EB Coils - think I found the unicorn

[JohnnyU]

The three guys that you mentioned know me. If my first impression comes off as an Ass Hole then that's too bad.

I do know Joel, and as much as I hate to, I must say he is VERY knowlegable in RBV's and is often arrogant because 99% of the time, he's right.

Oh, and by the way, 4.5" of suspension lift and 3" of body lift will perform VERY differently than 7.5" of suspension lift.

 

[littleredrangerhood]

Wait a second, you mean CopyKat=Joel H. Why the hell didn't you say so man? Last time I knew you were going by Forest or something like that. Here, I thought you were just some punk ass guy I had never heard of before ripping on my sh*t. That changes my whole attitude now. Well, except the fact that you still come off a little arrogant even if it is deserved.

 

[McDerry]

I do know Joel, and as much as I hate to, I must say he is VERY knowlegable in RBV's and is often arrogant because 99% of the time, he's right.

Oh, and by the way, 4.5" of suspension lift and 3" of body lift will perform VERY differently than 7.5" of suspension lift.

He's also the same guy that asked me which end of a shock goes up...


...in reality 99.9% of the time I'm right, I just find out about the argument after the fact. Take that Joel

 

[McDerry]

Well I might aswell add my two cents again and bring the value to 4 cents.

Now lets bear with this with an open mind, as I know alot of people don't think outside the box let alone any further away then this site or there local wheelers.


Now lets assume I want a suspension that can get me all kinds of travel. Now I can only have 6 inches of upward wheel travel cause I want to keep my fnders and still have this streetable (otherwise you might aswell build a buggy). Now Were gonna take all the variables out of the equation, except for the weight of the truck and the spring rate of A coil (any given coil) till we find one that gives us the upward wheel travel we desire(we have to take in account how much the spring settles with just the trucks weight) SO we may end up with a coil, any coil, that compresses 6 so inches when the truck is in a level position and another six inches at full stuff. We don't care about the free length of the said coil.

But I want 4" of lift aswell. So, bigger space, and a better coil bucket on the axle, something liek joel's one but deeper for more coil support, I'd probally weld in two pieces of short pipe in it to twist the coil into to hold it in place. But your gonna want all kinds of down travel out of this setup to keep some tire on the ground and to keep biting. So we leave the top of the coil free and build a self centering coil bucket on the frame.

At this point the drawback is unsprung weight on the dropped tire relative to the sprung weight of the truck. But that can be adjusted, skidplates, axle trusss, big beefy tires in addition to the entire sprins will add unsprung weight And things like body panel removal, interior downgrades, etc of fat trimming will remove sprung weight from the truck.

So how far are you guys willing to go??

 

[CopyKat]

Well I might aswell add my two cents again and bring the value to 4 cents.

Now lets bear with this with an open mind, as I know alot of people don't think outside the box let alone any further away then this site or there local wheelers.


Now lets assume I want a suspension that can get me all kinds of travel. Now I can only have 6 inches of upward wheel travel cause I want to keep my fnders and still have this streetable (otherwise you might aswell build a buggy). Now Were gonna take all the variables out of the equation, except for the weight of the truck and the spring rate of A coil (any given coil) till we find one that gives us the upward wheel travel we desire(we have to take in account how much the spring settles with just the trucks weight) SO we may end up with a coil, any coil, that compresses 6 so inches when the truck is in a level position and another six inches at full stuff. We don't care about the free length of the said coil.

But I want 4" of lift aswell. So, bigger space, and a better coil bucket on the axle, something liek joel's one but deeper for more coil support, I'd probally weld in two pieces of short pipe in it to twist the coil into to hold it in place. But your gonna want all kinds of down travel out of this setup to keep some tire on the ground and to keep biting. So we leave the top of the coil free and build a self centering coil bucket on the frame.

At this point the drawback is unsprung weight on the dropped tire relative to the sprung weight of the truck. But that can be adjusted, skidplates, axle trusss, big beefy tires in addition to the entire sprins will add unsprung weight And things like body panel removal, interior downgrades, etc of fat trimming will remove sprung weight from the truck.

So how far are you guys willing to go??

Most of that may work fine for a Solid axle but on a TTB it's hard to add unsprung weight in the right spot. Lead or water in the tires is about the most effective.

Your uncaptured coil is an OK idea for a Solid axle again..................OK it's stupid to start with.

TTB needs that spring pushing down on it or you'll have next to no weight on that tire=Useless. May as well Just three wheel it.

For my lower bucket I do have a piece of pipe I have to 1/4 turn the coil into. But the height of that bucket needs to be low. If it's high then the coil bow will be hitting the sides of the coil. It makes an awfull sound.

Here is where I think your .1% wrong, McDerry!

 

[McDerry]

I'm Not wrong Your trucks just to damn fat. Face it you've turned a 3400lbs rig into a 4500lbs rig, when you should have made it into a 2800lbs rig, but thats just the nature of the beast.


Oh By the way:
35" tire would hold over 340 pounds of water, about the same as what your one inch of compressed spring would be placing on the tire.

So other then its a mod happenning more commonly outside north America, and us being americans have these large bloated rigs, whats the real downside??


On another note:
How is this icon 'family' oriented other then the potential to produce families?

 

[JFA_Spyderman]

Yo,
At the equipment rental yard i work at, most all of our tractors are about 70% calcium (sp?) filled. This is to better distribute the weight, otherwise you pickup a load of gravel with the front end and the bucket stays there and you lift the tractor off the ground.

One downside with filled tires is its going to be harder to stop, and (im not 100% on this) wouldnt you loose some floation in mud?

Oh and McDerry, i think you are right. I dont see a practical application for this avatar.

 

[McDerry]

Oh and McDerry, i think you are right. I dont see a practical application for this avatar.

Apparently someone got there shits and giggles out of seeing smileys fucking in a hottub, but hey to each there own...

 

[4x4junkie]

Junkie could you get some pics of your recent work?

Here ya go.


I cut the bucket across the middle, and welded in a section of 2" x 1/8" CR steel strip, formed into the same shape as the bucket itself.
I then welded the whole thing to the side of the F-250 shock bracket.
You can also see where I added the piece of metal at the top to support the coil better from bowing out.

Next pic shows the height difference between the old Rancho coil, and the new SJ one. The wire is also thicker on the SJ coil (0.66" vs. 0.62")

In checking to make sure the axleshaft wasn't binding up on anything, I had to widen the beam window a bit more, as well as trim down the radius arm bolts a bit where they protrude into the beam (you can see the shaft is all the way at the top of the window in the pic).

Last one is of it back together (gained almost another inch of height in the process. Now I'm probably gonna have to figure out how to get the rear up another inch also , maybe the front will settle in a little).

 

[JFA_Spyderman]

Yo,
wow, Junkie, thats pretty cool. So when you cut and reweled the coil bucket, was that for the purpose of just being able to fit a longer coil in there, or more for reinforcement?

What are the specs on the new coil you got? Did you remove all your washers when you changed the coil? I assume it was a SJ XJ coil...

I also see you are using your faithful wood blocks again

I have heard good things about offroad design's zero rate add-a-leaf, you might look at that if you are only want to add an inch in the rear. It's looking good man! Keep up the good work.

 

[4x4junkie]

Yo,
wow, Junkie, thats pretty cool. So when you cut and reweled the coil bucket, was that for the purpose of just being able to fit a longer coil in there, or more for reinforcement?

What are the specs on the new coil you got? Did you remove all your washers when you changed the coil? I assume it was a SJ XJ coil...

I also see you are using your faithful wood blocks again

I have heard good things about offroad design's zero rate add-a-leaf, you might look at that if you are only want to add an inch in the rear. It's looking good man! Keep up the good work.

I posted the specs earlier in the thread, but here you go again (too lazy to look back where it was + the server's being a bit slow right now):

Skyjacker # JC60F (pair)
5.5" O.D.
22" free
12 turns (11 full-dia. + 1 small turn)
0.66" wire

Currently they sit between 16-16.5" under my BII (approx 1600lbs sprung weight up front).

I modded the buckets primarily just to get the longer coil in there, yes (I needed new coils anyway, so I went for the longer ones mainly to have the working range of the coil be a smaller percentage of the coil's total length. I figure they might hold up a bit better that way, time will tell).

I'm still hoping the front might settle down a bit though, although if the SJ springs are of the quality I think they are, that may not happen.
I've got some old long-leaf add-a-leafs laying here I could try on the rear (pulling out a stock (less arched) leaf for the AAL, shouldn't stiffen it up too much, if at all).

 

[samsonitesamsonite]

how is the alignment with those 2.5" drops?

 

[4x4junkie]

The bushings currently are set for about -1° of camber correction (both sides), leaving about 0.5° positive at the wheels (vehicle unloaded). The axlebeam pivots are almost 2" above the hub centerline.

With the Rancho coils, I originally had it set up where the bushings were dead on 0° for camber. As they sagged with use, I added probably over an inch of washers on one side (half-inch on the other) to keep it at the same height.

 

[Todd]

I added probably over an inch of washers on one side (half-inch on the other) to keep it at the same height.

Was the side with the most washers the passenger side? Ive noticed after having my beams out agian that the pass side is about 10" shorter then the drivers. On my setup I have about 1/2" to 3/4" more spacer on the pass side beam to make the two sides level.

 

[littleredrangerhood]

Here is an update. I got the springs. I ordered JBG EB coil buckets as well as the stock upper coil spring retainers and they are on their way. I ordered lower Ballistic Fab coil spring retainers and they are on their way. I am going to make a short lower bucket using some 5.5" diameter pipe and seal the deal with the spring retainers. I am going to mod the upper buckets a little bit by welding a curved piece of plate steel arching from one side of the bucket to the other side. This, along with the lower coil bucket, will be to help keep the coil from bowing out too badly. I am going home this weekend so I will be sure to post up pics of my progress. Hopefully, I will get the front lift all squared away and then I need to turn my attention to finishing the frame chop/bob and setting up shackles to match the lift height of the front.

Running project total: ~$340
Cost breakdown:
$200 for springs
$100 for EB coil buckets
$20 for upper coil spring retainers
$20 for lower coil spring retainers

Good thing is that my girlfriend bought the coil springs and EB buckets for me for our 2 year anniversary. Last year's anniversary present was my Warn diff skid for the 8.8. Last year's Christmas present was the F250 shock towers. A woman who is willing to buy truck parts for presents is definitely a keeper in my eyes