OME Dakar install: this look right to you?

[YotaJosh]

The springs are in the right place, they are NOT mixed up.

Did you verify this by measuring the springs eye to eye, eye to center pin, or just by the part number written on them?

To me, your front shackle angle is too horizontal for new springs, and your rear shackle angle is inverted, meaning the fronts are too long and the rears are too short. It even appears that your front axle moved forward some with the new springs.

It really, REALLY, looks like you have the rears on the front, and the fronts on the rear. Edit: or they gave you two sets of front springs somehow.

 

[90FJ]

I have seen about ten 60s with the ome lift and ome shackles and they were all close to to being vertically strait up and down including mine. The angle improves once the springs settle in but they are still closer to vertical than 45*.

That's cool man, me too. Doesn't make it right or change physics, "lift kits" are always going to have more arch and typically longer shackles. OME drives pretty good compared to old saggy springs on the street but if you take your truck off-road and are concerned with how much droop or articulation your rig has, having a shackle that is straight up and down sucks. End of story.

That being said, I think OME is a great kit for an all-around daily driver/camp rig I've helped instal a few for buddies.

 

[lcwizard]

I called Al at Man-a-fre on this. He said the 017's are a single stage "light" spring according to ARB. The true medium rear (004ra & rb) is dual stage . Even though the primary rate of the medium is about 13 in/lbs heavier, 268 for medium vs 255 for the light, he believes they stand a little higher do the the belief at ARB that being a single stage spring they will squat lower with a load. His site gives very detailed specs on the springs here: The springs listed as "standard" lift medium and light are off the shelf Dakars. The ones listed as "low" lift are their offerings of modified Dakars, (leaves removed or relocated)... on another note, the RA rears have 20mm more arch than the RB's

http://www.man-a-fre.com/parts_accessories/omesuspensions60series.htm#dakkar

 

[lcwizard]

individual leaf spring part numbers and descriptions

http://www.man-a-fre.com/pa/omedakkarleafsprings.htm

 

[Bama4door]

I have the same problem with my Dakar front as well, sags really bad. Not exactly sure what lift is on there yet, just bought it a couple weeks ago and haven't checked part numbers.

I was just on Man-A-Fre today and saw they had Dakar AAL's for sale, would a long AAL remedy the saggy front?

 

[jawjatek]

Did you verify this by measuring the springs eye to eye, eye to center pin, or just by the part number written on them?

To me, your front shackle angle is too horizontal for new springs, and your rear shackle angle is inverted, meaning the fronts are too long and the rears are too short. It even appears that your front axle moved forward some with the new springs.

It really, REALLY, looks like you have the rears on the front, and the fronts on the rear. Edit: or they gave you two sets of front springs somehow.

I absolutely put the springs they sent in the correct locations per the directions. I agree that the springs may have been mislabeled or are otherwise wrong. Terribly wrong. Waiting to hear what ARB/OME has to say.

 

[lcwizard]

No, your pics correspond with the part number. If you had any of their other rears there would be a overload leaf. They are on correctly. The fronts are shorter and a five leaf pack I believe. The fronts are definitely not the eight leaf as in your pic

 

[jawjatek]

Whew. Glad we cleared that up. I do screw up from time to time, nobody's perfect, but I am an OC nerd when it comes to reading directions and following the manual.

 

[bapmia]

Shoot me some pics and let's see if we can't kill two birds with one stone.

To back up the pics you've seen, we've installed many of these exact setups here in the shop. They start with a bit of rake (no more than 2") however the rear always drops a bit more once it gets some loads in and out and some flex. The fronts rarely see much droop as they already start with a heavy motor load and they by design have far less arch thus less designed sag. But with two trucks experiencing 6" of rear lift... we need to get with ARB/OME.

Kurt, I sent you an e-mail but figured I'd put the pictures up here too. Springs are light/medium and part of the deluxe kit. As i said, two leafs have been removed. I am 100% sure the correct springs are in the correct spots and installed correctly.

By the way, for perspective, the tires on my truck are 32.5 inch and are mounted on 16 inch rims. When I had the original rims and smaller tires (and without the two leafs removed), the truck looked EXACTLY like the original poster's pictures. At least 6 inches in rake. I remember thinking at the time that there was no way on earth it would settle enough to be right.

 

[gbobo]

We just installed the same setup (Purchased from Kurt @ Cruiser Outfitters) on our 60 and it looks just the same as the original poster here. Big time stinkbug. We measured about 5" lift in the rear and 2.5-3" in the front. I'm subscribing to see what happens.
http://i878.photobucket.com/albums/ab350/gbobo/FJ60OMElift.jpg

-Greg

We are running 33" tires on 17" FJC wheels w/ spacers.
-Greg

 

[brett76]

i didnt get near that much lift out of the rear on mine. 5 inches? holy cow. i mean i have about an inch difference but thats it. like every one else
i have the heavies

 

[lcwizard]

Unfortunately Kurt is put in the middle of an ARB issue here. Pulling the bottom two leaves will fix this but
most people will want ARB to take care of this, meaning Kurt. This seems to be an issue with a recent batch
of springs and ARB should be made aware. As consumers , giving a direct call may have more effect than vendor calling. Wholesalers will react faster to direct input from consumers than from their vendors who they invariably feel owe them some kind of debt for just allowing them their vendor status.

 

[dbleon]

This is making my descision to use stock leafs +AAL even easier...

cheers

 

[90FJ]

This is making my descision to use stock leafs +AAL even easier...

cheers

+new bushings and shocks, great setup.

 

[lcwizard]

This is making my descision to use stock leafs +AAL even easier...

cheers

Make no mistake, I'm not criticizing ARB so much on their springs. These things will happen when you build thousands of anything. Especially when you are building a product thousands of miles away from your target market. ARB made a
choice based on economics to shift production to the Eastern rim knowing that labor and production costs in Australia would price them out of the international market, as many US companies have done. The last Aussie made rear springs from ten years ago cost over 300.00 each. At that time the Aussie dollar
was about .60 US. Adjusted for the current Aussie dollar the same spring would cost about 500.00 US today. No matter how much better the Aussie made spring was the consumer would pic the lesser import so they made a choice. It's not just
Kurt dealing with these issues it's every vendor of the Dakar spring. MUD has always been a tight community supporting each other. I urge you to supprt Kurt on this by taking time to relay your input direct to ARB

 

[atomicshawn]

What a drag it's got to be to go to all the work and expense only to be disappointed... A frustrating problem for all involved I'm sure. I'm impressed by the patience all of you having this problem are showing.

...MUD has always been a tight community supporting each other. I urge you to supprt Kurt...

x2

Honestly I've never met a person more customer oriented or passionate about their work than Kurt. If you've ever done business with Kurt you know what I'm talking about. I'm certain he is doing everything possible on his end to resolve this issue. And if there was an easy solution he would have found it by now.

 

[MicahMan]

Kurt for president!

Always a+ just like the other vendors here on mud. I don't even hesitate anymore if I need cruiser stuff he's my first call

posted on the go

 

[atomicshawn]

Kurt for president!

...I think you're taking it a little too far Micah

 

[jawjatek]

I want to make it clear that Kurt has been nothing but 100% forthright and responsive to this issue, which is squarely on ARB and not him. He had no issue with me putting pics on here FYI. I have 100% confidence in Kurt; I feel pretty sure ARB/OME will stand by their product and make it right, and it won't come off his end, thats all. Discussion of the product is good for this community; I'm sure mods will yank this if anything otherwise develops.

 

[Tasmanic]

That's some stance you got there Jawjatek. Maybe it'll settle down once it's got a bit of a load on it?

Or maybe not? I was also considering that this might be an 'offshore' issue since they moved the plant to Malaysia. Never seen such a stance on OME set-ups, only on monster trucks!