Rough Road Fabrication 4Runner Mid Travel Setup
01-06-2012, 06:38 PM
#44
Registered User
I'll add to the diff cutting..
Look into cutting down a dana 44 or ford 9". the toyota housing isnt really designed like a dana housing, and cutting it down poses a problem simply due to the really strange housing it's built with.
If you look at a dana 44, you'll see just how easy it would be to cut down the housing, have shafts made, and then bolt on some CV's.
Look into cutting down a dana 44 or ford 9". the toyota housing isnt really designed like a dana housing, and cutting it down poses a problem simply due to the really strange housing it's built with.
If you look at a dana 44, you'll see just how easy it would be to cut down the housing, have shafts made, and then bolt on some CV's.
01-06-2012, 07:56 PM
#45
Registered User
I'll add to the diff cutting..
Look into cutting down a dana 44 or ford 9". the toyota housing isnt really designed like a dana housing, and cutting it down poses a problem simply due to the really strange housing it's built with.
If you look at a dana 44, you'll see just how easy it would be to cut down the housing, have shafts made, and then bolt on some CV's.
Look into cutting down a dana 44 or ford 9". the toyota housing isnt really designed like a dana housing, and cutting it down poses a problem simply due to the really strange housing it's built with.
If you look at a dana 44, you'll see just how easy it would be to cut down the housing, have shafts made, and then bolt on some CV's.
03-06-2012, 09:17 PM
#48
Registered User
It would be interesting to see more of the front travel. Have you had a chance to really flex it out and compare it with before? Looks like a fun time.
03-07-2012, 06:41 AM
#51
Registered User
Thread Starter
Join Date: Oct 2010
Posts: 56
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Yea it's the best view. I'll take a another video once I get the truck back. My buddies and I were in Ocotillo Wells two weekends ago and some whoops snuck up on me at 65-70mph..
Damage report: broke the right rear shock clean off the frame, and the axle housing smashed the shock body on the left side. Also bent the upper coil cups (if that's the right terminology) and broke a motor mount.
The rear is being reinforced at the moment with the addition of hydro bumps as well.
I need to post some pics of the quick disconnect swaybar links he made me. They are simple and held up nicely when the rear broke.
Sorry I don't feel comfortable with posting any prices since Rough Road hasn't set a price yet. Though I will say, depending on what your setup will be, it can cost less than half of what long travel would be.
Damage report: broke the right rear shock clean off the frame, and the axle housing smashed the shock body on the left side. Also bent the upper coil cups (if that's the right terminology) and broke a motor mount.
The rear is being reinforced at the moment with the addition of hydro bumps as well.
I need to post some pics of the quick disconnect swaybar links he made me. They are simple and held up nicely when the rear broke.
Sorry I don't feel comfortable with posting any prices since Rough Road hasn't set a price yet. Though I will say, depending on what your setup will be, it can cost less than half of what long travel would be.
03-08-2012, 06:28 AM
#54
Registered User
Sorry about the damage man. If you're gonna play...
It's encouraging then that nothing in the front suspension broke. Durability is always a good thing. Good luck with the repairs!
It's encouraging then that nothing in the front suspension broke. Durability is always a good thing. Good luck with the repairs!
03-19-2012, 11:00 PM
#55
Registered User
Thread Starter
Join Date: Oct 2010
Posts: 56
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
I'm not sure what which uniball is being used. I'll find out for you.
Thanks Jburt.. Yea it happens... The front held up like a champ, however the bumps were very slightly bent. Austin added gusseted them but I'm probably upgrading to hydro bump stops in the future. Trucks all fixed now, the setup is much more solid and hydro bump stops were added to the mix. There's enough travel to now to drop the coils out of the upper buckets a bit so J-hooks were added at the bottom to keep them in place. Ill post some pics tomorrow..
Here's some pics of the last desert trip.
Thanks Jburt.. Yea it happens... The front held up like a champ, however the bumps were very slightly bent. Austin added gusseted them but I'm probably upgrading to hydro bump stops in the future. Trucks all fixed now, the setup is much more solid and hydro bump stops were added to the mix. There's enough travel to now to drop the coils out of the upper buckets a bit so J-hooks were added at the bottom to keep them in place. Ill post some pics tomorrow..
Here's some pics of the last desert trip.
Last edited by Motorheadno13; 03-19-2012 at 11:03 PM.
03-20-2012, 01:02 AM
#56
Does this kit use stock bump stop mounts? With stock bump stop mounts, stock droop bump stop and 3/16" compression bump stops I was able to squeeze 8" of travel from my setup. The limiting factors in our front suspensions are the angle our inner CV joints will droop out to and how much compression our steering parts (mostly our tie rod ends) can handle. The point I'm trying to make is that if you don't go with heimed steering, there really isn't a point of adding a uniball.
Keep in mind that of the two IFS compression bump stops, the rear IFS bump stop mount is almost 3/8" higher than the front IFS bump stop mount. It appears that you're running 3/8" Energy Suspension bump stops, meaning that you're rear IFS bump stop is doing all the work. Correct me if I'm wrong. Be careful running low profile bump stops, if the bump stops don't absorb all the force of the suspension compressing, something else will. In my case it was the upper torsion bar mount (where the motor mount is) ripping out of the frame.
Rough Road Fabrication is local to me too, so I might have to go by there and check them out. On their website it shows that they built Seth's Deathrunner. Austin must have used to work at Protrux before they shut down. I'd be interested in one of their idler arms, if they're cheaper than a Total Chaos idler arm.
But what matters most is that you're happy with it. After years of screwing with the stock IFS suspension and three wheeling every time I went rock crawling, I've come to the conclusion that for the offroading I want to do, it requires a LT kit or a SAS. Our stock torsion bar suspension is great at speed but just doesn't flex while crawling! Are you located in SD? If so we should hit the trails sometime!
I've welded SDORI (similar to Sonoran Steel's design) IFS braces on both of my first generation 4runners, which takes up much more room than Motorhead's or Total Chaos' braces and I've never had a problem pulling my front differential.
Last edited by strykersd; 03-20-2012 at 01:29 AM.
03-23-2012, 06:50 PM
#57
Registered User
Thread Starter
Join Date: Oct 2010
Posts: 56
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Nah he's a great welder. Its one of the reasons I like going to him. It's sort of hard to tell in the picture, but the shock is still mounted to the welded tabs. The piece of "subframe" where the tabs were welded is what broke. It's the same place where you would mount oem shocks.
So we decided to cut out the area of where the oem shocks mount, run a tube which connects both inner sides of the frame right above the coil buckets. This should strengthen the frame, along with the coil buckets which are now welded to it as well, and act as mounting points for the shocks. We also swapped the front shocks with the rear shocks. Front's 2.0x8, Rear's 2.0x10 is the current setup. Even though the front's are 8inches it still gets a little over 9inches of travel which is the same from before. However, a little over an inch was gained in the rear.
Yea I've heard of the low profile bumps being a bad idea... They wont be a worry for much longer as hydro bumps are going up front as well.
From what I understand we still gained some travel from moving over to uniballs. The main idea behind it is for strength without having to go with custom upper arms however. With that in mind, I still plan on switching over to heimed steering in the future... I'm not sure on what to do about the CV's binding though. I've been lucky since they haven't yet, but whenever they do... Well, I dont know lol. I hear the Porsche CV's or boots is it, could be an option? Maybe you can give some more insight on that.
I'm happy with the setup and where its going. The whole intent was too have a daily driver, smooth on the streets and a balanced between rock crawling and desert driving.... LT has it's cons too, the widened track width is a turn off to me. Then you need fenders. Plus a T100 rear end to match the track width, if you want to do it right in my opinion. That's a lot of extra $$$. I'm sure its worth it in the long run but, once the hydro bumps are installed up front on my baby, I think she'll out perform some budget LT setups honestly.. And still squeeze through those narrow trails. Like you say though, it's all about preference. I'll add to that by saying it depends on the driver too.
We should definitely connect stryker, It would be nice to not be riding solo every time I wheel!
So we decided to cut out the area of where the oem shocks mount, run a tube which connects both inner sides of the frame right above the coil buckets. This should strengthen the frame, along with the coil buckets which are now welded to it as well, and act as mounting points for the shocks. We also swapped the front shocks with the rear shocks. Front's 2.0x8, Rear's 2.0x10 is the current setup. Even though the front's are 8inches it still gets a little over 9inches of travel which is the same from before. However, a little over an inch was gained in the rear.
Yea I've heard of the low profile bumps being a bad idea... They wont be a worry for much longer as hydro bumps are going up front as well.
From what I understand we still gained some travel from moving over to uniballs. The main idea behind it is for strength without having to go with custom upper arms however. With that in mind, I still plan on switching over to heimed steering in the future... I'm not sure on what to do about the CV's binding though. I've been lucky since they haven't yet, but whenever they do... Well, I dont know lol. I hear the Porsche CV's or boots is it, could be an option? Maybe you can give some more insight on that.
I'm happy with the setup and where its going. The whole intent was too have a daily driver, smooth on the streets and a balanced between rock crawling and desert driving.... LT has it's cons too, the widened track width is a turn off to me. Then you need fenders. Plus a T100 rear end to match the track width, if you want to do it right in my opinion. That's a lot of extra $$$. I'm sure its worth it in the long run but, once the hydro bumps are installed up front on my baby, I think she'll out perform some budget LT setups honestly.. And still squeeze through those narrow trails. Like you say though, it's all about preference. I'll add to that by saying it depends on the driver too.
We should definitely connect stryker, It would be nice to not be riding solo every time I wheel!
03-23-2012, 10:38 PM
#58
Porsche CVs would be your ticket, but adapting them to work on our front ends won't be cheap. Downey used to make them, if you're lucky you might be able to find someone selling some.
03-25-2012, 12:39 AM
#59
Registered User
Thread Starter
Join Date: Oct 2010
Posts: 56
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
By the way.. Looks like Rough Road posted the uniball kits and idler arms.
http://www.roughroadfabrication.com/Parts.html
More Updates...
A little dusty...
New front tabs for 2.0x8's
Front quick disconnects
Rear quick disconnects
I mentioned earlier that hydro bumps were installed. They are actually Fox 3inch air bumps.. Sorry about that.
http://www.roughroadfabrication.com/Parts.html
More Updates...
A little dusty...
New front tabs for 2.0x8's
Front quick disconnects
Rear quick disconnects
I mentioned earlier that hydro bumps were installed. They are actually Fox 3inch air bumps.. Sorry about that.
