Not sure of the size, but that sounds about right. In '06 Ford did change the strut & the spindle diameter. For '05 Ford changed the ball joint size to a slightly bigger one. Making the '05 spindle different then the others. So the earlier suspension kits fit '00-'05 cars & are more popular then the '06-'11 kits. Seems like when Ford changed the diameter, the suspension manufactors didn't follow suit. So you having a '07 & want to change out your struts & springs to a earlier kit, you'll need to get a pr of '05 only spindles or hit up Karl @ Massive performance to get his "Omni kit''= sleeves that take up the clearence of the bigger diameter spindle & a earlier smaller diameter strut. Just to add, the early & later springs & struts don't interchange= no mix & matching. The later spring have a pigtail on the bottom & the later struts have a platform to except the pigtail. Hope that helps you. Felixthecat[thankyou]

 

Thanks Felix. [thumb] I still would like to confirm the exact size. I guess I can always hit up the junkyard with some calipers.

Being in the machinist trade for the past 10+ years I just can't see me paying $80+ for a 5mm shim (2.5 when you figure in the radius or .01") I have shim stock laying around in that size I can use.


Right now I'm looking at the M-3000-ZX3A kit. Car has 60k plus 8 years old and things are a bit mushy IMO. Figure anything new will be better and I'm not looking for a slammed look. (I outgrew that stage of my life) so this kit seems right up my alley.

Already snagged a swaybar from the junkyard, trying to come up with some ideas on how to build the brackets. Seen a few I'll interpret my own ideas.

 

Lots you can do with skills/tools materials handy, "fix" either of those problems.

Tabs on the shock shims you make to keep 'em in position during assembly is one suggestion for home made I can think of. (To keep 'em from sliding down as struts installed)

Cheers

 

When you say the 2005 has a unique spindle, do you mean steering knuckle?

Toby

 

Yea= spindle, knuckle, upright, whatever you want to call it.

 

Son of a gun. Since Ford renders parts obsolete after ten years, I'm going to have a heck of a time swapping all this stuff if I ever need to. Thanks for this thread, I didn't realize the suspension parts changed this much over the years.

Toby

 

Why would you need to swap parts for? You'll only have to change out the struts, ball joints or lower control arms, tie rod ends when they wear. No problem getting those parts.

 

I need this car to last another decade or two, so I'm planning for the worst. I saw Dorman makes control arms, but they aren't my favorite. OEM parts will soon be unavailable.

Toby

 

Any '05-'11 A-arms work. Plus you can hit up CFM for tubular control arms + the oem ones too. They should be around for a long time, besides thare a crash part, so the aftermarket will pick up the slack.

 

Moog lower control arms

 

Got my kit in today. measured 1.798 +/- .001 ( roughly 45.5mm) I'll give that extra .5 mm to the paint thickness and/or material tolerance.

 

Have you had a chance to mock up a shim for the struts??????

 

not yet. Just got the kit this morning won't know exactly what size shim I'll need till I pull my stuff apart and measure the diameter of the old strut. If someone has a new strut and a set of calipers to measure that would be great. (too lazy/busy to run to the parts store to do myself. )