thanks to everyond for the kudos! I never expected to be an internet celebrity, but someone actually flagged me down on the road and mentioned that they had seen this forum and liked my build! kinda crazy!
anyway, I haven't been on here much but wanted to catch up on some questions that people have asked. first up, about the spare tire... yes, it's basically just bolted up to the cross member with a plate to hold it in place. it's not a very good solution, and I really should re-do it. getting everythign to line up properly was a real chore, but at least it's now on solid. it's darn near impossible to get it put up on there though, I wound up using a rachet strap to hold it in place, I'd hate to change it in the mud/rain. while there's a certain efficency in using the plate method, I think it would be easier to make a hinged cage to hold the wheel, or some type of racheting lift to crank it up. anyway, hopefully I won't have many flat tires.
secondly, someone PM'd me and asked this: "Please tell me about your suspension lift and how it is working for you. Have you had any problems or would you change the design at all. Im going to lift my trailer a bit and don't want to change all the bushings out. Your design looks like a perfect solution."
I think the design is working pretty well... at least I haven't had any problems. (there's a ton of pictures of the lift earlier in the thread. personally, I think it's a bit better of a solution than a SOA conversion, but others may disagree. I like it my way because it doesn't raise the trailer TOO high, and you could easily do it a bit lower by using smaller blocks. I'm not 100% sure of the strength of my way though. I haven't had any problems, but I also havent' really pushed the limits off road with a full trailer either. I think my solution is a little unsightly, but I havent' taken the time to correct it. if I could change anythign, I'd probably make use a piece of black plastic to fill in the gaps in the wheel well, so it dosen't appear to be up on blocks. it's a minor thing, to be sure, but it looks a little unfinished.
one other thing, my front landing leg design kinda sucked, so I've now replaced it with a proper caster single wheel. basically, the problem was that my two wheels weren't far back enough from the center of rotation on the leg and so it was pretty squirrly whenever I would push it around. parts were starting to bend a bit too, so I cut the whole thing off and re-did it. I'll attach a picture soon.
