Ladder bar fox body mustang 28x10.5

Do you normally have to hit the tire Hard or soft with ladder bars, never had a set friend just got a new backhalf car with ladder bars. Travel up front? Shock settings? the car is 2800lbs and is 59% on the nose it has a BBC boat anchor up front.

studly wrote:Do you normally have to hit the tire Hard or soft with ladder bars, never had a set friend just got a new backhalf car with ladder bars. Travel up front? Shock settings? the car is 2800lbs and is 59% on the nose it has a BBC boat anchor up front.

You will have to hit it hard and have enough motor to keep it hooked on the launch. I see a ton of 10.5 x 28 cars that hit the rear tires hard on the initial hit but they rebound and unload the back before the front suspension has time to react and get the weight to transfer. Ending up with a bounce and then spinning.

With this being said most engines are different and will need a different bar set up along with shock setting to make that specific engine chassis combo happy. If you can find someone with a similar set up and ask if they will help you with a base line.

Or you could get some chassis software and lay it all out and let it figure what you need.

what kind of power?

a good set of dbl adj shocks will be your best friend.

key word a "good" set.

richter69 wrote:key word a "good" set.

YES! cheap shit will cost you. a good video of the back tire can be very helpful too.

motor makes about 850hp without Nitrous he is starting with 250hp but we should end up around 450-550 worth of nitrous, it is a nitrous specific built motor this explains alot. took power out with progressive for first pass and it spun, i took more power out and it spun worse
it is doing exactly that hooking then coming back down and unloading tires. next time out i will keep putting power to it faster and harder

A lot of times because a ladder bar setup can be quite violent with decent power/torque it might not be a question of "will it hit the tire hard or soft" on the inital hit, but "will it hit the tire hard or too hard". Because of this good "drag racing valved" shocks/coil over shocks are very important, especially with big power. And the shocks might end up having to be set quite stiff to keep the ladder bar's violen hit in check.

A longer than "normal" ladder bar can sometimes calm things down (with big power) enough to allow you to back the shocks down a little, but you never know for sure untill it's tried on a given combo.

And even though a ladder bar is said to be more violent than a 4-link if a car is way down on power and the shocks are real loose to help the hit, the ladder bar & 4-link can both have problems keeping the pressure applied after the inital hit without some bounce happening.

What is the ladder bar length (I/C length)?
How high off the ground is the front rod end (I/C height)?
Bottom bar angle?
How tight is the rear shock extension & compression valving set (from full tight)?

Next time out get some good video shot from a combined rear/driver side angle.

also what trans type and ratio? rear gear?