DSM_guy

ok well in addition to my BL (which will be here monday by the way) i also plan to go with a 3" suspension lift via JGC coils. since i have the 4 door, a carrier with a full size 31" tire, a sub box..and am currently building a sturdier rear bumper, its a pretty given fact im not gonna get a full 3" of lift. before i start searching for JGC lift springs to compensate for this, i have heard much talk about ppl using spacers ranging from .5-1" in thickness. i have looked at the suspension...and it seems that not a whole helluva lot keeps our springs in place. my question is this... how safe are these spacers??? i mean...whats to keep our springs from just sliding off? i sure dont wanna have to limp my pathy home lookin like some ghetto cruiser. i see we have a lil hump there in the middle of the spring perch (at least on the botton) but there comes a point if you used even a halfway thick spacers youd end up making it obsolete. am i just reading too much into this? sorry but im just not the type to do a half-ass mod and comprimise my saftey or reliability. i see some like "88" and a few others have utilized them with seemingly great success, but i just need a bit more clarification. thanks guys!

well, upon some closer inspection and thought...this is what "I" have devised. instead of using just one of the 2 points i mentioned...i decided ill just use both. by using a peice of angle iron i plan to use the 2 factory bolt holes in conjunction with a big freakin bolt through that little side tab...and on top of that ill spot weld it all. i should imagine all that SHOULD hold. if not, id have no clue what else to do lol. i was planning to incorporate my push bar into my new bumper (only the top) but since i know that ill now need some lower support..i think they will serve well as a base with a lil reinforcement. thanks for all the help guys! i gotta either find a place indoors to start in on this or wait till we get rain. oh and i also need to get my lift in before i finish up as well.

wow thanks alot filthy! that is quite an ingeneous setup you got there! i am trying to get a better idea on how/where you strengthened everyting up at but im sure ill find it. if not i added you to AOL and of course i know where to find you here. any pix of the beefed up reinforcements would be great tho! also... i got underneath and looked for place to mount an extra lower set of supports to mount to...kinda sketchy. i see 2 possible mounting places. one would be flat against the underside of the frame using the 2 threaded bolt holes for the factory tow hooks on each side. the other possible place would be in a vertical orientation right up against those tabs that have the oblong hole in them. they hang down right there under where the very front most body mounts are. unless there are any other places that im missin here...im thinkin maybe the factory bolt hole locations might be the best...unless otherwise noted. sorry for all the questions, just want this done right!

ok....ANOTHER question iv been lookin and reading around, and it seems that people also anchor their winch bumpers down below to the cross member. or at least it seems that way. to be honest, im wondering if i need to do this. i have built bumpers before, and we just mounted it right where the factory mounts were....slid back into the frame. im puttin in a 2" receiver hitch in the front, and gonna use one of those nifty winch mounts so i can switch back and forth between the front and back. then gonna run a peice of square tubing out between the 2 "arms" commin from the frame and mount the receiver in that peice. then weld the "shell" of the outer bumper if you will, to that peice of tubing and brace it all up. its pretty much like the ARB design outside. sorry for so many questions..i just guess im a stickler for saftey, and paranoid about getting everyting braced up right. no need in tearing off my front end when i go to use anything! ok, here is a quick lil drawing of what im sorta talkin about

ok thanks guys, i guess it was a bit of a stupid question now that i think of it, i mean there IS only one way to do it right. i guess ill just have to bite the bullet now and get the lift so i can press on with my project. oh, and another lil question realated to winch bumpers and strength. how many bolts and what grade is reccomended? do i need more than a grade 8? 10? would 4 of these suffice?

ok so sometime in the future (hopefully near future) im gonna be going for a 3" BL. right now im in the process of making my own winch bumper with the body at stock height. and of course something with that much stress wont be merley using risers to readjust the height. any suggestions? should i just wait till i lift it and then continue my fabrication? what do you guys with body lifts and aftermarket bumpers do??

also check your turn stops. they put a lil rubber "condom" of sorts over it but over the years that will wear through. then when you turn full chock and esp going over corners..it will rub metal to metal and make a god awefull squeaking noise. that could be part of the problem, and may be something that ALSO needs to be corrected..but it sounds like you have a few other issues besides that that are your main problems.

i just vote WD-21. 2 door...4 door..carbed...FI..it dosent matter, their all tough as nails.

several of you guys forget...it was rolled. sure, you can sell a prefectly good pathy for anwhere from 7-10,000 $'s...but thats a GOOD pathy. and yeah, i believe they give you what a dealer would pay you for it...so thats why we were expect ALOT lower. so no...7K isnt bad. you wreck and car and the value is gonna plummet. as far as buying it back..eh. she just wants her new lil car and i have enough already.

well in the US the build date dosent matter either. most vehicles are made even a year and some sold a few months before their model year even come around. my DSM was built in 95, but its considered a 96 year model. the 06 eclipses were avail in june or july..somewhere around there of this year....about 6 months before their "official" model year. im sure most eveyrone does that this way.

well, on monday we had the pathy towed over to the body shop, and about mid week the insurance adjuster came out to asess the damages. we just heard back today that they are actually TOTALING it! there was talk of ordering a new door for the rear, so i guess they didnt wanna/couldent fix that by pulling the dents. and a few other things. they didnt give the full rundown yet, but they said all told it was $5000 worth of damage...so i guess there was alot that i didnt see or something. but they are giving us $7000 for it which was more than we figured on. its a 98 XE with 150K miles on her. so now mom is driving MY pathy for a bit, and we are gonna go down after the holidays and put down a payment on a new beetle which my mom has wanted REALLY bad since they first came out. i just cant believe it was totalled with seemingly so little damage. i mean of course i felt real bad about it, but i guess the only upside was that mom got a bit more out of the car than she thought....and now she can get the car she REALLY wants. no offense to the pathy, and she loved it to death, but that was more my fathers decision...not hers. and her gas bills will go down substantially now.

dont worry too much about it slick. its become blatantly obvious the kid tends to run his mouth about things which he knows zilch about. and since im sure he has seen a little jeep bashing on here...he's just tryin to fit in and be "cool" -thnkboutit-

thats what i did to mount mine. they made a factory light rack for a bit...and it was basically a peice just like a roof rack peice that had holes in it. but for ALOT cheaper roof rack + drill bit = light bar. then i just ran the wire down through the pass side door grommet and behind all the panels and under carpet. i actually used double insulated wire so it would be a bit cleaner (vs having 2 wires running seperate)

ehh, its already a bit late for the pathy. hell, even the R50 (im sorry guys but you know its true) made a HUGE leap towards teh mall crawler. for gods sakes its a unibody! and the soccer mom appeal started then as well. and i REALLY hate to break it to you...but the majority of pathy and even xterra owners (even tho the x was supposed to replace what the wd21's essentially were) are mall crawlin soccer moms. so dont you hold your breath in thinking that their gonna come back with the tough-as-nails capabilities they once had. get real man...people nowdays are concerned with their in-car entertainment with dash mounted navigation and heated steering wheels. they could give 2 sh*ts about offroading. and since THOSE are the people buyin..THOSE are the people that the mfg will strive to satisfy. its that way with any type of enthusiest related vehicles wheather it be off road rigs, sports cars...whatever. they arent gonna necessarily crank out the fastest or the most capable..their gonna crank out a product that the vast majority of consumers demends..and im sorry to say but we enthusiests are in the minority in almost every aspect of automotive detail...and our opinions hold little value to the company.

thats the only question "I" have ever asked. you get em too much bigger adn youll NEVER get teh SOB out. its rough as it is.

alright ladies iv heard of those sorts of things. no thanks..ill just get my lazy butt under the car and pull the plug. no need to half ass anything...esp when it comes to something as delicate as a car engine.

firefox here as well. im about sick of microsoft products. if i could afford a halfway decent mac i would in a heartbeat. between windows, MSN messenger, and IE...iv about had it! but uh yeah..no worries here so far -bounce-

oh noes! weve been haxored!!! this has happened to several forums (in the past) that im a member of. usually its nothing big...but other times they really wipe it out. lets hope they have had their fun and are moving on. im gonna :help:

ok well just a lil update. silver is getting towed to the body shop on monday...will get appraised and work will start. went down to clear up my ticket and it wasnt EXACTLY what id hoped for...but it was better than what i was facing. the judge (actually JP) took a look at the ticket...heard a few words from me...and knew it was a bull@!*% charge. he came right out and said it. i had THOUGHT they had teh ability to just dismiss tickets right there on the spot if they didnt agree...but i guess he dosent. he said i could of course contest it and all...but if i ended up convicted id be payin for court costs as well as the fine...as well as either extra on insurance or paying all out to take DD. so if i woulda decided to contest i would be taking a 300-500+ dollar crap shoot. and if the cop was asshole enough to write me up for that...who knows what he'd say to the judge..and pull out some back-of-the-book BS on me..then id be screwed facing a big fine. it was already a 175 ticket...then some new laws stated theyd add an extra 100 bux. but he felt bad about the whole deal so he is letting me take DD to dismiss everything and keep my record clean...i dont even get any points! so all total thats gonna be $150 with the course included...but its a helluva lot better than any other choice...and more predictable than fighting it. im sure the judge woulda ruled in my favor...but i dont have $500 to gamble with to be honest. and my deductable is only $250...so all told its gonna cost me $400 to get EVERYTHING cleared up. not too bad..but the stress and financial strain has DEFFINATLEY come at a bad time.

i plan to fight the ticket...i just dont want to go through a whole big mess of OFFICIALLY challanging it. hopefully the JP listens to my story, see's it as a totally bogus charge..and just lets it go w/o having to set up a court date and whatnot. no, mom isnt mad. like she said " id be mad if you were actin like an idiot...but its not your fault" as far as ice...we only get it a few times a year down here...but when we do get its its usually pretty nasty. as far as toys...none for mom. im payin the deductable and everything but were taking it all right back to stock. shes not an aftermarket sorta person lol too bad...i think a lift or something with some 33's would look bitchin! but alas..no. its her lil DD so...no fun with it.

ok ok, here are the pics silver on her side...baring her shame pics of the damage. mostly on the rear door. you can see where i plowed teh t-post right there at the antenna and across the door. thank god for the fence tho!

everything he said is true...esp the part about trying to find something to break your fall a bit. see my post below. fence kept me from doing ALOT more damage to my pathy than what already is done. do everything you can to be safe, stay off the brakes and use your tranny to engine brake. but ill tell you straight up...all the preparedness in the world and all the "doing the right thing" you can do wont always save you. thats exactly what happend in my case. the safest way to drive on ice is to not drive at all. if you do drive..its a craps shoot...and i lost my butt yesterday. iv driven in much worse conditions up in the texas panhandle (worst area in texas) and never had an issue. i get 5 miles from home on a seemingly normal day of snow...BAM. so just watch yourself and be prepared for the worst.

ok ok, well not MY pathy, but rather my moms 98 XE. i drive my mitsubishi because of gas mileage since i drive about 60 or so miles per day to school and back. so today it was a bit icy and i got to school ok, but the ride back was a bit different. it got quite a bit worse while i was in classes...much icier. now before anyone lectures me to the rules and precautions of driving in snow/ice...spare me. im well awre of them and have followed them religiosly in my 6+ years of driving. i was already doing about 30 on a decent streach of road. i peaked a hill and what i saw before me on the way down was just a solid sheet of ice. well i was already rolling and it was surley too late to back out. i did want to slow downa bit because i saw a car comming the other way (playing safe) so i eased her down into 2nd (no brake). well all went good till i was about halfway down. i hit a very slick patch of ice and then i lost it. turned 180*, slid across the road (this is a little farm to market country road mind you) and off into the opposing ditch. i did miss the other person with more than plenty of room (150 feet or so) and that was my greatest concern. now im no stranger to ice...and iv lost control and been taken for a short lil ride at times. as i spun aroudn i figured "no biggie" and counted on the ditch to slow me and stop. then id just give a lil wave and get back on the road and go home. ahah wrong. said ditch did nothing of the kind. it was actually sloped down a bit. well i quickly realize that its not gonna prevent me from hitting this bared wire fence broadside. so here we go...slide in sideways, wipe out one t post and i go over very slowly. the fence actually broke my fall quite nicley. but of course, they werent meant to take 6000lbs of metal leaning agasint them...so it then sat me down full on the passenger side. then the pass front window shattered everywhere. saftey glass my ass...talk about shrapnel! so anyways, long story short, cops arrive, friend arrives, friend pulls over pathy. change 2 flat tires on pathy, check fluids, and drive home the rest of the way. as far as damage...im gonna need a new front fender, a little dent reworking near the door (where i hit the T post), and some rather broad dents in both pass side doors, and some small dings in the rear quarter, new pass side door window (front) and at least one bent rim. all in all not too bad. sure, it sucks but it coulda been much worse. all doors function perfectly, drives fine..although an alignment is deffinatley in order im sure. of course i feel terrible, and everyone says it can be replace and i cant...and i know that. but i feel really bad for it all. state trooper was a ****...honestly. gave me a ticket for unsafe speed. um lets see...i was probably doing 20 or so when this whole thing entailed. i did everyting in my power to keep from losing it. i dont give a damn if i was doing 3mph or 300mph...the patch of ice was still there and was still slippery on a prety good downhill grade mind you. 2mph woulda been unsafe! and then he had the gall to consider him nice for only issuing me a warning for "imporper lane change" or some bs like that. oh yeah buddy...let me tell you, i had EVERY intention of going into that other lane! jackass! trust me, if i could had my way, i woulda stayed in my OWN DAMN LANE! but the laws of physics didnt quite ask me if thats what i wanted! hopefully the judge sees things my way and throws out teh case. i got pics on my camera phone (may post up later) of the whole area...so hopefully he will see and agree that no matter how fast i was going...the circumstances were not my fault. you know, id admit if i was in the wrong...and driving 90mph like every other moron out there. im an extremley safe driver..and it pisses me off to no end when im branded as being wreckless when i tried to do everything just the opposite! im a firm believer in if you do the crime you can pay or do the time. but in this case there was no crime committed..but they stil want a few hundred bux of my hard earned money. so yeah, yall be safe out there and keep a hande on things as best you can and good luck when the weather goes south! oh and by the way...im perfectly fine...absolutley no injuries at all. sure wish i could say the same thing for the pathy...but she will be running around lookin like new in no time. although i will say it will take a while for my snow driving nerves to mend. i was beside myself the whole way home.

yeah...my drivers side plastic POS broke as well about 2 years ago. i doubt ill ever replace it, probably either continue to use the passenger side to unlock it all or ill get keyless entry.

bah, who needs trunk space? i have a Q-Logic box with 1cu/ft for each sub (2 10") and it leaves some room. if you need more just flop down the rear seats and re-arrange your box hehe. the only prob you have when building box's around things or going with small boxes for room reasons is you run the risk of limiting the potential of your subs. you should always place them in the appropriatley sized box. each one of my 10's calls for 1 cu/ft. and there isnt really any other place to put box's of that size.