S 10 BJ conversion

[1100kaw2]

I have read over everything I can find and still left me confused.

Thanks for reading this, I knows its been hashed out before, but I just cant seem to pull a definitive answer from everything I've read.
Maybe someone can get it thru my thick head


I have the car assembled now with Bob Gumm adapters. Its obvious that the geometry is all wrong. I am going to go ahead and pull it apart and do S 10 ball joints.
I have the rings from UB machine. Unfortunately I cant afford Justin's nice tube arms. So I'm going to modify stock 72 arms.
most everything I see posted suggests, relocate the lower BJ inward 1/4"
(looking at my car sitting now, 95% assembled, 1/4" just don't look like enough to bring it back)( maybe it is?)
Then I see variations on the uppers?
some say. just put it as close to stock location, weld up and enlarge hole till it fits.
others say. try to fudge it outward and rearward as much as possible.

What I don't get is..... should these thought be used together, or is this considered one or the other ideas?
I'm thinking, 1/4" inward on bottom and outward/rearward on top.
Shouldn't this fix Camber and also lay the spindle back a little for caster as well?
Good combo for street car right?
Darrell

[NVEGAR8D]

Hi Darrel, I'm thinking of going the same route with my vega and taking the top bjoint back 1/4 inch , bottom bjoint forward 1/4 and in 1/4 to compensate for the differences in locations. from what i remember that way the wheel stays centered and will provide better caster on the outer wheel too. just moving the top bjoint would move the wheel back. though it's not much i think also moving the bottom is the way to go.
nick75vega

[spencerforhire]

I would suggest that moving the lower BJ inward would be better than moving the upper out; narrowing the track width even a little can make fitting decent size rubber easier. I would be tempted to move the lower in as far as possible, and then move the upper back a bit and inward a 1/4" less than the bottom.

[megavega]

move the bottom in a 1/4" or .250" in from stock. On the top youll only be able to move it back slightly as the way the top control arm is stamped, the s10 balljoint only has so much room there as its quite a bit larger. I just weld op the stock rivet holes and open up the center and redrill the holes to bolt it on, pretty simple, you gain just a tad of caster by moving it back but its marginal.

I have done a few sets of the control arms with the s10 balljoints and theres zero issues at the alignment rack when doing them this way, the 1/4" on the bottom fixes the neg. camber issue. You will have a decent amount of adjustment with the stock cam bolts in the lower control arms then.

[1100kaw2]

Thanks megavega and spence. That's the info I needed.
Darrell

[1100kaw2]

I havnt been able to do the ball joint swap yet, but I have thought of another possible variable.
I removed K member and fabbed and welded in a new cross member.
I also cut out upper the upper core support area and installed new to accommodate the radiator. when doing this, I had to actually use porta power to spread the aprons apart to get back to the original width here.
* note I did these at different times, both were not removed at same time, no weight on suspension.
my concern is this, maybe my car has moved a lot more than I think, and the common 1/4" inward mounting of lower S10 BJ wont be enough?
Now that car is mostly together and sitting with weight on it. can I cut a strait edge to fit the rim edge. place it vertically on rim and use a degree finder to get the number of degrees its out? Then, how do I convert this to how many inches I need to move BJ inwards?
Thanks in advance for input on this. I hope to order BJ's next week and tear into it.
Darrell