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1970-1981 Firebird/Trans Am 2nd Gen F-Body
Pontiac V8 1970-1981 Firebird/Trans Am 2nd Gen F-Body
Tie It Together First — 1970-1981 Firebird/Trans Am 2nd Gen F-Body for Pontiac V8s
The 1970-1981 Firebird and Trans Am bolts a front subframe to a unitized body with a leaf-sprung rear, and the flex between those halves is what you feel as a loose, rattling car over bad pavement. On a T-top car it is worse. Tying the chassis together is the first real suspension improvement on a second-gen, not the last one.
Butler stocks subframe connectors for this chassis from both Butler Performance and RideTech, plus the RideTech systems that build on top of them: StreetGRIP, a complete coil-over system and an air ride system, the last two carrying the TruTurn front kit and a bolt-on rear 4-link.
More About 1970-1981 Firebird/Trans Am 2nd Gen F-Body
1. Subframe connectors before anything else
Modern tires and modern spring rates load a second-gen chassis harder than the factory ever planned for. Connectors cost the least of anything on this page and change the most about how the car feels.
| Butler Performance 70-81 connectors | the PTFB design, with the largest minimum cross-sectional area of the bolt-on connectors and maximum ground clearance, a single piece main beam and large mounting surfaces. They can be bolted or welded, come powder coated, and include solid body bushings with a 3-in-1 feature: standard height, 1/2" lower, or wedged. Hardware included. |
| RideTech connectors | sold as two different part numbers, 1970-73 and 1974-81, so order by year and not by decade. Fabricated from 1.5" x 3" x .125 wall steel, they bolt in with no fabrication. The rear end of each connector picks up three existing floor pan bolt locations and completely replaces the original leaf spring pocket; the front bolts through the subframe and is captured by the body bushing. |
| Compatibility | the RideTech connectors work with original equipment leaf springs, with RideTech StreetGRIP composite leaf springs, and with RideTech 4-link rear systems except the older uni-cradle design. |
2. Then pick a system
All three RideTech packages for the 2nd Gen are complete, so nothing has to be cross-shopped part by part.
| StreetGRIP | stock-style replacement. Dual-rate front coil springs, composite rear leaf springs that save 70 lbs of unsprung weight, HQ rebound-adjustable shocks, Delrin control arm and leaf spring bushings, tall ball joints and a larger front sway bar. |
| Coil-over system | the complete TruTurn front kit, front MuscleBar, rear 4-link and four HQ Series coil-overs. |
| Air ride | the same front and rear architecture running HQ Series ShockWaves for adjustable ride height. |
3. What TruTurn and the 4-link actually fix
These two pieces are why the coil-over and air kits cost what they do, and both address flaws specific to this platform.
| TruTurn | tall spindles, steering arms, tall inner tie rods, billet tie rod adjusters, inner rods and a centerlink, working as a set to minimize bumpsteer and improve camber gain. |
| Bolt-on 4-link | RideTech's unicradle indexes the lateral tubes off the leaf spring mounting points rather than off the frame rails, with a separate steel brace bolted inside. That is a direct answer to the production variation and frame rail thickness common to second-gen bodies. Minimal cutting, almost no welding. |
If the budget only stretches one step this year, make it the connectors. Every other part on this page works better on a chassis that is not twisting underneath it.
Not sure what your Pontiac needs?
Email our tech team at tech@butlerperformance.com. Tell us your engine, heads, car, and power goal, and we will put the parts together as one combination that works.