Armadillon's FW Ranger D44/Ford 9"

[RangerSVT]

I was refering to your RA's, they look like they're binding...

SVT

 

[armadillon]

Both of you are correct. I could tight up the arms a bit more but I need to bend the arms again anyway. Next paycheck I'll get a pipe bender and put more serious lateral/horizontal bends in the radius arms and bend the drag link as well. I'm happy with my axle placement for now and I saw Bray D had to bend his draglink too.

Update: It's actually sitting on springs supporting it's own weight with two ratchet straps keeping it on. I have a ruff stuff frameside track bar mount that's ready to go on. Just need to fab up me an axle side.

 

[armadillon]

Trackbar mount time. Now that it's on it's own weight, I'm a little worried about clearance. I'm using 3.5" EB coils and I feel it's pretty tight under there. In the third picture you can see the heim joint hanging down from where the mount is. I'll be replacing the crossmember with something more sturdy eventually.

What do y'all think? Enough clearance?

 

[Rowdy Fitzgerald]

After you get your engine cm fixed I think you will have enough clearance. You'll only have roughly 4" of up travel so you shouldn't hit the diff on the TA. You could build a new lower TA bracket and weld it to the axle tube. Probably oughta put a bump stop in to keep the axel from makin contact with the upper TA bracket when you hit a bad bump.

 

[armadillon]

Sounds good. I'll be doing the trackbar and axle side mount this evening. I was going to order one from RuffStuff but I don't need one that tall. Glad I have a bunch of .25 plate lying around.

Sent from my SGH-I747 using Tapatalk

 

[armadillon]

I'm attempting to finish my track bar, and I realized my axle side trackbar mount may be right on top of where the wedge is. In the first picture of my last post, you can see where I cut off the bolt for the original track bar mount. I can reuse it, but I don't like the idea of it being in single shear. I've noticed a few other builds where the track bar was bolted directly to the original axle side mount but not one person braced it.

Am I not searching hard enough?

 

[Rowdy Fitzgerald]

I recommend to always brace whatever you build. It's the "just incase" factor. All it would take is slipping off one rock and sliding sideways into another rock to bust stuff.

 

[armadillon]

Right. I'll see if there is a way to brace it.

Rowdy, have you ever welded to the actual wedge itself?

 

[RangerSVT]

There's been a couple that have used the original axle tracbar mount, and double sheared it. Ford designed it to last, I doubt it would fail, havent heard of one failing...

SVT

 

[armadillon]

Thanks SVT. I'll see if I can incorporate it in somehow.

I fawking hate backtracking. I welded up my trackbar and was checking angles and lengths when I realized that my axle wasn't centered properly. Thankfully I hadn't actually welded any mounts on.

In the process of trying to center it I got so pissed off at the bindage in the radius arm's that I've torn everything down.

As much as I want to finish this project, there is NO EXCUSE for doing it poorly. I had to take a breath and step back. I need to "rent" a tube bender from HF again so I can bend the radius arms and the draglink.

This gives me an opportunity to perform electrolysis and paint everything now. I was going to have to do it anyway.

Color ideas for suspension/linkage?

 

[Rowdy Fitzgerald]

No I haven't. If you decide you want to I recommend using a arc welder and cast 55 rods. They're a nickel blend. You get 2 rods for like $13. But it's supposed to reduce the chance of the weld or the weld seams from cracking.

 

[armadillon]

I got paid and picked up another HF Pipe Kinker. I went with the 12 ton instead of the 16 ton this time and used the 20% coupon. I filled the DOM Tube with sand and plugged it with some blue shop towels. Not sure why people weld a cap on the ends, the paper towels worked just fine.


The first time I bent the arms, they were at about 2*. Since it was binding horribly, I went for 4* and got a heck of a lot less binding, but I wasn't happy with it. I rebent again to about ~7* for each. I'm bolting up now but I felt like doing a quick update.

I put a bend in the draglink too so the TREs wouldn't bind up on the passenger side knuckle like before.

 

[armadillon]

So I had to scrap my RuffStuff track bar bracket. It just didn't do what I needed it to, and after welding all over it... It may be handy in the future. I'll hold on it.

Anyway, I learned how fawking difficult overhead welding is. Maybe my settings were off, but I will NOT post up my welds on this bracket. I don't have a good enough Dremel/small cutting tool to cut it off so this bracket will stay until I get access to my brother's superior welding skill and his Millermatic that can burn a hotter weld.

Here is the issue I ran into. My track bar from eye to eye is exactly the same length as my draglink. The end of my draglink is right above my wedge, but I couldn't use the OEM mount point because it was too low. In hindsight, I could have used it and just lowered my axleside mount, but I wasn't comfortable with it.

 

[armadillon]

This was my idea for the lower mount. I want the strongest point to be welded to the axle tube since I haven't heard the greatest things about welding to the wedge (which is apparently cast steel?

I would weld to the wedge anyway, but this way the weld on the tube would be the strongest point and any strength from the welds on the wedge would be extra.

 

[FordRanger89]

This was my idea for the lower mount. I want the strongest point to be welded to the axle tube since I haven't heard the greatest things about welding to the wedge (which is apparently cast steel?

I would weld to the wedge anyway, but this way the weld on the tube would be the strongest point and any strength from the welds on the wedge would be extra.

That looks like a pretty good idea to me!
I surprisingly did not have any problem welding to wedge and I did not even have to heat it up (probably got lucky..... lol). But I would differently go with your drawing.