A friend of mine is thinking of offering his 81 Delorean for sale to a few friends before going public. His car is in very good condition, I've driven it in the past and enjoyed myself quite a bit. My question is, his car is like a 70's sedan, floats, not sporty in the least. Any idea you can share as to cost of lowering the front end just enough to make it appear and handle sportier?
I have no unreasonable expectations about speed, but it would be nice if going into a lane change that it didn't have such body roll and sway to it.
I also don't want it to ride like your sitting on bricks, some cush., is nice. Any ballpark ubers to have a shop make some modifications will help, thanks, the answers will help determine my offer price and willingness to buy.
New lowering springs will lower the ride height, and new adjustable shocks will let you tweak the ride settings for how soft or sporty you want to go. Do a forum search for shocks and springs, there's lots of info on here. Plenty of DeLorean vendors offering different shock and spring setups too.
A Delorean "in very good condition" would not ride like it is floating like an old sedan or have much body roll. Something is wrong, it should have a much stiffer, more responsive suspension. Check how old the tires are and how much air is in them. While correcting whatever problem the suspension has you can improve it over the original and also in the process lower it. Realize that lowering the car is not without problems. You reduce the suspension travel and increase the likelihood of damaging the car from potholes, abrupt driveway bumps, ramps lifts, etc.
The Eibach springs and shocks kit from DMC is $1,328.00 for the entire kit. I think its about 2K installed from them now. My receipt has it for $949.00 for the kit, but that was 2012. My ride height is a smidge lower than some others I've seen out there, but I've had no issues with rubbing or bottoming out. It also rides very nicely and corners very flat. I hear this set up is not as harsh as the stock suspension set up as well.
As David T. alluded to, you should make sure you know what a DeLorean in good condition drives like before you assume you need to modify a bunch of stuff.
This seems to happen with a lot of these fanboys online posting up their "got to drive a DeLorean!" videos. They don't realize the one and only car they've ever seen or driven had some issues or unresolved problems and then they broadcast those deficiencies as typical for every car.
The cars won't compare well to a new vehicle in terms of handling or acceleration or how heavy the clutch is, for example, but that's ok, because they aren't meant to. Compare one DeLorean to another, or maybe to something else built and engineered back in the same time frame.
If you are a new owner, I would recommend trying to get the car back to working the way it was intended, without spending a whole boat load on modifications. If you haven't yet bought a car, I'd try and get familiar with the cars in general by going for a ride in someone else's car or having someone knowledgeable look at the one you're interested in for you.
On a side note, the ride height was raised to where it is in order to pass safety standards in effect at that time in the US. The car was originally intended to be lower, yes, but that's not what the final design included. I see often guys who have lowered their front ends and they tend to mention it is now a safer car. I'm not convinced that's an accurate statement though. The safety piece that is. For two reasons: first one is that the ride height came up to pass the design criteria in place at the time. So either it is safer where it was allowed to be or the criteria back then was wrong and created for frivolous reasons. I don't know enough about the logic for why bumpers needed to be a certain height to critique it.
The second is that it would seem like other aspects of the car had to change in line with this differing ride height to pass as a whole, wouldn't it? Or did the front springs get swapped out for taller ones at the very last minute, just as they were leaving the assembly line? I assume that didn't happen and that other suspension components fit the springs that the cars actually did come with. What height was the car at when it went through the crash testing?
I only mention any of this as a question to whether lowering the front ride height is indeed a safety improvement versus a change to the safe handling of the car with unknown or at least unmeasurable results?
The ride height has been a very controversial subject for a long time. No one has produced any documentation one way or the other about if it was changed, why it was changed or when. The only official stuff we have is in the alignment specs and it has always been the same. From a purely aesthetic point it appears the styling design intended the wheels to be higher up in the wheel wells making the car lower. There where (and are) Federal regs that set minimum clearances and bumper heights. You don't want car hitting everything in the road and you want all car's bumpers to be roughly about the same height so in an accident no one "underrides" the other in an accident. back in the day the "hot ticket" was to swap the front and rear springs and in the process cut the front ones to lower ride height. Today we have a lot more and better options. Just don't overdo it. Make sure the tires do not rub anywhere. One one car we did at a tech session we almost ripped all of his aftermarket aero stuff off when we pushed it onto a lift because it was so low! Here in New Jersey (and the whole metro area as well) the roads are in such bad condition that if you hit a big pothole you will get destroyed! I see it all the time when people put those low profile tires on and wreck their tires and rims on big potholes. Not enough "give" and when you hit at speed the rim gets bent. Also they are milling the roads all over and when they do you have to avoid the raised manholes and other "iron". If you are too low you will rip out the frame of your car if you hit anything.
A Delorean "in very good condition" would not ride like it is floating like an old sedan or have much body roll. Something is wrong, it should have a much stiffer, more responsive suspension. Check how old the tires are and how much air is in them. While correcting whatever problem the suspension has you can improve it over the original and also in the process lower it. Realize that lowering the car is not without problems. You reduce the suspension travel and increase the likelihood of damaging the car from potholes, abrupt driveway bumps, ramps lifts, etc.
This my friend. My car I used and drove quite alot with all original shocks and springs and it did not do that or float. After i had the new set put on by dmc NW its like night and day
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Originally Posted by David T
