Flygtenstein

Forests are green because the trees are green, trees are not green because forests are. Buggies have miles of flex. It helps, but it is not the end all.

I would take diff clearance, wheelbase and breakover, in that order. Right now my truck gets held back by crappy steering and low ground clearance. When I hang an axle it will be to get stronger steering and joints. Anyone who tells you to hang an axle purely for travel needs a thump from the Clue by four.

I thought Jeeps were narrower, 3rd Gens are at ~61". Get back to work RCDMF.

I bet Steve's vertical wheel travel is as much as 18 inches. Maybe as little as 12 inches. The thing is, he will likely never break an axle or toast a steering rack again.

joez

Its still only a D44, and its shafts/joints are not made of unobtanium or anything. Yeah, if he put alloy shafts in it he wouldnt break anything probobally ever, but stock-strength parts are still plenty breakable.

There is a difference between trail flex and being a ramp champ. Most buggy's you see are still putting pressure on the tires all the way till they hit the limiting straps, they have the potential to travel a lot more, but there is no point. A tire drooped past the point that any pressure/weight is applied is useless. You dont need gobs of useless wheel travel, there is a point when it becomes "just for show". I would think that is what they are getting at.

sschaefer3

You realize I have a 2.7 liter 4Banger right. Not a power house by anymeans.

Why aren't you at the levy?

joez

Yes, i do. But its being talked about like its unbreakable, all im saying is that you can, and probobally will at some point, break parts.

bamachem

wow, a "let's bash Steve" party...



This sums it up for me as well. Steve's usually very short with responses and comes across as a jerk on the net and sometimes with a "greater than thou" attitude. Talk to him and you'll realize that you couldn't be any more wrong. He's actually a very nice an knowledgable person who is giving his personal time to answer questions for people he doen't know and will probally never meet. I've talked to him quite a bit over the last 6 months about all the tundra coil stuff, and he's never once been rude or had an attitude with me. In contrary, he's been very inquisitive (i.e. wanted to LEARN about what I had done) and was very helpful in keeping me from going down the same paths he'd already tried and discounted (i.e. openly sharing his knowledge base). Doing that helped US come up with the overall Tundra Coil Package as it exists now.

For those of you who've met Steve and don't get along w/ him, maybe you should be looking at your own issues if you can't deal with somebody who might approach things differently than you would. I for one find that refreshing while others may find that offensive only because they feel either intimidated or threatened by his personality.

sschaefer3

Hey, here's a great idea. Lets talk about a Dana 44 on a 3rd Gen.

We can even start what is called a "new post" and talk about all of the other things in the world.

Nothing new is going to happed on the swap, it drives fine it rides good. I need to come up with a new steering shaft, we're working on it. Take some time off and tune back in after a week or two has past. We can talk about a Dana 44 on a 3rd Gen.

Isn't that really what this post is all about?

XXX OOO

Flygtenstein

For brevity...

IFS wheeling total, one dead CV from excessive droop. One and a half dead BJ's from overal abuse. I have wheeled with Steve in 3 states and he is not a throttle jockey. This will make it 95% bullet proof for him.

Stock axles, for Steve, are pretty likely unbreakable, as I said. CTM's and Warns, in this application, will likely last Steve a lifetime.

Steve is a prick, he is just nicer about it in person.

Steve did this for strength and simplicity, any gained travel is gravy.

rockota

this thread need more pics...

Robinhood150

This thread has some pretty good tech so we'd like to keep it available to the membership here. However, it got off topic pretty quickly toward the end so the thread has been locked. Steve will be submitting update reports and pictures as they become available.

Robinhood150

An update from Steve:





Here are the Toyota sliding steering shafts I have obtained, all of these
vehicles used these drive shaft style steering shafts and did not use the
rag joint. These sliding shaft are a much higher end was of doing the same
thing the rag joint did.

Top tow are from an 1988-1990 FJ-62, The FJ-60 does not have a shaft like
this. These long sliders have to come from 62's. The lower shaft is from a
1980 Toyota 4X4 mini pickup. Originally they used sliding shaft and then in
84 switched to the rag joints. So if you have a 84-85 a hit tip would be to
upgrade your steering to the older more expensive to make style. There was
a boot on the 1980 shaft but after 25 years in the desert it was shot. The
62 shaft with the boot is 10 years newer and cam from Colorado.



Here is a shot from this Wednesday. For all of you that are worried about
the shackle angle, after 1 week of street driving the driver side is
straight up and down and the passengers side is almost there. I'm not going
to worry about it since the thing has yet to even see a trail.

Robinhood150

Update from Schaefer:

1999 4Runner Dana 44 SA Conversion and Rear Leaf Conversion - Pics and Writeup

Write up and Pics:

http://www.sonoransteel.com/Dana44/index.htm

Parts list:

http://www.sonoransteel.com/SA_Parts.html