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So I'm pretty familiar with mild suspension lifts; but am looking for some advice on doing something a bit taller.

I have a LWB RRC chassis that I'm modifying to fit a S3 bulkhead and parts (It's what I have lying around, and I'll fab the missing bits) and since it will be trail-only I'm considering a bit more of a lift. I know doing raised mounts with +2 springs will work, but ideally I'd like to do fully retained light-duty springs all. I'm hoping to find some +4" progressive wind springs.. anyone know of any off-the-shelf options? 

I know I"ll have to modify some other things and already plan on modifying the rear A-arm and longer trailing arms to keep things in correct geometry, on the front I'm not totally sure yet but in the interest of keeping things inexpensive I may just cut and re-mount the axle mounts for the radius arms to keep things lined up.

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  • 1 month later...

Don’t know if you’ve solved this yet. But as you are mounting a different body on the chassis it gives opportunity to effectively perform a body lift when you locate the bulkhead and other body mounts. That way you won’t need to go as tall on the suspension lift. 

I too would like some +4” soft springs. Flatdog in the U.K. used to list them but don’t know.

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Has anyone tried Landcruiser springs? they are about the same diameter but longer... I think that LR +2 is about the same as STD Toyota, so Toyota +2 would be LR +4! The only head scratch is can they be made to fit?

Failing that you'll have to get some springs wound, there are places out there that'll do it, and the more springs you have wound the cheaper they will be.. Might be worth a group buy?

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Assuming we're talking coils, one of the websites had a list of land rover springs including police spec, after market etc with spring rate and length so you could work out how much lift it would give depending on the weight of your vehicle.

I had bearmach BA2257 (or 6, can't remember now) all around on my offroad bobtail range rover and due to the reduced weight I ended up with more than 2" lift and they were soft so gave good flex despite the reduced weight. For any speed work you would've probably wanted double shocks at the back though.

 

 

I think the BA2256 was the front and BA2257 was the rear but when I bobtailed it the back end lifted up by maybe 1.5" so I put the BA2257 at the front as well.

 

The shocks were procomp +5" all around with gwyn lewis +2" pin to pin mounts front and back. The springs didn't dislocate much, partly as they were soft and expanded a lot but I never really saw a lot of point in doing that anyway.

Edited by Cynic-al
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3 hours ago, miggit said:

Has anyone tried Landcruiser springs? they are about the same diameter but longer...

They do not have the same ends as Land Rovers.  LR use ground and closed ends with constant outside diameters.  LC is closed (unground) one end pigtail the other end.

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Yep. This one is a bit of a truggy though; so I'm personally looking for really soft springs that will compress quite a bit and stretch easily. So saying 4" lift isn't quite the same as a +4" spring.

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8 minutes ago, ajh said:

Yep. This one is a bit of a truggy though; so I'm personally looking for really soft springs that will compress quite a bit and stretch easily. So saying 4" lift isn't quite the same as a +4" spring.

Agree. This is what I’ve been after too. Kicking myself for not buying the Flatdog ones when they had them listed. 

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42 minutes ago, ajh said:

Yep. This one is a bit of a truggy though; so I'm personally looking for really soft springs that will compress quite a bit and stretch easily. So saying 4" lift isn't quite the same as a +4" spring.

Well, +4" spring is meant by almost everyone to mean a 4" lift.  Nobody ever refers to the free length as that varies a huge amount.  Stock springs are anywhere from 14 to 18' long.  You need to be careful with really long springs that they do not bind at max compression.  A spring needs to be properly designed for it full travel.

Plus you ask for progressive.  That needs a very specific design.  Most progressive springs are actually dual rate and the change in rate happens as a specific point in the travel and you need that to be exactly when you want it.

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I know... progressive was just a pipe-dream really. I'm planning to do the mods as needed to get the extra droop/flex. This one is just going to travel on a trailer any time it isn't on trail anyway.

I am building a street Tomcat on a D2 chassis as well; only going with stock-height (perhaps +1) on that one, though it is being built more as a tow/expedition vehicle. Just figured since this RRC chassis came in such good shape I'd use some of the other parts lying around to start to build something for weekend fun.

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NRC4304 or 5 would probably work as you are probably quite light.  If you want to go really long travel, you really need  to go with coilovers and all custom links.  There is little point with a stock suspension for long travel as the radius arms can't articulate any more than the stock shocks.  What most people need to do is setup the shock mounts and bump stops to get full use of the shock travel.  Most people put in lift springs and lose compression travel.  You need to carefully choose spring rates, bump stops and shock mounts to get it all working at its best.

Like I said, a lift with the stock links gives bad geometry and this is bad for off road use, not just on road.  The stock geometry is not that spectacular to start with and is goes downhill the farther you lift.

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Yeah, at this point though it is a 'what's in the bin' for most of the parts, traditional Leyland-style... in the future converting the front to a 3-link and the back to a 4 might be in the cards but honestly doing 2 at once is already going to be a crapload of work. :)

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