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Subframe drop for R50


shift220
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Wow, this is great!! I have been wanting to start a post like this for a long time but didn't want to ask a bunch of questions until I was ready to start. I think I will be ready to start in about 2 months but I am still not sure if I want to do it. I can get all the parts made up for free and I will have it installed by a shop that builds rally cars. But all my off roading is done in that sand, and my problem is that I want an awesome truck but I am pretty sure if I do this lift my R50 will not actually do as well off road because it would mess up my roll over angle. I am actually so disturbed by this problem I am thinking about just buying another R50 and having one with just the small lift, and make the other into a monster. Or I might just give up and get a new Xterra as my truck to modify.

 

MichiganAve, I never thanked you for the info you gave me before, it was very helpful. After I got your message I had to go to Azerbaijan for a month and forgot to write you back.

 

I am thinking to compromise on my lift and do a 2 in SFD to have about 3 or 4in lift total. How do people feel in their rides after they have put on there lifts, do they feel unstable off road or on? And dose anyone think that the SFD would have trouble with high speed sand driving?

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michiganave - Can you rehost the pic? They are not showing for me. Or maybe its just my work comp? hmm...

 

But good answer. That post should be stickied! SFD how-to!

 

Jose

 

I 2nd the motion to sticky

 

great writeup... makes me want to do it to mine...

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michiganave - Can you rehost the pic? They are not showing for me. Or maybe its just my work comp? hmm...

 

They are posted directly as attachments on the message board. Anybody else having problems with the pictures? You should be able to click the attachment and have the full photo open.

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They are posted directly as attachments on the message board. Anybody else having problems with the pictures? You should be able to click the attachment and have the full photo open.

 

OK I gotcha. Thanks. Those are great pics that show what everyone wants to see. This definately needs to get stickied at once!

 

MODERATORS! ADMIN!! HELLO!!! lol. :lol:

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I don't know. From the pics i've seen of the other SFD's overseas, they always just had a block. Maybe they adjusted the steering shaft itself?

 

And YAY for this being stickied!!! (or pinned...whatever)

 

Jose

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My blocks are all 2.5" x 3.5" with the 3.5" becoming the lift. All blocks are also 6" long.

 

The struts sit at an average angle of 12 degrees off the vertical axis (going from side to side of the vehicle). I'm going to fab the strut spacers so the strut stays at the same degree.

 

On another thought, although alot harder to design and fabricate, a much better solution would be to put the spacer at the bottom of the strut where it bolts to the spindle. Has anyone seen something like this before? It would provide ample tire clearance as well!

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My blocks are all 2.5" x 3.5" with the 3.5" becoming the lift. All blocks are also 6" long.

 

The struts sit at an average angle of 12 degrees off the vertical axis (going from side to side of the vehicle). I'm going to fab the strut spacers so the strut stays at the same degree.

 

On another thought, although alot harder to design and fabricate, a much better solution would be to put the spacer at the bottom of the strut where it bolts to the spindle. Has anyone seen something like this before? It would provide ample tire clearance as well!

 

Bottom of spindle would certainly be possible. One person played with the idea actually, but I don't think he made it work. If you are feeling adventurous, I really think coilovers would be the way to go! With the original strut spacers on top, 33x12.5 barely clears my strut with 3.75 backspacing. But it works. 35x12.5 has been done as well.

 

You are correct that the strut spacer must be made at an angle. I seem to remember 11 degree range? I couldn't find the specs searching though. Perhaps Tyler, Keith, or Alex are willing to share what they used.

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Bottom of spindle would certainly be possible. One person played with the idea actually, but I don't think he made it work. If you are feeling adventurous, I really think coilovers would be the way to go! With the original strut spacers on top, 33x12.5 barely clears my strut with 3.75 backspacing. But it works. 35x12.5 has been done as well.

 

You are correct that the strut spacer must be made at an angle. I seem to remember 11 degree range? I couldn't find the specs searching though. Perhaps Tyler, Keith, or Alex are willing to share what they used.

Coilovers would be nice but unfortunately can't be used in place of struts. Struts act as an upper control arm which is why they have a much thicker piston shaft among other things. Plus they are really expensive. I may pursue making a lower strut mount extension, I just have to check the minimum amount I'll have to lift to do it.

 

The angle really depends on the condition of your struts and I didn't remove the wheel or anything so I just got an average over a couple measurements. If you design it around the angle when the system is fully dropped, it should be within spec at all ranges and it will be consistent.

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All right so strut spacers it is. After drafting up our strut suspension in Autocad, it occurred to me that we would need at least a 5" suspension lift and the steering axis would be thrown off requiring us to either relocate the strut upper mount or make longer a-arms. Although longer A-arms would be ideal, but i'm not quite ready to produce a set of those yet, unless I had a donor arm to make a jig with :)

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How'd you come to this conclusion? I never had any problems with my setups..

I'm talking about adding a spacer on the bottom of the strut in my previous post. It will mess up the steering geometry unless fixed by the items I suggested (or similar).

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Maybe I'll explain myself a little better.

 

First of all, our struts sit an angle of 12 degrees side to side and 5 degrees front to back (with suspension at full droop). Now I measured this on my driveway so it might be off a little bit due to the angle it was sitting at on the ground.

 

Now, if the 5 degrees is changed, it will not have a great effect on the vehicle. But if we change the 12 degrees, then we are messing with the alignment and the tires will wear unevenly. I think most of us knew this already, that's why it was agreed that we need angled strut spacers to maintain alignment.

 

So while making angled spacers isn't that big of a deal, it puts unnecessary forces on the strut mounts and ultimately the body. What I mean by this is that the stresses are no longer axial, but a torque is applied to the mounts as well.

 

Basically, I'm trying to avoid making angled strut mounts to keep the stresses near stock.

 

Anybody know how much in and out play I have in the CV axles?

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  • 3 weeks later...

Here is the strut spacer flange Autocad file that I drafted up. To anyone that I sent the previous file to, this one is updated and fits a little better. I got 4 of these cut out of 1/4" mild steel and they will be welded to 4" ID 1/4" round steel tubing cut angled at 12 degrees

 

I'm slowly accumulating all the parts I need to put together this lift. I have everything really except the rear spacers and the steering shaft (which I will probably have to do a design-build on) as well as some misc stuff. It would go a lot faster if this vehicle wasn't my winter DD!

 

R50 Strut Spacer

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  • 1 month later...
  • 2 weeks later...

So this afternoon I started the tear down. Its now jacked up high in the air with everything torn apart. Blocks have been fitted and I'll powder coat them tomorrow morning. All that's left is to see if the strut spacers will work, figure out the steering spacer and reassembly!

 

Pics to come very soon.

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