Lowering Caps and Sidewinder II Wheels on Gen IV [Pics]

[FrgMstr]

Got the new Sidewinder II wheels and shoes back on with the lowering caps installed. Car stays a bit flatter on launch which is nice. Kinda cold here today so it was not hooking incredible well though.

The caps surely dropped the car. I was worried I was going to have to put it on ramps to get the stands out from it since it damn near did not clear my low profile jack, but it just made it.

Also, the front wheels are .5 inches wider (18x10.5) than the last 6-spoke fronts and the offset is a about .5 further out too, so the front fills out a little different.

I drove around a bit, did not have any issues with rubbing or lock to locks.





Here is about the only good profile shot I have of the car, but it shows how much the wheel gap closed.





Yep, still sporting my [H] vinyl!

So there are a couple of little tricks to doing this and I will pass along my opinion. I did "all" the work myself. You will need a 4' crowbar....yeah. 21mm, 18mm, 15mm, assorted sockets and wreches and extensions, and a phillips head driver....and a tire tool of course. And a dead blow hammer helped me get some of the bolts in and out.

Took under 2 hours to pull all the coilovers out. You will need to pull out the rear fender skirts first. I don't see any way of doing this on a Gen IV car with the coilovers in place. The back is straight forward, top and bottom bolts out, use the crowbar to push the control arms down, work it out. On the rears there is a 5" relief cut into the body with plugs in these. On the convertible, it says to remove the convertible top first in the manual...I did not do this. Working the backs out I pushed the plugs up and out of the relief holes. I did not remove the top and the carpet to push these back down and after playing with it for a bit, I don't think it can be replugged any other way. So I may do that later. Getting the rears back on is simply the reverse of what you did to get those off.

On the fronts, you will need to pull the top and bottom coilover bolts. Using the right sized tool will let you do this without pulling the skirts. However, per the service manual you need to pull the sway bar control rod that is pressed into the lower control arm. Don't mess with it. Instead, pop the three 15mm nuts on the bottom of the lower control arm that hold the bottom shock mount. This will give you enough wiggle room to get the bottom shock bolt out without having to hammer out the sway bar control arm. Once you get coilover out, again you will likely need the crowbar (carefully), go ahead and fasten down the lower shock mount to the control arm and torque to spec. When you go to reinstall, simply put the bolt in from back to front and if you take the coilovers off again, you will not need to loosen the lower shock mount. I called JonB to make sure this was not an issue and it is not.

On actually getting the caps installed. There is no way in hell I would suggest you do it yourself. I tried, failed, and moved on. These coilovers are tight as hell and very short. I hit three auto shops before I found one that would do it. Well actually the second would but wanted $180. Eff that....Third shop did it for $80 while I waited. Do have the person doing the actual cap install be aware that the caps are keyed for the ends of the spring so that it will sit flat. (Once you look at the part, you will know what I am talking about.)

And clean the hell out of everything while you are down there. I did mine with Simple Green, then came back and wiped it all down with WD40 and green scrubbie pad.....wheelwells look NEW. It took longer to clean than the install of the coilovers.


Thanks to JonB for his guidance and advice and his lowering caps. And he has the wheels for less than $2400 a set. Give him a call.