There is no reason. 80 folks are just cheap, and anti-rock is expensive.
Radius Arm Flip
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There is no reason. 80 folks are just cheap, and anti-rock is expensive.
That is very impressive. I love the jig I think more than the result.
Nah, only joking, thats just brilliant.
Any downsides to having that much flex at the front offroad? On side slopes for example. I'm presuming you're running without a front swaybar.
Nah, only joking, thats just brilliant.
Any downsides to having that much flex at the front offroad? On side slopes for example. I'm presuming you're running without a front swaybar.
That is very impressive. I love the jig I think more than the result.
Nah, only joking, thats just brilliant.
Any downsides to having that much flex at the front offroad? On side slopes for example. I'm presuming you're running without a front swaybar.
Yeah, first thing I always do is ditch the front sway bar. No problems like that. Its rock solid.
Ps. This is where the sway bar design will come into its own (on side angles)
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They are all torsion springs, just different ways of implementing.
No setup can truly unhinder flex as by design they have to limit flex inorder to limit body roll. There is one way around it such as connecting the two wheels on one side of the vehicle rather then opposite sides of the axle. The 200 series does this, but it is a more complex system using hydraulics.
Your talking about an x link. Another aus design.
Pretty sure cranky still has his sitting on his garage floor. Been around for ages and just like the 3/4/5 y links etc. They flex great. But handle like total garbage on the road. So they started making lockout pins. Another bung with a hole in the crossmember where a pin is inserted to stop it being able to twist. Meaning you have to stop, get out and remove the pin before flexing.
Ive tried many suspensions, and the 1 I have now is by far the best. Regaining its road handling and characteristics. And great flex. Another big difference is because there is still some binding, so it gives feed back to the driver of what its actually doing. Mine has been running normal low nitrogen psi off the shelf shocks for a few months during testing. Before adding the fox. Coil rate is progressive (not stiff) as it doesnt suffer anywhere near as bad as other lifted trucks.
actual experience and feedback with the x link setup is nice to have on the forum! Thanks for the info. Do you have any thoughts as to why it handles poorly on pavement?s
Under braking the vehicle will squat at the front, this causes a pivoting action on the middle bush of the radius arm. As the front squats, the rear arm-chassis bush moves downwards causing the front most bush to move upwards which then acts directly on the other radius arm by pushing it downwards, which then acts on the other arm-chassis bush.
A merry go ground of braking forces if you will.
From the drivers seat it will cause the body to wobble about under braking, and induce more body roll when braking and cornering.
I rekon even a poorly done y arm 3 link or 5 link would perform better.
The xlink design was modified with a lock out pin, but the problem there is slight play in the pin quickly wears out both the pin and the holes it goes through. The 'hitch pin' mod does exactly the same thing.
huh, so for simplicity moving the radius arms up top seems to be the best for gains and little for compromises. Then the next step may as well be triangulated 4 link if a guy was going to go to all the work of links and heims. Though your also pretty much going to coilovers and disconnectable sway bars if you go triangulated 4 link so the investment in parts and fabrication gets much bigger.
I always thought it would be cool to have a pneumatic sway bar disconnect, and a pneumatic sliding pin for one side of the radius arms front bolt. Im sure the effect would be very noticable, and there is sometimes you would want sway bars before off camber terrain which you couldnt be bothered to climb under your cruiser and reconnect the sway bar for.
Actually Ive had removable front sway bar pins in the front of mine since I bought it and ive never actually disconnected it. Probably would have tried it out if it was push button though!
I always thought it would be cool to have a pneumatic sway bar disconnect, and a pneumatic sliding pin for one side of the radius arms front bolt. Im sure the effect would be very noticable, and there is sometimes you would want sway bars before off camber terrain which you couldnt be bothered to climb under your cruiser and reconnect the sway bar for.
Actually Ive had removable front sway bar pins in the front of mine since I bought it and ive never actually disconnected it. Probably would have tried it out if it was push button though!
The affect most commonly discribed is (squirly). As in, it feels squirly under braking/handling on the highway and cornering. You can build a backyard y 3/4/5 link that is awsome offroad. But drive ability is a major factor, and concern. There is no ill affects with this design after tweaking deflection angles a little. It simply works and the pieces of the puzzle finally fell into place. That's why I'm happy to release pics now.
A triangulated 4 link won't cope with the lateral forces of the steering linkage. You need a panhard. And with a panhard you don't need to triangulate the upper links so you're left with a good old 5 link.
So basically what we are looking for it's replicate the rear suspension geometry ( links geometry ) in the front .. hopefully with longer links ?
I think I understand the benefit to what's being described by TheBigBoy more, though I've no doubt I'll be corrected where I err.
The OEM geometry places the front radius arms, rear links, and pan hard at angle "x".
By lifting, angle "x" (not pinion angle, mind you) is exaggerated, and by any other form of correction, isn't possible to re establish.
By flipping the radius arm to the top of the housing, raising the pan hard mount at axle, raising the rear link points at the axle, it's possible to set all the links back to OEM geometry, angle "x", when lifted, therefore minimizing the ill affects of lifting and redistributing the weight bias back to OEM specifications.
The OEM geometry places the front radius arms, rear links, and pan hard at angle "x".
By lifting, angle "x" (not pinion angle, mind you) is exaggerated, and by any other form of correction, isn't possible to re establish.
By flipping the radius arm to the top of the housing, raising the pan hard mount at axle, raising the rear link points at the axle, it's possible to set all the links back to OEM geometry, angle "x", when lifted, therefore minimizing the ill affects of lifting and redistributing the weight bias back to OEM specifications.
TheBigBoy said:
Then, to me in my uneducated eye, begs the question of how far up the rear axle center is still advantageous?
If lifting 4", then flipping the radius arm affects angle "x" by some degree, but that doesn't necessarily mean by the lift dimension, right?
On the rear, to achieve the same angle as the front radius arm, is it doable to link to the top of the axle housing?
You could, but a well done y arm 3 link would be just as good as a radius arm, flipped or otherwise, and a bit simpler to do than a 5 link
It's setups like this:
https://forum.ih8mud.com/80-series-tech/560329-ardentyotas-3-link.html
That give them a bad name
In this example you can see there is only one upper control arm. It is one upper control arm short of being a 5 link like the rear, and one UCA short of being something that doesn't handle and brake like crap. What happens here is braking force on both sides is transmitted through the one upper link which is not centralised on the axle. So the braking force from the driver side wheel will exert much more force on the link through leverage, than the braking force from the passenger side wheel. result: 'squirrily' braking because the axle is twisting in all directions. Similar thing happens when each wheel hits a bump. The driver side will deflect backwards much more then the passenger side will.
The y arm approach (that is attaching the upper arms to the lower arms via a heim joint, and not the chassis is very similar in characteristics to the stock radius arm setup (but flexes better) The trick is to make the whole setup symmetrical.
What I like about bigboys flipped radius arm and modified panhard system is that it shows using almost all stock components you can achieve excellent on road handling and flex for very little cost assuming you are doing the work yourself. The biggest expense I see there is the hi-steer arm.
You are right about link separation, both vertically (to control axle wrap under braking) and separation from the centre spreading load easily. But... Having built a 5 link before. It still doesn't handle anywhere near as good as radius arms. Y link is the same as the old bolt on 5 link for patrols. There still isn't enough separation between the bush's on the horizontal plain. People started moving the top link further forward which started it binding more. Meaning better handling but less travel. So some binding is needed for on road predictability. It took me a very long time to dial it all in correctly. Now it's easy.
Just checked out the link. Some builds just show that it doesn't matter how much money you spend. And most of the ones that are over the top just show how much they have spent trying to fix their problems. You know your onto something special when it can be run with stock off the shelf shocks and a stock rear sway bar, with no I'll affects. Always room for improvement though.
It should be pretty simular to the stock radius arm, since y-links are just a different style of radius arms. Sorta like EB's were just a different style radius arm.
You make it sound like a 3-link is just a 4 link (5 counting panhard) with one link missing. From what I've read the geometry is much different in a 3 link vs. 4 link.