, and definitely not a 2-inch drop as advertised. Easily taken care of: we've never met a set of lowering springs that didn't need to be cut.

Back in the tech center, Jason put g/28 back on the rack, yanked the front springs and whacked 1.5 coils off with a wizzer wheel. (Whatever the spring rate was before, it's now a little higher.) With this last bit done, we got an alignment with one degree of negative camber dialed in. Now go back and compare the stance from the previous picture to the shot at the beginning of the story. Now that's what we call stance!

BEFORE
So how does it work? In these before and after shots, you can see the significant improvement in road holding. The average speed through the 420ft slalom course went from 40.3 mph (best, stock) to 46.2 mph (best modified), an improvement of some 15 percent.

AFTER
To put things into perspective, Art Morrison's fully-independent '55 Chevy-the quickest car we've ever tested in this slalom-ran 48 mph.

BEFORE
On the skidpad, the before/after results were just as dramatic. In bone-stock trim, the best average lateral g-force in the 200ft skidpad was 0.70g (0.69 CCW and 0.71 CW). That elevated to 0.79g with our new PST/Global West suspension (0.78 CCW and 0.80 CW)-an improvement of nearly 13 percent. With a set of R-compound tires, this will easily bump up to 0.90g or higher.

AFTER
One other observation: Even though we didn't touch the brakes, we saw a vast improvement in 60-0 braking performance due to the wheel/tire upgrade. Stopping distance was cut from 216.9 feet to 163.9 feet-nothing to write home about compared to today's cars, but still an improvement of 24 percent.

Next month: We're headed out to Baer Racing for a complete front and rear brake overhaul. We'll be shooting for a stopping distance of 120 feet from 60 mph. Can we do it on all-season tires? That's a tall order for a 3,700lb car without ABS, but we guarantee the improvement will be spectacular!