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i am almost done mounting everything that is going to go in the car. i have to finish a little bit of the interior and i think im done adding and taking out weight.

i have a few buddies that race dirt track and they scale their cars everyweek. they say "we can scale the nova for you if you want" well my question is, what do i look for? just front/rear ratio? corner weight? crossweight? what is the ideal ratios for this stuff? do i want all my corner weights the same? do i scale the car with me in it like the dirt guys do? do i evenmake any sense?

Yes you'll want yourself in the car. In theory....you want the left rear to weigh the same as the left rear, same up front, but I didn't have any luck doing that, to get my car to go straight, we ended up the same in the rear, but left front about 50lbs more on my car. You'll want to get as close to 50% front weight and 50% rear weight. What we did was scale it first, right down all the numbers, then ran the car, tweaked it in till it went straight, then rescale it again and record the numbers, then next time you make any change to the car, you'll have record of what you had before that seemed to work out good, then you can resetup the car in the future quicker than before. I hope I make sense of this, just my exspierence, other will chime in I'm sure. My Mustang is 52.5 % front heavy.

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Dogg
http://www.stevemorrisengines.com

Yes you do scale it with you in it, race ready. What type of suspension do you have?

stock type front suspension, and stock leaf spring rear suspension. another thing i was wondering, how do you make adjustments witht the weight?

Your going to be limited on how much you can adjust weights with a stock suspension. In a 4-link car , or even a ladder bar to some degree. You make adjustments by lenghing or shorteneing the 4 link bars.
You will be able to make some changes by changing the ride height . Probably the best thing to do is just put the car on the scales and record your numbers. then take it out and try it.

so pretty much,to get a good starting point, my goal is to get the two front corner weights the same and the two rear corner weights the same and 50/50 front rear ratio. in theory? am i following correctly?

50/50 Front to rear is hard to achieve , even in a full chassis car. The more weight you have on the back, the better.
You'll probably find that the car works better with alittle more weight on the left front corner. That'll counteract the car trying to roll over due to engine torque

Jacob,

Rick and Dogg are right, you are very limited to what can be done to a leaf spring suspension, however, one of the more important adjustments you can make on a leaf spring involves the front of the spring. There are modifications that can be made to the instant center (IC) which is controlled by where the front of the spring is located, Moroso / Alston makes frame connectors that have a spring pocket in the end of them that will allow you move the front spring eye up or down, this is very valuable.

I know thats not what you asked for but it somewhat goes along with it

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JPR Racing
http://jprmotorsports.blogspot.com
1972 Nova
460 C.I. 10.83 NA @ 122.98
1/8 Mile 6.841@ 100.65

i have comp engineering bolt in connectors that are welded in. the front spring eye is in the stock location. i also have the caltrac bars there too. i guess it is too late to change that now.

how would i got about getting the car to sit a little lower? i have stock leafs with a 1 inch block now.

calvert springs? and keep the block?

Be VERY careful!!! Remember when you raise or lower the car you also change your pinion angle. !!

yea, i checked the angle when i set it up the first time it was within 1 degree i think. i think im getting too technical for a car that only goes 12s lol

No such thing jacob, the more you learn now the quicker it will get

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JPR Racing
http://jprmotorsports.blogspot.com
1972 Nova
460 C.I. 10.83 NA @ 122.98
1/8 Mile 6.841@ 100.65