Fitting Disc Brakes to a Series Wagon...

[Fatboy]

Evening all,

It a question that has rattled round in my head for a while.....

As you are not supposed to alter the chassis in a significant manner without going the SVA trauma route and it seems to be quite expensive to fit aftermarket discs to a series axle.

Why can't you just remove all of the coil spring / radius arm mounts and brackets from a coil sprung axle and weld on the bits and pieces and fit them instead with leaf springs?

Thoughts or knowledge appreciated...

[Jon White]

Because the rangie trackrod wants to go where the leaf springs are! There are ways around it but its not as simple as many people think! You cant just rotate the axle as it screws the castor angle up etc etc etc.

There are some people have done it, but you're always compromising something IMHO.

Jon

[bill van snorkle]

Because the rangie trackrod wants to go where the leaf springs are! There are ways around it but its not as simple as many people think! You cant just rotate the axle as it screws the castor angle up etc etc etc.

There are some people have done it, but you're always compromising something IMHO.

Jon

The compromise is ground clearance, which is an important part of what 4wd's are about. Drop the springs down far enough to clear the track rod and I think you will lose about 1 1/2'' of ground clearance under the springs. Rotate the axle assembly down and aside from increased castor angle, the already ridiculously low trackrod will be even more vulnerable to damage offroad.

Bill.

[Paul Woodward]

Have a look at this thread in the Series section,

http://forums.lr4x4.com/index.php?showtopic=12046

[jericho]

The compromise is ground clearance, which is an important part of what 4wd's are about. Drop the springs down far enough to clear the track rod and I think you will lose about 1 1/2'' of ground clearance under the springs. Rotate the axle assembly down and aside from increased castor angle, the already ridiculously low trackrod will be even more vulnerable to damage offroad.

Bill.

The idea is to rotate the axle forward,so the track rod clears the spring.It does put the track rod close to the spring,but if you make the spring pads 10mm to 1/2" deeper you get about 20mm to 7/8" clearance over the spring,which from the experience of a couple of people who have done this,is just about enough throughout the full range of travel (tramp problems included).

All castor is lost by rotating the axle,but fitting longer shackles tilts it back again,so restores possibly 2 degrees of castor.

Its all a bit close,but buy losing just 1/2" of ground clearance (and that is only under the springs,not under the diffs - of course),and losing a degree or so of castor,its possible to achieve a satisfactory conversion.Well,it had better be possible,because I've just spent £245 on a pair of 24spline disco axles.I'll report back when they are actually on.

[MECCANO]

ive got rangie axles on mine.

Spam time

the axles are wider

the track rod clearance is this in a standard set up with 20mm of lost ground clearance

How ever i had a custom track rod made up usign landrover bits to give me this

Which now means i can have it back to a standard setup... with no compromises

However i did find after i had the track rod made, new defender track rods look like this

http://82.0.157.13/jrfabs/images/shopimages/IMAG0044.JPG

and would probably do the same task with a bit more investigation

Oh and i know my shocks are upside down

[Fatboy]

Thanks for the links and information, much appreciated !

If I do anything, I'll make sure I write it up.