Volvo 1800ES: Engineering a Resurrection

Last night was pen-and-paper and a bunch of photos night with the front suspension.  I think I want to stick with the ES subframe and use, more or less, what the Gothenburg engineers gave me to work with, but with some tweaks and optimisations.  It'll be cheap, I have a bunch of 1800 and 122 front suspensions lying around I can cannibalize from if I need to, and the risk of going too far wrong will be minimised.

First, a shot at the stock 1800ES suspension, looking at it as if one were sitting in the driver's seat looking forwards.  

Incidentally, I love that M+S tire on there, it just looks like so much business.  A tiny little pizza cutter, with big knobby treads.  

Anyway, this is the suspension at full droop.  The line formed by the LCA pivot points is just barely downward (toward the ground, from the center of the car) facing as it is, which means at ride height it's going to be almost exactly level.  The UCA is very much downward pointing; at stock ride height it'll still be slightly downward, though as the suspension compresses it will invert and start pointing upward.  Essentially, it seems like Volvo's goal was to engineer the suspension such that camber remains more or less constant throughout the suspension travel.  Which is probably a plus, if you're traversing dirt and mud roads in the middle of, say, Brazil.  

It is highly unlikely this car will ever be driven in Brazil.

Back in the late 2000's, we (me, tuna55, tester (I think that's his screen name) and a couple of other miscreants with whom I associate) used to campaign a Volvo 122 in the 24 Hours of LeMons.  Being young(er) and dumb(er) then, we decided to simply cut the springs all the way around the car, dropping it approximately 7 feet, and race it.  Obviously, you can see the flaw with this plan now.  Cutting the springs in the front puts the LCA into a decidedly upward-pointing pose at static ride height, which means that at any suspension compression it's going to a) reduce the track, and b) contribute to positive camber.  Both of which are....suboptimal.  Granted, the UCA will be pointing up, too, which will help at least with the camber department, but still the roll center and track get all screwed up.

So what's to be done?

A quick sketch, showing roughly where the roll center currently sits.  Granted, this is with suspension at full droop, but as you can see, as the suspension compresses, the situation doesn't exactly improve.

So, if the Volvo were parked in, say, Oklahoma, the roll center would have struck black gold.  

The suspension camber goes rather positive as it compresses.  I've seen a few guys fabricate adapters to relocate the upper control arm mounts down about an inch and inward about 3/8".  Apparently this helps the geometry, although I have not seen a plotted curve.

It's fairly easy to make - a 3/8" plate with nuts (or a threaded boss) welded on the back side. The OE holes in the sub-frame are used to mount it, new holes a drilled for clearance. It's also fairly easily reversible. 

Figure out ride height, do a bit of modeling and see how you can move arms to make the geometry better? In all honesty it looks like a fairly decent starting point it you're a cut and weld sort of fellow. 

My big question is whether you want to stick with those knuckles? I don't know anything about them or if there are better options for reasons like brake mounting and bearings. 

In reply to Ian F :

Yep, that was my initial thought.  Sketching it out, using a theoretical new location for the inboard mounting of the UCA, the results look very much better.

Now, as the suspension compresses (due to cornering, or if I cut the springs), again, the roll center gets lower, but at least this is a good (well, better) starting point.  

In reply to mazdeuce - Seth :

The idea occurred to me to modify the knuckles to create essentially a drop spindle.  Since the ball joints bolt to the control arms, though, I could conceivably use some other knuckle entirely.  Of course, this would also mean not only figuring out the brake equation, but also possibly different spindles, hubs, wheels....etc.  

In reply to mazdeuce - Seth :

The 1800ES brakes are great.  Save ABS, they are about as good as anything installed on a car short of carbon rotors.  I say this having done multiple long drives in hilly terrain in a stock car.  Four wheel disc, power assist, good swept area for the weight of the car, incredible hydraulic redundancy, true mechanically separate parking/emergency brake.  The brakes were ahead of their time.

The bearings don't have a reputation for excessive wear, although like most older cars, they will require service and replacement from time to time.  If there is one issue it is the price of replacement rotors.  They are available, but aren't cheap.

In reply to mazdeuce - Seth :

The Volvo 122/1800 front upright is a very stout piece with easily serviceable ball joints, and a bolt on caliper bracket. The brakes are pretty good as well, if a little heavy. The only thing not ideal is that it is a little short above the spindle. VCH's lower the upper inner pivot idea is the best starting point, and only easy option. I highly recommend it as a suspension guy, but have no experience with a car so modified. An extension of the pin out of the upper ball joint would also be a move in the correct direction, but harder to achieve in the machine shop.

mazdeuce - Seth said:

 In all honesty it looks like a fairly decent starting point it you're a cut and weld sort of fellow. 

I believe we've well established, in fact, that is precisely the sort of fellow I am.  

In reply to TurnerX19 :

I was looking at that connection point last night.  Also, an extension at the lower ball joint would help to lower the car, while leaving Roll Center essentially unchanged which would be  a step towards the goal.  

All the positive comments about the ES brakes, by the way, are spot on.  Even the 122, with its rear drums, had pretty spectacular binders, at least by the standards of the day.

Not to get too far ahead of ourselves, but my original plan for the brakes, at least on the fronts, is to replace the solid rotors with vented deals from a Volvo 240, and mount corresponding calipers.  The 240 brakes take the ES brakes even a step further, and are fantastic on a 3500 pound 240 wagon (I can personally attest to that).  So they should be even more fantastic on a 2500 pound 1800ES.  

In reply to NOHOME :

Just shared some of the work I've been doing here with our old friend Dimitris.  His reply?  "I'd leave it alone", and "Well, if you screw it up, at least you have other cars.  Just don't crash."

Reminds me why I'd rather hang out with you guys here.  

You can buy longer ball joints. Maybe try to see what will fit out there in race car land for a longer lower ball joint. I found one to fit the truck which helped a lot.

In reply to tuna55 :

Possible.  The lower ball joint mounts to the LCA via 4 bolts.  Depending on fab skills, it should be possible to make an adapter to mount a different ball joint.  Or just fab up a different LCA (which is another option for the UCA).

4 bolt lower ball joint? 2wd Colorado with coil spring front has something like that (see picture) I do know there is some 'lowering' ball joints available from Belltech, not sure it helps at all.

That Chevy ball joint is similar, but the angles in either plane would prevent it from fitting I personally don't care for the extended lower idea because the load amplitude is so high there. The originals did fail on occasion too, I changed a fair number of them when these cars were common dailies.   

In reply to TurnerX19 :

I remember selling a lot of ball joints and similar parts in the late 80's into the 90's.  With modern cars I think we forget what used to be considered "regular consumable parts" back in the 70's and before.

In reply to Ian F :

122/1800 ball joints are still a whole lot better than the 544 king pin set up, and I dailied a 445 Duett until 1991

In reply to volvoclearinghouse :

Glad to hear he is doing well. Tell him I said hello! We had some great discourse ( civil) on the Sweedspeede forums! 

Pete

Here is a link to a similar forum in Sweden, and it is a 1800S -69. I think the pictures will give you some ideas what this guy did to his car. His idea was to mod it enough for enjoyment, but nothing that couldn't be reversed if wanted to. +300rwhp never looked so good. 

https://rejsa.nu/forum/viewtopic.php?t=92434

I am a Volvo nut too and a transplant from Sweden living the life on a bayou in Louisiana.

In reply to BearWolf :

Wow, that looks like a good read.  Thanks!

In reply to NOHOME :

I try to remain civil with D^2, but he comes across very condescending at times.  He's also oddly conservative technically, which I feel hinders him.  But, we share a passion for similar cars, and he is the one who got me into Volvo 122's back in the early 2000's.

In reply to DjGreggieP, tuna55, & Ian F :

Thanks for the ideas on the lower ball joints.  I'd been tossing around ideas in my head to accomplish a) lowering the car, b) correcting the sub-par roll center location, and c) achieving camber gain on suspension compression.  I'd call my fab skills "adequate" to attempt control arm surgery.  That Colorado joint looks interesting, but as pointed out the angle of the bottom is in the wrong direction which would either mean fabbing a rather odd-looking (and potentially weak) adaptor, or living with near-binding angles on the ball joint.  I've never had a ball joint fail on me- and I dailied a 122 for years, rally-crosssed it, and just generally followed Volvo's advice to "drive it like I hate it" and they've always impressed me as really stoutly designed cars.  When I pulled the front bearings off the 1975 Ford LTD we LeMons race now, I was shocked to find they were about the same size as the 122's.  

Armed with my trusty impact (I cannot overstate how much I love this tool; I can't even fathom how I used to get along without it!) last night I tore into the front suspension with an abandon one might best describe as "reckless".

(I really need to tidy up tonight.)

Let's see what we've got here.

The stock UCA location.

It appears, like Ian F mentioned, there's an "easy inch" this can be lowered.  As lowering it correspondingly pushes the connection for the upper spindle ball joint outboard, some sort of a spacer will be needed to achieve negative camber.

There's also some danger of the UCA contacting the suspension crossmember on full droop, so some cutting and welding new braces in here may be needed.

For reference in discussions, here's the upper ball joint.  It's not tapered; it's simple a straight shaft with a little notch in it.  The "female" portion on the upper spindle has a springy clampy arrangement with a through bolt; the bolt both clamps the upper spindle around this shaft, and passes through the little notch in the ball joint shaft, positively securing everything together. 

The upper spindle:

So, yeah.  Extending this would be tricky.

Here's the lower ball joint arrangement, showing the 4 bolts fastening it to the LCA.

Without getting into major reconstructive/ alterative surgery, and barring any magical extended ball joints I can adapt to, it appears the best I can do here is the relocation of the UCA hard point downward an inch or so.  Some other, more difficult ideas I had envisioned:

1. Relocating the LCA hard points up.  This would involve welding a new tube to the suspension crossmember, and braces and such.  It could be done, and would definitely help with camber gain.  But it would be time consuming, and tough to get aligned and located properly.
2. Extending the top &/or bottom of the spindle to lower the lower ball joint &/or raise the upper ball joint.  Again, difficult, unless osme sort of extended ball joint is available.  And then there's the concern of added moments at those somewhat critical connections.  
3. Flipping the spindles upside down &/or side to side.  Not all that tricky, actually, since the brake brackets and steering arm brackets bolt on, it might be possible to find an orientation that would make them all play nicely.  But the different ball joints, with the obviously stronger one on the bottom, make this idea seem...ill advised.

To head off on a somewhat different tack, if the entire suspension itself could be raised up in the car, that would necessitate less overall lowering of the suspension geometry (i.e. spring cutting), which would retain some more favorable suspension static orientation.  With the UCA moved down into it's hypothetical location, and the subframe temporarily back in the car, it looks like there's another "easy inch" the suspenson can be raised, without too much modification.

Really, all it would take to accomplish this will be to cut the mounting plates on the crossmember and move them down an inch, welding them back to it and some minor gusset rework.  

Looking holitically at the plan for the car, this shows promise.  The planned tire size for the car is a 205/50r15, which is about 2" smaller in diameter than the stock 165SR15 tires.  So that lowers the car an inch.  If I then raise the suspension in the car by an inch, that's 2" of total drop.  Then I can play with the springs and cut maybe another 1/2" to 1" out without negatively impacting the suspension geometry significantly.  So, there's up to 3" of total drop that can be achieved, sort-of incrementally, without major changes to anything.  

The only other issue I forsee with raising the suspension is that the stock engine mounts will also raise, raising the engine.  But since the plan involves relocating the engine and mounting it off the frame, rather than the suspension, this shouldn't cause a problem.

Thoughts from my car consigliere?

Oh- another idea I just had for the upper ball joint: what if I fabbed a shaft, identical to the one in the ball joint, with a corresponding clamp-through bolt arrangement attached to it, sort of a male-female adaptor, like a short socket extension.  This would raise the outer UCA connection point, further raising roll center and helping with camber gain on compression.  The upper ball joint is subject to much less stress than the lower one, this might be a safer solution.  And it's easily reverted back if it turns out to be a problem.  

In reply to volvoclearinghouse :

I was going to suggest this as I read the above post. A simple lathe job with a careful whiz wheel slot for the pinch bolt if you don't have a milling machine. The load on the upper control arm is low enough there should be no issue. Raising the subframe in the chassis however has a major issue, as it moves the engine up the same amount

I really like the thought process going into this build. The idea of channeling the front suspension to not muck up the geometry is a clever idea.Going to be interesting to see how the relative engine location plays into the plan since tunnel clearance and driveline angle are all going to come into play if the engine moves up.

Question about lowering the rear:

The tunnel on these cars is quite low on the floorpan. How much can the rear  be lowered before the top of the tunnel comes into contact with the driveshaft?

Pete

If you switch to an IRS, you won't have as much tunnel clearance issues.

Still thinking a longer lower BJ is better BTW.