Got my OME torsion bars and 860 rear coils in today.
I have never worked on a torsion bar equipped vehicle, so even after reading a few threads on ih8mud, there was still a learning curve once i got under the cruiser.
Thankfully, this cruiser is about as rust free as you can get from a 10 year old vehicle.
Once you get all the bolts loosened, the hard part is getting the bar out of the spots it sits at each end. For the front i used a pry bar and just kept popping at it. For the rear of the bar, there is very little room to do much of anything and i was stuck! I called LT up at Metal Tech hoping he'd have a solution. He said he hadn't worked on one in a while and couldn't remember any tips/tricks to getting it out. So, called up Slee Offroad, he said you could hit at it from the back side and pop it out. Get off phone, look under truck, the back side is just solid metal, so hitting it won't pop out the bar. So, brainstormed for a few minutes, grabbed a mini-sledge
(wear safety glasses at all times working under the truck!) and started tapping at the adjuster bracket. It slowly starts working its way off, WOOHOO! When this thing pops off, be out of the way of the adjuster bracket, it weighs about a good 15lbs or so and hurts if it falls on you
Then you just wiggle out the torsion bar. I grabbed the new OME bars, cleaned off the cardboard off the splines, applied some M1 grease to the splines to allow them to slide in easier to the brackets and to prevent any rust from seizing them up if i ever need to remove.
Installing them took a good bit of trial and error. It is definitely a 2 man job (IMO) in order to get them clocked correctly. For the rear, you have to be pushing up on the bar and rotating it WHILE then attaching the front end with the rear adjuster bolt all the way out and just seated in the threads. Once you do this, put anti-seize on everything, tighten everything back up, then torque everything down.
The rear a monkey could do (especially if its the apes from rise of the planet of the apes!).
Jack up, put frames on jack stands, unbolt the bottom of the shocks (not replacing shocks, they haven't arrived yet
)
I unbolted from the frame just one side of the sway bar. It would be easier to unbolt both sides, but not necessary.
Then lift up on one side with the jack, which pushes down on the other side, pop out old coil, pop in new one, repeat for other side. Easy peasy.
I re-tapped the threads for the sway bar mount. Any time i ever remove a bolt and there is ever any resistance to it coming out i always retap and chase the threads on the bolt as well, just a habit. And apply antiseize
I forgot to bring my Bump It Offroad diff drop in to install.
Tomorrow, Hodges is meeting me up at the shop. I am going to be painting the White Knuckle rock rails, Outrider lower shock armor (thanks Fingas74!), and probably something else too. Jason has a snorkel to install
Radflos front shocks should arrive Tuesday-ish, mount for LED bar should arrive Monday, snorkel gets shipped out ~Sept 1st-ish.
Here are some cell pics from today. Got better ones on the DSLR, just need to upload them.
Layonnn's build thread is getting ready to be hacked up with the same OME L shock discussion that has kept people arguing on here for years...
