The part # for the A bodies is 550-41046 and they're available at www.jegs.com (http://www.jegs.com) $184

direct link to product info:
http://www.jegs.com/cgi-bin/ncommerce3/ProductDisplay?prrfnbr=191757&prmenbr=361

Chris

ssm is still around, they did change their name and website though.

their new website is www.ssmliftbars.com (http://www.ssmliftbars.com)

What is involved when installing these things?

Yenko,just like installing stock control arms except for drilling 2 holes..

I couldn't get any response from SSM so I ended up buying Edelbrock no hop bars and new Edelbrock lower control arms in an attempt to eliminate my bone jarrring wheel hop. I have not installed either and I would love to just get a new set of lower arms (ssm lift bars) and return the lower arms and no hop bars. It would save over $150 and install easier I assume. Are we sure these Jegs versions are exactly the same as the SSM lift bars everybody seems to rave about? Skip

Skip,the bars that Jegs sells with their name on them are the SSM's

Chris, does a sway bar work with these?

Gene
The pair I have come with holes for the swaybar.
-Kid

I was able to put my sway bar back on but it was a snug fit. The SSM's are a little wider than a stock arm.

I just put a swaybar on mine last dec.,ordered the bar from gmpartsdirect, went to the local hardware store and bought some grade 8 bolts and it almost fell in,a little snug but it fit...been running SSM lift bars for good 3.5 years graemlins/thumbsup.gif

How good these work ,like realworld times, compared to stock lowers or caltracks or http://www.trzmotorsports.com/ or http://www.wolferacecraft.com/SearchResult.aspx?CategoryID=28
what kind of setups do you people use ?? specially at A-body.

Its hard for me to say how much they helped,I went from stock unboxed lowers and street tires to SSM bars and slicks,however I was able to get pretty consistent 60's in the 1.8 range with the liftbars and street tires(Cooper Cobras)I am now also running METCO adj. upper control arms,no adjustments with them as yet. I just installed a th400 with a 10" ATI converter last november(previous was th350 and 11" B&M) and had a 60ft time of 1.70 with more or less no track prep on a cool day. My best 60ft ever has come with drag radials(1.64)Hoosier slicks(1.66) so I am hoping to improve both of those this year with the new converter and better track conditions. With the SSM liftbars,wheel hop is non-existent and they seem to be quality parts,no problems yet and easy installation.

That is good news. I will be sending my no hops and lower control arms back and ordering a set of the Jegsters. Thanks for the help.

That's great ! I was going to order the metal pieces that you weld in to "box" the original lower control arms, but after seeing this post , I'm ordering those lift bars. Thanks Chris :D

And, yes, you can see the holes for the sway bar in the link that Chris posted. Very coool :cool: It seems between the powertrax locker post and this one, Chris has saved me a ton of money and even more time. graemlins/hurray.gif

How hard is it to get the holes drilled correctly? All I need is a lopsided differential.

Originally posted by YenkoChevelle69:
How hard is it to get the holes drilled correctly? All I need is a lopsided differential. It's not hard. Set the pinion angle you want, suggestions for various uses are included, vise-grip the plates, drill and bolt.

Pat, obviously you must be using these bars. Did they make the back end stiff? What shocks are you using on the rear? Adjustable upper arms?

Randy

I detected no difference in ride from the stock control arms when I was driving the car on the street (it's a bracket-car now, no street use). They only come into play during launch otherwise they are just like stock arms. I'm currently using 50/50 adjustable shocks but ran gas shock with them for quite a while. I have stock upper arms (poly bushings). Since I set the correct pinion angle when installing the lift bars, I had no need for adjustable uppers.

Since this topic cam up on another board and I made up a little drawing in paintshop I thought I would post it here. I first want to say that lift bars like SSM's work really well on a particular setup and work terrible on others. They are not a miricle cure all for traction or wheel hop. In fact many times new shocks and bushings will handle your wheel hop problems.

Obviously the reason many choose to go with a SSM/lift bar setup (relocates the lower point) or no-hop bars (relocates the upper point) is to bring the Instant Center (IC) back. Although both SSM's and no-hops work for a number of people they do not move the IC to the same location, thus are aimed to do different things and will only work on a certian setup. Each has a separate list of advantages and disadvantages. THe diagram below will show how each varies the IC from stock:
http://www.mnracing.org/modules/coppermine/albums/userpics/crappy%20drunk%20sketch.JPG
I probably should of drawn in the anti-squat line but wanted to keep the diagram small. As you can see the SSM's leave the IC much higher then the no-hops do. On most applications the SSM's will be above the anti-squat line and the no-hops will be below.

Lift bars work on the principle having an IC above the anti-squat line (like when using SSM's) will increase the anti squat & cause the front end to rise, which improves weight transfer. That will hit the tire harder, but it may hit it too hard and you will unload/spin after the first couple revolutions of the tire, especially on a car with alot of torque and/or poor weight distribution. You also may just put your front end into the clouds and waste a bunch of energy going up and later bouncing rather then getting down the quarter mile. SSM's generly work well for more mild combos (slower) with heavy front ends.

On the flip side an IC below the anti-squat line (like with no-hops) will result in the car squating down. This lessens the rise of the front end and provides less hit to the tires. This seems to work better for more powerful and especially combos with lots of torque (which generally don't need that much help with load transfer), lighter front ends, drag shocks or springs up front, etc. This will provide a more controled launch and direct more power into going forward rather then up.

I hope this clears some things up and helps folks pick the right parts for their car.

Cap'n, awesome description there. Sounds like I should continue to use what I have since the tires get 'hit' pretty hard in a clutch car as it is.

How do you determine where the antisquat line is and on what often seen advise "lower arms should be parallel to ground" is based on ? would it be better to lower front mounting point of lower trailing arm ?

nevermind.....sorry redface.gif

capncrunch: From all the posts I've seen on SSM lift bars,only one person said they actually worked better mounted in the stock location(more or less just boxed stock arms) It seems everyone here has had good luck with them, there are occasions when my car will hook and unload as you speak,but I attribute that more to track prep than the SSM liftbars,because my car is fairly consistent AND I am still running stock a/c big block springs in the front. If I were running Moroso trick springs or Moogs equivalent,I would venture to say that the unloading on occasion would be gone totally. Now I don't know if my car is the slower car that you speak of,but high 11's,low 12's is pretty quick for a street car graemlins/thumbsup.gif If I was going for an all out strip car,I'd lose the liftbars in a heartbeat,I'd go 4 link and coilovers or to Eds secret suspension :D

Just a few notes as to what I've found with my car. It's a round tube Vega S/G car, 98" wheelbase with a 4-link, 14.5Wx32 Hoosiers, A-arms in front, DA Konis all around and the weight is 2180# with me in it, 1100# rear 1080# front. 355" motor on alcohol, 1.76 glide and 4.88 gears. It runs 9.05-9.15 off the stop.
I struggled with this car cause my chassis guy was used to building big inch nitrous combos that were nose heavy. He set the 4-link and the car was inconsistent and would go left or right unpredictably when launching. It would not hit the tires at all.
I kept moving the i/c back and the car launched better and better. Then I tried moving it up. The car would hit the tires violently, unload, and drive out flat without lifting the front. I then lowered it bit by bit until I got it to leave with abt 6" of daylight under the front tires.
Now when we go to the track all I do is adjust the shocks. If it's sticky like a Division race or National event I stiffen the extension front and rear 2 or 3 clicks. If it's real greasy I soften the extension front and rear 2 or 3 clicks and stiffen the rear compression 2 clicks.
With 4 flats of (+) preload it'll 60' deadhooked at 1.23-1.235 all day long and leave dead straight with 6" of air every time. I just use the DA Konis to adjust the launch entirely.
I believe the wheelbase, torque, and C/G have major impact on how each app works. What works on a short, light, low torque car will not work on a long, heavy, high torque nose heavy car. And how high the centerline of the crank and driveline is of MAJOR importance. JMHO!

Randy

Originally posted by PETE466:
How do you determine where the antisquat line is and on what often seen advise "lower arms should be parallel to ground" is based on ? would it be better to lower front mounting point of lower trailing arm ? The anti-squat line will roughly go from where the rear tire centers on the ground and extend roughly to where the upper control arm/top of the spindle is on the front of the car, although the actual height of this point varies with you Center of gravity height. Obviously every car is a bit different and when you get down into it... there are 200 page books on the subject so I can't hit everything in one post. There is alot more to making a car launch then just control arms. If one part of the equation is outta whack you will not get the best launch you can get. Also just like building motors... there is more then one way to skin a cat. I choose to simply treat my factory 4 link like a drag car 4 link and use those theories rather then listening to what other car that is possibly very different from my combo is doing. If you don't know anything like I posted above listening to another guy or copying what he does is probably the only way you can go.

Rapid Robert: If you put the SSM bar in the stock location it doesn't reloctate the IC so really it is no better then a stock boxed lower arm. GM 4 link style setups suffer from an IC too far forward for launching, thus you have not done anything but gone to a solid bushing. IMO most of the time when a car hooks and then unloads it isn't a track problem, it is a suspension problem... whether it be setup, shock selection/setting, etc. It is possible if you get a cheap track owner who only puts VT down for 10 feet.

I shouldn't of used that term fast... because speed doesn't really have much to do with things, but your setup of your car does. For the record... I am aiming my car for 9's eventually, but until I run a bigger shot of nitrous she will be in the tens on a small tire and stock style suspension and sees a large number of street time/cruise time. It sucks when you have a warped sense of speed LOL. graemlins/clonk.gif

What works for one guy may not work for another was my point of going indepth on the last post. I simply wanted to help some folks who don't have luck with SSM's some info as to what they may try to help and for people with combos that do not really theoretically work well with SSM's the chance to save a few bucks.

Why do so many have great luck with the SSM's here? Let's take you average Chevelle here... I will guess it has a mild BBC or pumped up sbc (I will say 350-450hp). Full weight for the most part except maybe a fiberglass hood. Most probably run and auto with mild converter, and pretty streetable 3.55-4.10 gears. I bet most launch off the footbrake. In this case a SSM usually works great graemlins/hurray.gif ...

But now say you have a slightly different more aggressive setup :eek: . Let's say you have one or more of the following: 600 ft-lbs of torque, a bigger converter with an aggressive stator, 4.10+ gears, fiberglass bumpers, hood, relocated battery, drag shocks up front, drag shocks, and/or leave on a transbrake... Well now this will make you already shock the tires hard/already accomplish the front end raise you are looking for without the SSM's... thus you still keep the SSMs or buy them to try and help traction and you MAY hit the tires and then unload or put the front end sky high. One of the best things you can do IMO is spend a day at the track with a buddy and a video camera. Watching you car launch can help give some valuable insight in tuning or modifying your suspension.

ToyzRMe: Another S/G guy graemlins/thumbsup.gif A friend of mine runs S/G as well. We tune his car pretty much the same way... haven't touched the 4 link setup in ages.

Actually, I think the SSM will work much deeper into the ET range. My car isn't fast 11.80's but I know several guys running low 11's and high 10's with SSM bars. That's not to say they are for everone. Without going to a much different setup, SSM bar were the choice for me even if they raise the IC. I tried no-hop bars (with their lower IC) with boxed and poly bushed lowers and had very bad wheel hop, SSM bars eliminated that. I don't doubt that they are not the best choice for a low 10 second or quicker car. And, of course, I'm not optimised like a class car would be. I dial what the car is running that day.