Has anyone tried these yet? Their lower control arms for the rear look pretty cool to me. Similar to Global West's but for a lot less money.

Thanks!

WAY BETTER THAN GW ARMS. Sorry to shout but they are not even in the same playing field as GW or anybody else for that matter. Currie and Edlebrock are the only companies who have figured out that poly bushings in the rear arms only hurts performance.

Thanks Denny!

I saw a writeup of them in CarCraft a while back and that "Johnny Joint" seems like a beefed up spherical joint.

FYI: Just to make sure, I called Currie and they said that a rear sway arm will bolt directly to the arms. They are pre-drilled with no modification necessary.

No kidding? I will check these out.

Edit:

Are not these arms the same as Edelbrock with the spherical end on them? I installed my stock uppers with poly bushings and found the car to be very tight in back now. I almost put the rubber bushings back in the frame mount side just to loosen things up as it seemed painful to the suspension when trying to flex.

I wonder who has a better price is comparible?

Pricing is about the same, you can get the Edlebrock arms at Summit or Jegs, I don't remember.

Yes, they are the arms you are thinking of except they don't use spherical bearings. The use an end called a "Johnny Joint" made by Currie, it is a really big, sealed, and rebuildable spherical joint. It actually has more degrees of movement than a conventional end, just a couple degrees shy of a ball/socket arrangement.

So I would imagine either one would be fine to use, and perform very similarly, so price may dictate on which one is chosen.

Ease of adjustability would be a very important feature to me as well, the OD trans I recently installed along with the no hop bars created some harmonics at speed, so I imagine my pinion angle went out of whack. Plus traction would be improved as well, at the track and on the street by being able to dial this in.

I am a lay on the floor and crawl under the car guy, so anything to help me out for ease of use is high on the list.

Both arms are adjustable without removal of either end. graemlins/thumbsup.gif

Their lower control arms for the rear look pretty cool to me. Similar to Global West'sWhere'd you find these?

I checked the Currie website and only found the upper arms.

If Currie makes lowers I agree they will be a step up from the GW units. The GW TBC-4's with the spherical bearings at the frame side are excellent pieces (especially when paired with the Edelbrock or Currie uppers) but if the Currie lower arms have the JohnnyJoints at frame and rear end they'll be even smoother than the GW TBC-4 lowers (which are pretty darn smooth!) because they will allow an even greater range of motion.

I run GW TBC-4 lowers with Edelbrock uppers and if you take the rear springs out the rear end moves through it's full range of motion quite freely (you can move it very easily by hand around normal ride height), but it still firms up in a few spots near the extremes of the travel where the twisting/deflection is greatest. The Currie lower arms (with the JohnnyJoints at the front and rear) should let the suspension move even more freely.

I may have to snag a set of the Currie lowers for thrash-testing until/if/when I swap my entire rear suspension out either for a custom 3-link or IRS.

Troy

Correct me if my thinking is wrong here, but if one installs the 'jonny joint' equipped arms on the lowers (with the uppers), would that not give some degree of side movement that is unwanted? Or is the side to side stiffness built in the geometery of the design from GM and this would not be an issue?

No, the fact that the uppers arms converge at such an angle controls lateral movement, in fact the more secure the mounts are (johnny joints or rod ends) the less movement you will experience.

There are very successful suspension designs out that do not use any conventional lateral locator (Satchell link). It uses 2 upper links that run parellel to the vehicle center line and 2 lower lower links that converge from the axle to the frame. It works very well and has no laterel movement.

Hey guys. Here is a short article from Car Craft. They have some nice photos of the actual arms. The Johnny Joint appears different to me since it is the same width as a normal control arm.

http://www.carcraft.com/techarticles/116_0302_john/

P.S. You can find them in the back of any recent issue of Chevy Hi-Performance or Super Chevy. Just look in the advertiser's index.