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SAS Progress
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My
Solid Axle Swap donor was a '97 Toyota FZJ-80 Landcruiser. Why this
one? I didn't want a Dana 44 as it's not all that strong of an axle
without about a grand in CTM u-joints and alloy axles. A Dana 60 is
far bigger and heavier than I want. I really wanted something with a
3rd member. A Toy mini truck axle is too narrow and the birfs too weak,
although the Longfields are supposed to be performing pretty stellar and
would work well. It's still too narrow though. I even thought about
something custom using a spare rear 12 bolt diff I have with Dana 60
knuckles, but cost would be absurd. Not to mention needing custom axle
shafts.
The FJ-80 axle is about 63" WMS to WMS. That's about 2" wider
than my IFS with the 2" wheel spacers I've got on now. It's the
perfect width that I wanted. It's also got a 6 lug wheel pattern,
although it does appear to be hub-centric rather than lug-centric.
The hub, rotors and calipers are also huge and wouldn't even come close to
fitting the stock Isuzu 15" wheels. The aftermarket 15" AL
wheels I have though will just fit with a little grinding on the calipers
so I'm good there.
It's
got a high pinion diff and there are 4.56 gears available for it to match
my rear axle. I was supposed to be getting the factory electric
locker as well, but the junkyard screwed up majorly. They couldn't
locate a locking diff for it, but they did refund some of my money.
All in all, it was still a pretty good deal for this axle, although not
the smoking deal I thought it was when I was buying it. It also came
with the springs and radius arms which I wasn't expecting. I think
I'll be able to use them and they will save me about $400 - $500 if it all
works out.
It uses full-time drive flanges in the hubs, but they can be swapped
out for manual Aisin hubs from a pre-85 solid axle mini truck, and they
can be kept for trail spares in case you blow a manual hub. The
spring pads place the coils outboard of the frame rails with about 2"
clearance, which looks just about perfect.
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18 Jan 04 Update:
New
Bilstein 5150's are mounted. I'm re-using the original mounts I made
for the old shocks, but I need to move the upper mount. I want to
stand the shock up a little more vertical and I have to move it
inwards. As it is now, the tires hit the shock body at full
lock.
I
got one of the cheapie Harbor Freight tire changers on sale for $35 to
mount my tires. This thing is a bargain. For what it cost, it
works extremely well. It could use a couple improvements, but
mounting tires with it is easy. After getting the tires mounted, my
first trip was through Martinez Canyon to
try them out. So far, they're great.
I also
tested out the removable bolt in my driver's side arm to see how much it
improves flex. The result was pretty astounding. There's a lot
more flex with the bolt out than I was expecting. The animated GIF
shows the difference. In both pictures, the driver's side is jacked
up until the bump stop on that side just touches.
With the rear bolt removed, the front one is going to have a lot more
load on it. I want to beef up that mount before I try this off-road.
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2 Nov 03 Update:
I'm getting some time to do some more work on my suspension
finally. The coil mounts seemed like a good idea, and worked well
for fine tuning the height, but the geometry just isn't right. The
top of the coil is free to pivot around the rod end. At first, this
seemed fine, the coils pretty much stayed in place. But, after
several months, they now tend to pivot inward and allow the coil to bulge
inward.
I re-did the upper mounts, this time making it rigid. Height is
still adjustable by a few inches, but with spacers instead of a rod end.
I've also picked up a spare birfield and long side shaft that I found
pretty reasonable. Still looking for 1 or 2 more and a short side
shaft, but I've got time enough to wait for a good deal.
Shocks and tires are next. I've got a couple Bilstein 5150 shocks
ordered for the front to replace my too-long Pro-comp cheapies, and I'll
move the upper mounts so they're a little more upright. I also
picked up some used 37" MT/R's to replace the worn-out 33's.
I'll need to get some replacement leafs in back (that aren't bent) and do
a lot of trimming on the fender and bumper mounts up front to fit them
without rubbing.
Just getting a feel of what they're gonna look and fit like:
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27 Apr 03
Time's
a wastin. I'm almost there. I've now got:
4.55 gears in
ARB in
Arms and brackets done and painted.
Trackbar on.
Draglink done.
Hoops for shocks & upper spring mounts.
Steering.
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15 Mar 03
I
got a new 220v MIG welder finally, after years of wanting one. This
ones a Miller 175 and it does a *much* better job on thicker steels than
the old 110v unit did. My arms are fully welded up now.
I ended up dropping the adjustments on the arms for now. The
strait tube I was trying out wants to bind unless there's a pivot in
it. I'll work on something new later on, but for now with time
running short I'm just using bushings front and back of the axle
tube.
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15 Feb 03
Well,
two steps forward, one step back. After spending a lot of time with
the FJ-80 arms and cutting up my cross member for mounts, I decided I
didn't want to use them after all. They just weren't going to work
very well. I've also spent a good bit of time on a dual t-case
adaptor, and that kinda killed the option of using the arms.
I've built new I-beam type arms that fit much better and will still fit
when I get the crawler box in too. I started out with cardboard
templates cutting to fit, then copied in steel. The center webs are
3/16" and the caps are 3/8". They seem to be quite
beefy. I'll finish weld when I get my new welder (with more amps)
and I'll add gusseting in key areas.
The
rear mount of the arms is a large RE
spherical bearing. The front is a standard busing. The
middle a rod end. The idea of the middle is to make it adjustable on
the passenger side to tweak the caster if I need to. The driver's
side will slide freely, for off-road use, but lock in place for on-road
use.
I'm
not set on the middle bushing type yet. I'm still trying to get a
feel for how well this will work and may change it yet before I'm done.
Bump stops will go on top of the arms where they cross over the
axle. So far, I'm pretty happy with how the arms are turning
out.
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10 Dec 02
I'm
finally getting back to work. I've been distracted lately by our new
pup. He's a handful. I've also spent a couple weeks
pondering radius arm mounting. I've run through a dozen different
possibilities of arms and mounting positions and finally started on the
mounts.
The ends will be inside the frame rails, mounted to the tranny cross
member that will be re-inforced as well. They'll also be flush with
the bottom of the frame rails. It'd be *much* easier to just weld
some tabs on the bottom of the frame rail, but they would stick down
3" at least and really suck for ground clearance.
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30 Nov 02
I spent some more time with axle positioning. I don't think I'm
going to move it that far forward. I'm gonna shoot for a 97" -
98" wheelbase, which is about 5" forward of where it was.
For oil sump clearance, I'm gonna look for a 2wd oil pan that's a stamped
steel unit and gives better clearance for the tie rod.
I
also looked at my front drive shaft. I know I'll need it lengthened,
but I hadn't really looked at how to adapt it to the Toy diff flange
yet. Turns out, the Toy and Isuzu u-joints are very similar in
size. The Isuzu joints have a little bit bigger cross, and the pins
are larger, but the O.D. of the caps are the same between the two.
I was able to use my old drive shaft, pull the front flange off it and
put the Toy flange on in it's place. I used the Isuzu u-joint and
caps and had to file off 40 thou off the inside of the ears on the Toy
flange, but they fit together relatively easy.
The only downside is that the Isuzu u-joint is not greasable. It
does have the boss for the zerk, but it's not drilled. The rear
drive shaft uses these same joints, but with the zerks installed so
they're greasable. I'll probably switch to these eventually.
The splines on the slip joint are 4.5" long. I'll have to
wait until I have the axle installed and flex it out to see if this is
gonna be enough travel or not. I'm pretty sure it will be. The
radius arms and the drive shaft will be traveling in arcs very close to
one another. I don't expect to need much slip at all.
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24 Nov 02
Not
a whole lot done in the last week. I've spent the last two weekends
looking at steering boxes at the junkyard. I did pick up a couple,
but they're not gonna work. I think I know what box will work now,
it's just a matter of finding one. About $100 shipped using www.car-parts.com.
I'm looking locally for a cheaper one for now. I've moved on and
started working on the radius arms.
I also got my manual hubs. I cleaned them up and re-greased
them. Also painted the outer ring and dial, but I liked the ones on
my Isuzu hubs better, so I swapped them on instead. They're both
Aisin hubs and most parts are interchangeable.
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14 Nov 02
I've
got the passenger side cut off and cleaned up now, and I've rolled the
axle underneath to check fit and clearance issues. This initial
picture is about a 96.5" wheelbase (4.5" over stock).
Positioning looked good, but it did have only a couple inches clearance
between the tie rod and the oil sump. I could modify the sump if
needed by cutting off the front corner and welding in a plate at an angle.
I
then stretched it out to a 99" wheelbase so the tie rod clears the
oil sump. This pic on the left is what it looks like. I didn't
like it at first, but it's growing on me. Not sure where it'll be
yet, but somewhere between 97" and 99" wheelbase. I'm also
planning on re-doing the rear suspension eventually and moving it back
4" - 5" as well.
Height is about 2.5" higher than before. More than I wanted,
but not bad. The back was previously a couple inches higher, but I
might have to fix my bent rear springs to get another inch or two to level
it out. The body support horns on the front cross member will have
to go, but it's not a major job to cut them off and move the body mounts
inward a few inches.
I
still haven't decided on a steering box, but it'll likely be the Scout
box. I need to pick up a couple types from the junkyard to get a
better idea of what'll fit. There's also plenty of room outboard the
frame rails for the coil and shock towers so that won't be an issue.
The
tie rod is lower than I like, and the radius arms will no longer run under
them for protection. There are forward facing hi-steer arms
available, but they're expensive and probably wouldn't work
anyways. I'd have to lift it several inches more to clear
them. The radius arms will run right above the tie rod and I may
look at adding a skid of some sort to them that wraps down under the tie
rod.
Lots more pics on my Swap Pics page.
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13 Nov 02
I've
got one side done almost. Just a little bit on the bottom of the
rail to clean up. I need to re-fill my oxy tank. It's amazing
how quickly that stuff goes when you're cutting with it. I had the
little mini tanks from a Home Depot portable kit originally, but they
don't last long. Before I started on this job, I swapped them out
for the next larger size which holds 4 times as much gas, but they're
about the same price to re-fill. The acetylene will last I think, but I
used almost a full oxy tank on this side.
This is not a fun job either. Smoky, smelly, dirty and
messy. I'm doing better with the torch than I thought I would
though. I gouged the frame a little bit, but nothing not
easily fixed. It only took me about 10 minutes with the grinder to
clean up the rail.
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12 Nov 02
The
width is looking pretty good. Not too wide, but a good improvement
over stock.
At
this point, I've got as much of the IFS un-bolted as I can. The
torch comes next... :)
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10 Nov 02
The
axle now is assembled for the most part and I'm ready to start cutting on
my truck. I've been using my spare tire to test fit on the
axle. The rotors and brakes on this thing are huge and they just
barely fit inside my 15" aftermarket wheels. I had to grind a
ridge down slightly on the back of the calipers to clear. The hubs
just barely fit through the center hole in the wheel too. The stock
Isuzu 15" aluminum wheels don't even come close to fitting BTW.
Some quick measurements show I'll be about 1" wider than my IFS is
now with 2" wheel spacers.
Or, about 5" over stock width.
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2 Nov 02
So
far I've just been cleaning the axle up, sandblasting, painting and
re-packing the birfields wheel bearings. All the seals looked good
and none were leaking so I'm re-using them. I did put in new axle
seals though as they're cheap and easy to do. I had to cut the
mounts for the radius arms off along with a bunch of tabs that weren't
being used any more. The radius arms will be flipped and wrap around
the top of the axle instead of the bottom.
I'm thinking about modifying the arms to make them adjustable. On
one side, the adjustment would be done via a screw jack of some
sort. Like how tie rods are adjusted. The other would be a
sleeve that could be clamped down for road use, and loosened to allow it
to slide and give better flex for off-road use.
I
also pulled the axle shafts apart and took out the inner snap-ring inside
the birfield and made 3 "Marlin
Tacks" on the inner splines of the inner shafts to make it easier
to pull the birf apart on the trail if needed.
I've also been looking for a new steering box. I'm retaining the
rear mounted tie rod on the axle, and I think I'll be using an IH Scout
steering box. This is a Saginaw box with the mounting flange on the
sector shaft like the Isuzu box, but it mounts on top of and to the
outside of the frame rail.
The
pitman arm also points forwards so the drag link will be easy to do with
the axle pushed forward. It's very similar to the FJ-80 box, but can
be found from the junkyard for $50 instead of $500 - $1000 for an FJ-80
box (no kidding). There's also a bunch of pitman arms that'll bolt
on so finding one that'll work shouldn't be much of a problem. The
Saginaw boxes are also pretty easy to tap for ram assist steering.
Something that's *very* difficult with the Isuzu box and would require the
precision of a machinist to do successfully.
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Created by: Dan
Houlton
This page was last updated on 14 Apr 2004
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