Whats limiting my flex ?

Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Location: Australia

G'day all,

On my RHD FJ73 I have done a RUF, today I took out the shock absorber and the swaybar link to see how much flex I can get, I got a fair bit I think for a SUA setup. In the pics the front wheel is just off the ground while the opposing side is hard on the bumpstop. Question is, looking at the shackle I could probably get more flex but the tyre didnt want to do down anymore and I dont know why? The brake lines, driveshaft etc are on the compressed side so wont affect drop. All I could think of was that I have maxed out the steering links ? Any help appreciated.

Also I measure what size shocks I need with stock towers,

compressed ~410mm
Extended ~ 660mm

And rancho make a RS5000 that is

compressed 400mm
extended 686mm

beatuy!

Joined: 30 May 2006 Location: Gembrook,Vic

STOOPID LEAF SPRINGS ARE LIMITING YOUR FLEX!!!!

Joined: 15 May 2005 Location: Bayside, Brisbane

Opening up the spring pack retainers will help them seperate and droop more.

Or a custom leaf pack if you have the coin.

Joined: 30 Jun 2004 Location: Brisbane sometimes

check the angularity between the leaf pack eyes and the spring hangers on the chassis. I found that i was regularly chewing out bushes on the front end of my troopy when i was getting half decent flex similar to yours. I had somewhere around 15-20 degrees difference in angle between the springs and chassis.

i've noticed that the length from your rear spring pin to diff housing isn't that long, so your bushes might be binding up. unfortunately the only fix to that is to move your diff forward or to mount your hangers further backwards (which would probably be easier in the long run.)

If you compare a leaf set up to a coil set up, the setup/distance from your diff housing to rear spring pin is similar to the effect of having leading arms in a factory toyota 3 link. So it would be like doing a long arm conversion.

Posted: Sun Jun 01, 2008 8:36 am

Evil 73 wrote:

STOOPID LEAF SPRINGS ARE LIMITING YOUR FLEX!!!!

thats the one.

Joined: 14 Jan 2004 Location: somewhere out there

it looks like you have a heap of droop left in the front passenger side..

your springs are soft enough as they are starting to seperate, if you open your spring retainers they will spread more.. not sure if you'll get a heap more flex out of it tho.. and i dont think thats limiting it..

whats the angle of your front shackles normally? maybe your spring is too long and it wont flex much more?

not the best pic but you can see how far the shackle has moved (closest)... and how flat the other side is..

if i open my retainers a bit it should make the shackle hit the anti-inversion bolt.

Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Location: Australia

Spring retainers are opened up, will check the angle between the spring and shackle. Would it be best to run rubber or plastic type bushes ? currently the plastic type in there.

rockcrawler31, moving the spring mount and making that length longer makes sense, though i'll probably have to go custom springs then and engineering etc. To much $$$ methinks I might just get the shocks and leave it at that. Cant really move diff forward anymore, already gone 20mm anymore and i'll have to cut off the front guards to get the tyres to fit!

Here are some pics of the shackle, spring on the compressed side, not the best but you get the idea, and at ride height too.

I think the springs are a little to long, they are 2'' lifted 60 rears, might see if I can find some stock height 60 rears which would be stock length.

Joined: 15 May 2005 Location: Bayside, Brisbane

hulsty wrote:

Maybe undoing the sway bar might help ??

Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Location: Australia

It already is, took the passenger side link out

cheers

Joined: 25 Oct 2006 Location: Brisbane, Aspley

its not lief springs at all. basically from what i have gathered about these trucks is that the spring is simply too short to be a good flexer. you will pretty much need longer springs. this was the only way i could sort out the rear of my lux. ppl seem to give them the extended shackle treatment, i think yours has em already?? but this dosent fix anything. You have the right legth shocks ect?

Joined: 14 Jan 2004 Location: somewhere out there

looking at that shackle angle i reckon your springs are too long..

try some front springs from a 75 maybe? (nfi if they will work or diff from yours).. need somnthing slightly shorter (20-30mm) i reckon.

Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Location: Australia

stock middy springs are the same as a 75 front, had them, they were to short with 2'' shackles to flex to the bump stop. Will see if I can hunt down some stock 60 springs instead of 2'' lifted ones, should be ~20mm shorter.

cheers

Posted: Mon Jun 02, 2008 1:49 pm

you want long flat springs champ.
but the flex you are getting is pretty good. nothing to be ashamed of there.

Joined: 30 Jun 2004 Location: Brisbane sometimes

DIRTY ROCK STAR wrote:

you want long flat springs champ.
but the flex you are getting is pretty good. nothing to be ashamed of there.

that's what i thought. not bad really.

your springs could be a tad shorter from diff to shackle but i don't see that as the reason why they aren't drooping more. undo both sides of the sway bar too. i found that if i left the sway bar on one side of the my mine it still bound up against the bottom of the axle housing a bit.

Everyone says to use rubber bushes, but my experience was that the nolathane ones flexed as much as the rubber ones, but lasted longer. Because of high angularity, i was lucky to get one decent trip out of rubber ones. But my troopy was heavy, so maybe your's won't have the weight to push the nolathane bushes to the limits of travel. the only way you will find out is trial and error.

To be honest i would keep it as it is and lock the diffs. With that much travel and diffs nothing will stop your car.

how is the ride btw with the shackle angle like that?

MILO

Joined: 30 Jun 2004 Location: Brisbane sometimes

Evil 73 wrote:

STOOPID LEAF SPRINGS ARE LIMITING YOUR FLEX!!!!

rubbish

nothing wrong with leaf springs, and set up right will flex pretty damned good. Plenty of trucks out there that flex like crazy on leaves (hilux's to start with)

Leaves are solid, robust, and easy to fix if you break one. The only downside (which is why i went coils) is the time and effort to change spring rates for play and load carrying. and the expense of leaf packs.

M

Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Location: Australia

rockcrawler31 wrote:

DIRTY ROCK STAR wrote:

you want long flat springs champ.
but the flex you are getting is pretty good. nothing to be ashamed of there.

that's what i thought. not bad really.

your springs could be a tad shorter from diff to shackle but i don't see that as the reason why they aren't drooping more. undo both sides of the sway bar too. i found that if i left the sway bar on one side of the my mine it still bound up against the bottom of the axle housing a bit.

Everyone says to use rubber bushes, but my experience was that the nolathane ones flexed as much as the rubber ones, but lasted longer. Because of high angularity, i was lucky to get one decent trip out of rubber ones. But my troopy was heavy, so maybe your's won't have the weight to push the nolathane bushes to the limits of travel. the only way you will find out is trial and error.

To be honest i would keep it as it is and lock the diffs. With that much travel and diffs nothing will stop your car.

how is the ride btw with the shackle angle like that?

MILO

I know the springs should be shorter, about 20mm I reckon shackle to diff. But the good thing is they are factory front springs so cheap and easy to get!! Maybe once I sort out the rear i'll get customs for the front. Will pull out swaybar from both sides and see if that helps a little too.

Bit of trial and error on the bushes I might give a go, they are cheap and its only my time to fit. Locking the diffs, at least the rear is coming soon. Need longs in the front first snapping a CV sucks.

The ride with that shackle angle is fine, the front spring rate is really low due to that angle. Since not much shackle movement is needed for the spring to come up. It might be verging on to soft actually it only just holds the front end up.

Joined: 30 May 2006 Location: Gembrook,Vic

Articulation/flex does not equate to go offroad abilty very often, you live in melbourne, there is sweet F all rock around to drive on the amount of flex you are getting now is more than enough, get some lockers and forget about trying to make it flex like it has a "A" frame or coils or whatever.

If you are worried about lifting wheels and the like, as i say get some lockers and don't worry about it, also the problem you face with having heaps of uncontrolable flex with soft leaves is that your not actually going to get any downward pressure in the end anyway, it just becomes a slinky that handles like shit.

Ben

Posted: Wed Jun 04, 2008 10:37 am

I probably missed it, but is your compression side sitting hard on the bump stop. If it is not, you will not get the full droop is possible. Think of it as a lever, as the compression side hits the bumpstop, the wheel continues to rise, and the axle will pivot on the bump stop forcing the droop wheel to drop out.
Though you have some decent travel so dont be worried. Flex is over-rated anyway, too much and you can sacrafice stability. What you have with twin lockers is fine.

Layto....

Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Location: Australia

Evil 73 wrote:

Articulation/flex does not equate to go offroad abilty very often, you live in melbourne, there is sweet F all rock around to drive on the amount of flex you are getting now is more than enough, get some lockers and forget about trying to make it flex like it has a "A" frame or coils or whatever.

If you are worried about lifting wheels and the like, as i say get some lockers and don't worry about it, also the problem you face with having heaps of uncontrolable flex with soft leaves is that your not actually going to get any downward pressure in the end anyway, it just becomes a slinky that handles like shit.

Ben

Lockers are on the cards when I can either be rich and get newies or find some decent secondhandies. I'm not trying to get massive A frame flex or any crap, just want to know whats limiting what I've got now, since the shackle can move back further. The shocks i'm looking at will have more travel in them aswell so just want to know what could be stopping my current setup. As for downward pressure on the wheel, that might be an interesting thing to check actually, see how many kilograms are pushing down on the wheel near the bottom of its travel. Pretty easy to measure too

cheers

Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Location: Australia

lay80n wrote:

I probably missed it, but is your compression side sitting hard on the bump stop. If it is not, you will not get the full droop is possible. Think of it as a lever, as the compression side hits the bumpstop, the wheel continues to rise, and the axle will pivot on the bump stop forcing the droop wheel to drop out.
Though you have some decent travel so dont be worried. Flex is over-rated anyway, too much and you can sacrafice stability. What you have with twin lockers is fine.

Layto....

The compression side is hard on the bumpstop, which is the fulcrum point for the front end, can just see it in the pic of the spring further up the page.

cheers

Joined: 17 Dec 2005 Location: campbelltown

rockcrawler31 wrote:

Evil 73 wrote:

STOOPID LEAF SPRINGS ARE LIMITING YOUR FLEX!!!!

rubbish

nothing wrong with leaf springs, and set up right will flex pretty damned good. Plenty of trucks out there that flex like crazy on leaves (hilux's to start with)

Leaves are solid, robust, and easy to fix if you break one. The only downside (which is why i went coils) is the time and effort to change spring rates for play and load carrying. and the expense of leaf packs.

M

here is my sptoopid feaf springs flexing

the blue one is my one

Joined: 12 Feb 2007 Location: Australia

That looks good mate, what setup you got in the rear? I need to get my rear working atleast as good as the front now!