landy_andy

After some research have decided to get a couple of the 12” stroke Billy’s for the front. This should give the extra clearance on full stuff and be more than enough droop to have the springs almost off the lower relocation cone. In addition will be adding some limit straps front & rear to protect the shocks at maximum articulation. Lower cones need a remake as they snag the spring but that can wait until I swap the shocks out. Extended brake lines measured & ordered as they’ll run down the links to prevent snagging on brush.

Yup, that’s why I want to swap out the dampers for some slightly shorter stroke ones. Although if you look at the picture above at full flex I’m beyond coil bound with the damper fully stroked out so it’ll be close. Will be fine for the time being, just have to bear it in mind when I finally get it out on the trails. Some nice remote res. dampers with adjustable bump would be ideal.

Trimmed a bit off the lower spring locator & added the new larger pads. Leaves me with about an inch of shock shaft at full bump for good measure. Maybe down the road we’ll get some adjustable dampers & can then shorten the body up a bit more. Just not have to be jumping it in the meantime.

Checking clearances at full flex, I doubt it’ll get to this point as the spring will be past being coil bound. Just got to check with the springs now & adjust the lower bump stop pad for up travel.

Front axle is all squared up at close to ride height. Next to do a final cycle to check clearance and then get the springs & 3rd member in.

Sump back from the welder, fresh lick of paint & back on after I shortened the pick by 1.5”, new track bar bracket on as well. Next to get the axle under it.

Pedal box reinstalled & time to get things connected up with some Earls hose. Just need a 45 degree fitting to finish it off now.

Lots of owner operated mobile service trucks here that support the logging & other industries. Having certified welders living a block away & home shops is not uncommon here.

After a couple of hours work we have a nicely sectioned sump pan. Taking it off just below the old oil level sensor boss leaves just a small gap in places to be filled. Next a quick media blast & then off the neighbour for welding up. Oil pickup to section now and it’ll soon be back on. Definitely not worth spending $400 on a custom sump !

Next job is to section the LS truck sump and loose ~1.5” out of it for better clearance to the front axle like the example. Swapped the stock dip stick for a Corvette one, full will now be just below the windage tray.

Frame side track bar mount finished & ready for some paint.

My 3/8-24 die, coupler & jam nuts arrived today. Cut the threads & assembled things up, had to trim the stub shaft on the booster down to 1.5” overall to get a bit of free play on the pedal.

After a few fails…. found a master cylinder that’d fit under the hood, have an acceptable bore and not be made out of cast iron. Next to work on the new brake & hydraulic lines.

Redesigned the bracket in 1/4” as water jet shop doesn’t stock 5/16” plate. Hopefully it’ll be stiff enough with the two back braces and extending the heim tabs. Doubled up on the thickness of the lower tie in for the steering box.

Redesigned the frame side track bar mount, increased the material thickness to 5/16” due to the offset mounting position of the heim. Also added a back brace for additional stiffness & a tie in to the steering box. Drawings sent out & should see the cut parts in a couple of weeks 👍

Yup, the Stazworks rims are heavily offset so that doesn’t help either along with the extra 3” of wheel track on these axles. Ideally I’d like to get the rims recentered but that’d probably cost more than a set of new Trail Ready alloy beadlocks. As you can imagine, the bank manager would not be impressed if I scrapped the rims…. Down the road I may have to anyway as finding 15” tires is getting harder without having to pay for shipping out the US. I have not maxed out the shocks this time, keeping things flexy but at 80-90% for reliability out in the bush. Would suck to bust something 50 miles from the nearest real road… it’s way to heavy to have it heli-recovered like we do with sleds in winter.

Time to get stuffed… literally… checking the clearance for my 35’s at full articulation & stuff. Full left is good, full right is getting into the front out riggers & sliders. Will this be an issue… maybe or not, how often are you at full stuff & hard over… just something to remember when we’re finally out in her. Gotta admit the 16” of x-axle articulation is impressive 👍

Got the truck sitting on the front axle under it’s own weight. Really happy how flat the lower links are, should give a nice ride for a flex rock crawler. Got a few things to change… need a lower profile sump than the stock ‘truck’ one, frame side panhard bracket needs a redesign. Need to look at the front drive shaft, currently it’ll bind if I droop out at about 3/4 of the old setup. This is mostly due to the lower position of the pinion on the 9” diffs and I messed up on the axle build. Someone forgot to reverse the measurement of the pinion centre line from the back axle drawing so it now sits ~2” to the driver’s side and not inline with the t’case output flange. Way too late to fix that now, so we’ll make the best of it. Thinking it’ll need some of the Tom Woods extra wide angle 1310 U joints to fix it & we’ll hopefully get the extra droop back, time will tell.

The modified pitman arm has worked out really well, also took the opportunity to put in new seals on both the input & output shafts as they were original and starting to leak.

Picked up some 1.5” x 1/4” wall DOM and made up the panhard & drag links. Got them mocked up to work on the axle end mounting bracket. The relationship between them is best I can get so we’ll just have to see how the bump steer works out. Once the mount is made we can cycle the suspension to see if we have any binding, lots of parts wanting to live in the same space.

Thanks, just need an inspection here… we don’t have annual MOT’s or anything like that.

Wrapped the exhaust ‘Y’ pipe in bandage & got the x-member back in. Central link in and ready to make up the drag & track bar as soon as the pitman arm puller arrives from LRDirect to swap the new one on.

We met quite a few times at shows, I made the 3Link that ‘Gon-2-Far’ then ‘QT’ we’re selling… don’t really do that now. Just keep myself amused in the shop after dealing with avalanches in winter & MVI’s on the highway year round.

Nope… just a hobbyist, you missed the link Si. There are a few kits around for LR’s but I wasn’t going to pay what they wanted for them. I only paid $110cdn (70 quid) for the take-off booster shipped and the cut parts were another $40 as I had 2 sets made. Biggest investment are the Earls fittings etc. Going to be interesting to see how it all performs once complete. Thanks for the compliment, it’s been a very long haul… only seems like yesterday when I did the last LRO show with Dave Marsh before we emigrated… that was in ‘07 ☹️

Finished the modified pitman arm, added some strip stock around the end to thicken it up a bit where I’d reamed it out to suit the Chevy TRE’s. Also added tabs for the Gwynn Lewis hydro assisted steering.