plymouth fury project

[Neu]

but a much smaller percentage actually know what they are talking about.

Of course...and as you might expect...I am privileged to be in that smaller percentage group.

How would magnets have anything to do with mileage? It would do nothing, absolutely nothing. If you do a google search for "Cow Magnets mileage" you'll find page after page of people investigating and finding that it does NOTHING.

Gasoline is a liquid, has only trace amounts of metal, if any, found in it, how would a magnet do anything? Oh, that's because it doesn't. Even considering that this would do anything is ridiculous.

[Neu]

I'm getting somewhat tired of this b-s talk on the forum. It's fine to post about gas saving measures that work, (I.e. changing driving habits, tires being inflated, timing, etc) but posting gas saving measures that have no scientific basis are getting on my nerves, I'll end any topic that starts talking about running your car on H20 and anything snake oil related.

[takza]

Strange...I just redid the HHO gen in my car and intend to build another one for my truck soon. Still testing additives. Getting into sensor mods. None of this does anything for my mileage though.

[simon84]

One quick question for anyone that might know.
I replaced the wheels on the plymouth with wider tires and quite a different offset which required the use of 2" spacers for clearance. Now it handles differently on the highway. Could it need to have the alignment checked?
It does need the shocks replacing (next on the list) but there is a noticable difference in the tracking. It sometimes feels like the car is getting blown around by the wind on the highway.
I'm hoping an alignment once I replace the shocks will help.
Any thoughts on this?? Anything else to consider?
Thx

[Neu]

When you replace or mess with tires you should always align them and balance them.

[takza]

A lot of times a wider track will cause a car to follow ruts and so forth....since the steering geometry is set up to put the cars weight usually over the center of the tire...OEM? With RWD...I think you need to use a little more toe in to compensate for the added drag on the front wheels.

[simon84]

So I got the fury back from the tire shop. They repacked the front bearings, said they were a little loose which would explain the poor tracking. They also replaced the idler arm and did the alignment. It is better but still sometimes goes a bit squirrelly on the highway. It feels like it is catching a rut or one tire is pulling off course or something.
Any other ideas?
I will call them and ask if they think they had any issues with it. Did the alignment go ok, or is something else up. It was ok on the old wheels/tires.
The new shocks help but it is still a bit floaty. Not sure how much of that could be due to it being a big boat. Could it be the rear shocks?
Thanks for any ideas.

[splatterdog]

Did they give you a printout of the readings before and after? Anything more than toe is rocket science for many tech's these days. Actually, now that I think about it, it's been that way for at least as long as I've been wrenchin. The phrase "set the toe and let it go" or "toe and go" for short has been around a very long time.

Also, if I remember right, lots of old mopars had strut rods to control fore/aft movement of the lower control arm. Cracked or mushy rubber will make a huge difference. If available, polyurethane is a phenominal replacement for usually not much more moolah. I've replaced 2 year old strut rod bushings with poly and it was like replacing the 20 year old ones all over again. Also check control arm and leaf spring bushings too. Although they should've performed a thorough pre alignment inspection before doing one.

Torsion bar susp? Was ride height checked/adjusted? Another critical dimension that's often overlooked.

Wide aggressive tires can "hunt" too, especially on tire grooved asphalt roads.

[simon84]

Thanks for that.
I think I'm going to put the old wheels on the front and go for a spin and see what it's like. It seems that things changed dramatically with the new rims and tires. I also hear about old chrysler steering boxes being loose. First mechanic I took the car to 20 years ago said it needed a new steering box and I never replaced it and always found the steering to be great. Now I am hearing about bad chrysler steering and I'm wondering if the wider low profile tires are showing me something I never noticed before.
I'm interested to know more about the "hunting" with wide agressive tires. These are Pirelli Asymmetricos (235/55/17).
The tires are also used and have some slightly uneven wear on two of them. Still good tread though. Perhaps those 2 should go on the rear and see if it makes a difference.
Basically I'm going to do some wheel rearranging and see if I can deduce anything.
Maybe next year I'll get in there and replace some bushings etc. It's going to bed for the winter soon.