Photos of my shakedown run

[D.T.Starr]

Here are some picures of my shakedown run at Phil's this September.

 

[D.T.Starr]

 

[AngryLepercon]

Nice rig and great pics...

 

[D.T.Starr]

And some from my third run.

 

[danger88ranger]

How did it hold up?

 

[KELLY88]

Whoa, been a long time since I've seen this project. Looks pretty sweet. Good to see it out of the shop.

 

[D.T.Starr]

It has been a long time coming and I am still giddy as a school girl.
Everything went fairly well, I wheeled two full days, found that the front D-shaft hit at stuff (Tranny cable shifter and engine cage), then Sunday night I sheared off the driver's side high steer studs. Other than that it ran really well and performed great.
The second trip out I broke the rear d-shaft on the second obstacle of the day, but it was fixed as manufacturing defect (spicer's heat treating).
The third trip out I was getting some axle wrap so I cut the trip short and I will fix the traction bar so I can get out a few more times in Nov.
We have 2hrs of video that a buddy is working on editing down.

 

[D.T.Starr]

For those that didn't see this in the other thread

http://video.yahoo.com/watch/3538159/9800168

 

[rangerbum]

Those tires are freakin GNARL!

 

[D.T.Starr]

I was wrong about the problem being with the traction bar, the traction bar held the driver's side tube in place as the rear D60 diff spun. It also streched and striped the pass side u-bolts.

oops.

 

[Bray D]

Ouch, I assume the diff wasn't welded to the tube?

 

[D.T.Starr]

Nope that MIG weld was pointless, it was just to seal the edge of the traction bar mount.
The plan all along was to truss the rear, and at that time properly weld the tubes to the housing. I was just hoping to get in a few runs because I was sick of building, lesson learned.
I will pound out the tubes and use a new centre section housing with the old tubes and then do a proper truss and weld the tubes to the housing at that time.
If it was fully welded and I had stonger U-bolts on the opposite side it would have helped, but based on the fact that the housing cracked and broke at every plug weld I think this would have broke even if I properly welded in the tubes, and only a truss would have prevented it.
Time to improve it.

 

[Bray D]

Murphy's Law in full force. That sucks. It's too bad it failed before you got the chance to truss it in the first place.