- Thread starter
- #101
Engine & gearbox installed
Builds 40 Series Chassis, 80 Series Suspension - Kept it Simply (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter watrob
- Start date
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- Thread starter
- #102
Few photos.
DROOL!! WOW just WOW. Amazing
Why is this taking so long... 
Great work
Great work
- Thread starter
- #107
Had late night on Tuesday, finally got the gearbox cross member finished. Dropped the full weight of the combined engine & gearbox onto the suspension and watched the front coils compress and compress and compress and compress until there was only 4" to the bump stop and 4" left in the shock travel. Now this is just with the chassis, engine & gearbox weight.
So the standard coils out of a 80 series are way to light (the rear coils are perfect). So off to Kings Suspension this morning and bought a front set of 2" lift medium duty to suit the heavy diesel engine.
The original powder coated alloys are back after having them sand blasted, epoxy primed, re-powder coated and a top coat of clear.
The 60 series power steering box in installed and also the steering arms on the knuckles are 60 series. I have cut down the 60 series steering rods (as they to long for 40 series axles) and re-turned the internal threads (both left and right) in the ends to re-except the 60 series tie rod ends.
Friday, off to the welding shop for them to assemble the 316 stainless steel 3" tubing exhaust system (I purchased the tubing and bends direct from a steel manufacturer for a total cost of $245)
Re-fitting the wheels tomorrow, will take photos then.
So the standard coils out of a 80 series are way to light (the rear coils are perfect). So off to Kings Suspension this morning and bought a front set of 2" lift medium duty to suit the heavy diesel engine.
The original powder coated alloys are back after having them sand blasted, epoxy primed, re-powder coated and a top coat of clear.
The 60 series power steering box in installed and also the steering arms on the knuckles are 60 series. I have cut down the 60 series steering rods (as they to long for 40 series axles) and re-turned the internal threads (both left and right) in the ends to re-except the 60 series tie rod ends.
Friday, off to the welding shop for them to assemble the 316 stainless steel 3" tubing exhaust system (I purchased the tubing and bends direct from a steel manufacturer for a total cost of $245)
Re-fitting the wheels tomorrow, will take photos then.
How is it possible the front of your truck is heavier than the front of an 80?
Should you be careful that you retain enough meat in the tube after rethreading for the 60 ends?
Looking good... Keep up the great work!
Should you be careful that you retain enough meat in the tube after rethreading for the 60 ends?
Looking good... Keep up the great work!
- Thread starter
- #109
The 60 series steering rods wall thickness is double that of the light weight 40 series ones. All you do is cut about 35mm off each end which leaves around 30mm of internal thread left, you just then extend that thread internally again for another 35mm on each end and re-screw in the tie rods end. The trick is finding a engineering shop that can do it as the thread is not metric. This might be easy in the US but everything here in AUS is metric.
This way there is no welding involved, still looks original and is still fully adjustable, cost is around $200 but since you can pick up the 60 series steering rods here from the wreckers for $75 is works out cheap, a tailer made set would cost $500.00 and have to be engineer approved.
I had understood incorrectly that the new threads were REPLACING the old threads (cutting deeper into the thickness of the metal) instead of just extending the threads farther into the tube...
And how about the weight issue? Is this engine really that much heavier than the 80 series had?
And how about the weight issue? Is this engine really that much heavier than the 80 series had?
- Thread starter
- #111
Friday night was a late night, pulled the 2" heavy duty King 2" lift coils as they raise the height to much, tried another set and the knuckle bolts hit the edge of the coils. So I have order a set of standard height 80 series coils from Kings but heavy duty which have a 30% heavier setting than standard.
So I am back to the original 80 series springs until Wednesday, these only give me 4" of clearance to the bump stop, the Kings will give me 6".
PS. I dumped the 60 series steering rods as the levels were wrong.
- Thread starter
- #112
Also the 3" 316 stainless steel exhaust is finished, came up quite good. Also transferred the 40 to my main garage ready for the tube transfer now all the heavy & dirty work is finished.
- Thread starter
- #113
Fab'd up a splash tray to help keep the salt and water off the power steering pump & pulley & harmonic balancer.
- Thread starter
- #114
Now to start the tub transfer.
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- Thread starter
- #116
As its only a splash tray, not a bash plate its pretty thin, around 3mm (the diff and axle protects it anyway). Will drill a 1" hole directly under the power steering adjuster pulley bolt for access so to adjust the belt if needed. The last 2" of the rear of the plate I have to bend down (not done yet) so to deflect dirt from the deeper part of the engine sump.
The photo shows how long the tray is, this clears the drive shaft. At the front it bolts to under the radiator support and at the rear on each edge I will use couple pieces of 20mm wide 6mm thick alloy lengths to the edge of the chassis so its does not wobble around.
If the power steering pump fails I would have to pull the radiator out anyway, but on my current 40 this pump on the 2H has copped a belting from dirt & salt water spray and was impossible to keep the paint on it, hopefully this will work.
On the top side of the chassis there is a small plate that every 40 series has, which is like splash tray that sits above the front drive shaft and runs don the side of the engine which is yet to be bolted in place.
- Thread starter
- #117
My King springs arrived today, these will give the front a lift by around 2" as it sits from the standard 80 series front springs currently installed at the moment. With the fibreglass body, radiator, battery and bulbar installed it will drop it back down by 1", this should give me about 5" to 5 1/2" above the bump stop. At compressed bump stop there is around 3/4" still left in the shock, the shocks have 10" of travel in them.
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Been following this build for a while watrob, but keeping quiet. Are you slotting the bright green 43 tub onto this frame?
- Thread starter
- #119
Yes, its more of a bright yellow, close to colour of the King springs. You can see in the photo when I had the tub made the back wheels were very close the front of the rear wheel arch, the new chassis has a increased wheel span from 89" to 92", 1" increase in the front forward and 2" inches in the rear backwards.
I pickup the spare transmission cross member from the galvanisers tomorrow, the one bolted in at the moment is only painted and won't hold up on the beach.
Also found a company today that is going to make me 4 stainless steel brake disc rotors out of 316 stainless. Every time 316 stainless is heated and cooled it gets harder so as a disc they will be ok on the beach, there is a 90 day build time on them so I will run the current installed steel rotors for the time being and swap in the stainless rotors at Christmas.
Also my front and rear tail shafts are ready to be picked up, I am using 75 series shafts and they had to be shortened and rebalanced. Also running the bigger pinion flanges on both diffs and gearbox/t-case
Also have now finished the steering arms, removed the eye from the steering arm where the 60 series steering dampener connected and have ordered a alloy dampener from FOX, should arrive next week.
Lastly, the roll cage has now been galvanised as well, (under the Regulations because of the fibreglass sports tub the roll cage had to be steel) it started to rust.
Also under the Regulations the foam rubber cushioning that I had placed over the steel roll cage had to have a wall thickness of 20mm, this cushioning was starting to deteriorate from the UV, so I managed to find a black UV protection wrapping tape (about the same thickness as black electrical tape but the glue is not as thick and does ooze out). The tape is 96mm wide and sticks to itself, I did use black gaffa tape originally but the white glues just oozed everywhere and the sun made it brittle and it would start to unwrap itself for the weather exposure.
- Thread starter
- #120
I picked up another transmission cross member out of a 60 series and had it galvanised (picked it up this afternoon) as the one I installed in the new chassis was just sandblasted, etch primed & painted, it was sitting on the shelf for a couple of years and I thought I had galvanised it. On installing it got scratched and I realised it was just painted.
