Heidts Rear Suspension

Photos and text by Chadly Johnson

The second step in our suspension upgrade was to match the front Heidts system with a rear Heidts set-up.  We also replaced the stock rear end with a Currie that is complete with Wilwood brakes…this was followed up by a rear swap bar.  OK…here we go.

Here is a shot of our stock rear end with drum brakes. 

We began by disconnecting the drive shaft, this is accomplished by first removing the universal joint straps.

Applying tape around the universal joints will ensure that the caps do not come off.

We then unbolted the upper and lower trailing arms.

Here is our new Heidts kit.

We were lucky enough to have access to a fork lift when removing and installing our rear ends…here is the old one being dropped out of the car after disconnecting the shocks and rear brake lines.

Here is a shot of the bare rear area with everything removed.

Here are some shots of our new Currie rear end.

Next we mounted the lower trailing arms onto the rear end…a little anti-seize will allow for easier installation, and prevent squeaking.

Next we installed the upper controlling arms.

Once again we used a fork lift to hold the rear end in position while we lined up all the mounting holes in the upper and lower control arms…we won’t  deny this takes a fair amount of grunt work.

With the trailing arms in position you can now install your shocks.

At this point you should be looking like this.

At this point we were ready to re-install our coil spring, but to ensure that they didn’t fall out if we every maxed out the rear suspension we opted to make cups to locate the springs on the spring pads.

At this point you are ready to add a swap bar.  We used a safety stand to lift the bar into position as there was a good amount of tension on it when bolting it into place.

Here is a shot showing the swap bar bolted to the lower trailing arm.

At this point we torque everything to spec, and re-installed out drive shaft.

The last step was to weld in tabs to hold the rear brake lines to the new Currie rear end.

And you are ready to bolt on your wheels and go…

Next we will test fit our new LS engine and transmission, and show you how to open up your tranny tunnel to allow for the larger, modern transmission.

See part one of this series here.

See part two of this series here.