ToyRoverlander

Why would this be? Because of what you said before regarding thickness of the parabolic leaves? Reverse arching can be prevented with bumpstops. I've reverse arched and massively twisted my cheap parabolics and never snapped one. One issue I have with long travel leaf suspension is that the shackle end spring bushes wear out insanely fast.

I agree. I reckon the next step would be those swivellin mounts followed by longer springs. Both in combination with longer travel shocks obviously.

I can't comment on the axle tramp issue as I have never experienced it before myself, I guess my mechanical sympathy is a little OCD That spring in the second pic doesn't look too good, I wonder how long it will live when it gets bend like that on a regular basis. I know from experience that the el cheapo parabolic springs from paddocks (presumeably a blue box part...) are able to take a LOT of this sort of punishment without any side effects. We can make it all a bit more technical and talk about how short springs that arch a lot can have a jacking effect on the chassis when fully articulated as seen in the picture quoted below. This a rear spring which is already a lot longer than a front spring, but look at how steep that angle is from axle to chassis mounting point of the leaf spring. If that wheel has traction it wants to push the axle forwards and is trying to bend the spring and push the chassis upwards. Quite annoying. Longer springs allow for more articulation for a given curvature in the spring. I've used 63" long chevy rear springs, partly because of this, partly because longer springs are generally softer. The angle from axle to leaf mounting point is not so steep while it has way more articulation.

Sounds very logical to me. The comparison to radius arms would mean that one would best be of trying to keep the part of the spring that fixes to the chassis as flat as possible. This would keep the roll axis as flat as possible and should help with climbing boulders and such, and good for onroad handling. So you almost have to go spring over to be able to run relatively flat springs.

I was wondering. Would this problem be more evident when the front springs have lots or arch in them compared to a spring that's flat? I think it is. So it would be less on a sprung over vehicle with flat springs than on a lifted sprung under vehicle. What's a 101 like in this respect?

Absolutely amazing work! Love it!

Cool idea! How accurate can one get those measurements when amounts of paint on the chassis, rust, galvanising, previous patchwork and LR's notoriously bad accuracy can make measurements vary wildly Nontheless, would love to see this happen!

Sweet, good to know, thanks!!

Just wondering.... what's that white stuff you use to make the mock up with? Is that polystyrene or something? Awesome work by the way!

That's quite steep for just a book....

Would be a nice book to have, with lots of usefull information, I'll go and google it see what it costs.

People have mixed experiences with them, especially the rear actuator. The housing crumbles to pieces, it gets full of dirt and carp and refuses to work. I was lucky in that the housing was still good, so I cleaned it up, regreased it, fitted an extended breather hose to it, refitted the actuator with gasket sealant to prevent steel to aluminium corrosion and coated the outside of the actuator with hammerite and other stuff. I brought another one back from the dead, it was full of corrosion, dirt and carp but I got it to work again. I exercise them now and again when I park my truck in a city. Pretty hard to try to take it away with both lockers engaged and they need to turn it on asphalt . Those rear actuators are stupid expensive, if you haven't got one, or one that has a corroded housing it would make sense to find a cheaper, simpler solution. I haven't seen front actuators for sale new. Those seem to be less susceptible to corrosion issues.

I found it over on Pirate when I was looking for info on anti-squat and roll centre on leafsprings ages ago. Here's the pic with some info Here's the link to the thread on Pirate: http://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/general-4x4-discussion/639360-leaf-springs-anti-squat-whats-relation.html

Usually those front actuators don't go wrong often. You could keep it electric. I'm using the factory system and it has been working flawlessly for the past 4years.

No, 41462 is a guide pin where the locking fork slides over. Like a selector fork in a gearbox. The pinion rides on a rack that's integral with the locking fork 41451A. You can see the teeth on top, just underneath is where the guide pin slides through.. If the actuator can be taken apart so you could use the pinion you could fabricate something with a lever turning that pinion shaft. From memory that cap 41469 sits close to suspension components. On mine it sits basically inside the leaf spring perch.

That's what I thought, but I don't know how noticable it would be in real life. As the roll centre lies on the imaginary line drawn between the fixed end of the leafspring and the shackle mount, where it crosses the vertical line from the axle, the roll centre height doesn't change.

Leave them unlocked . Or does (on road) handling suffer badly when you do that?

This is much more clear

Fronts are different. There's a little rack&pinion sort of thing in there that moves the locking collar which sits at a 90degree angle, unlike the rear one that is in line with the locker collar movement. Don't know if I made it any clearer now

But he has parabolic prings with tons of room in between the leaves which generally don't rust together... so a non issue.

Sure it might improve it but even then, standard series suspension sucks for articulation, especially at the front. If you want a real improvement drastic changes are needed like those swivel mounts or longer springs in combination with longer travel shocks. For comparison. Mine when it was still totally original, sitting crossaxled. Front axle hitting the bumpstop. This is as much as the front end could possibly move. Compared to what it is now with rear springs up front, wider axles and 14" travel shocks (not fitted at the time this pic was taken).

The problem with a heavily curved spring is that they are way less capable of torsional bending than a flat spring. Easiest way to compare, try to twist a ruler when it's held flat. That goes easy. Now try again when it's bend, not quite so easy. More curved springs usually suck for droop travel.

Front parabolic springs only consist of 2leaves, not three. And those 2leaf springs are already too soft. Rears could be 2or 3leaf but the rear end is not his problem.

All very true, but Series have terrible front end flex due to their ridiculously short springs. You might get a bit more out of it by cleaning and what not but the difference is not going to be huge.

What fridgefreezer has is great if you don't want to fit longer springs up front. That, in combination with longer shocks works well. Probably the easiest way to achieve what you want. Longer springs up front, stick out more and reduce approach angle. I would only fit longer springs when you go spring over and/or fit bigger tires. This mod is more involved than the twisting mounts I reckon. Mine: Rear springs up front and 14" travel shocks, sprung over.