I bought one and I'm still not cool. Oh well.

 

Forget the SAS for now. I think you really need to get a front locker and wheel the hard trails before considering a SAS. If you get a SAS, and get on some tough trails before your ready, you could end up in trouble. I'd say get the experience of using a front locker and the type of trails that require a front locker, before just jumping into a SAS unit.


And as sombody pointed out earlier, the RD90 ARB units are much stronger and there will definitly be a line of folks waiting for that locker when you are done.



I think If you show up at an event with a SAS, its implied that you run the hard trails, and lead the way for the tough scary stuff. Heck, Schaefer showed us all how to do Rock Chucker in Moab. Of course, I couldn't let him be the only 4Runner to have the victory.
I'm not saying your inexperienced, but I would say, get to know your rig well with the front locker and the type of trails you want to do, before you step up to the next stage. You'll be surprised what a dialed in IFS setup can do. Adrain rode with me in Moab, and can tell you about how well the IFS can do.

 

Hey Steve, how do you like your pro-comp lift? I'm also looking at the Fabtech and tuff country ones. How much lift in the front do you have now?

Chris

 

I'm enjoying it. I had to really tighten up the Concentric alignement bolts to keep them from moving around, but it has been a very nice soft ride. I'm guessing (I don't know what the original setup height was) that I have around 5.5" of suspension lift in the front, plus a 1" Roger Brown Body Lift. I did'nt want to crank the adjustable Downey coil-overs too much because I wanted to have a nice soft ride, which I do have.

The Rough Country struts have a very cool spherical ball at the bottom that will last much longer than the rubber bushing, plus its rebuildable.

 

Yeah, I'm pretty much leaning towards the Tuff Country one, because it offers 5" of lift, and it has no spacers, because it's all one solid piece.

I've heard that the alignment on some of the other makes can get out of whack pretty easily, but I'm not sure. I would really like about 3-4" of lift using a new subframe, and then utilize some of the lift components I already have in conjunction with it. But, since the lowest I've found is 5", I'll probably just keep the top out extender in, and remove the cornfed spacers, leaving me at roughly 6" suspension lift and 1" body lift. I still haven't figured out if I'm going to do a 3-link or leaf spring setup for the rear yet, but I'm leaning towards a 3-link if I can get the amount of travel I'm looking for.

Chris

 

I went out yesterday to meet up with a few TTORA members to go wheelin up in Big Bear area. Needless to say they never showed, so I ended up hooking up with a Bronco group of 45 rigs that was having their Jambo of sorts. There was some really fun trails and even the most built Bronco of the group, was having a more difficult time than me climbing over the rocks. The difference in IFS and SA is very simple, SA flexes and IFS has travel. Now your going "What?" IFS suspension technically doesn't flex, because of the way a solid axle is, when it flexes the weight transfer is pushing equally on both tires, where IFS isn't. That's why SA works better on the rocks and IFS is better for the high speed Desert stuff. Since most of us use our rigs as DD's, then travel to and from the trails, trying to make them into a Hardcore rock crawler is out of the question. Just build a buggy and trailer it out.

So now here's the big delima, how far should you upgrade? Personally going SAS is a waste, except for the inital BLING factor of doing the swap and everyone drooling over it on the internet, but out on the trails I get more complememts with my IFS, mostly from the guys with SA's that are surprised how well my rig works. Now if you have the need to go larger than 35's, then by all means SAS is the only way to go, but then you'll need to do some major body work to clear them tires, unless your gonna lift it up, then you lose your ability to side hill.

The biggest problems I see in our 4runners, is the 2 crossmembers and fuel tank, robbing us of much needed breakover clearance. We are all limited at the rear because of the diff, but in the front it's a totally different story. You can make the IFS work extremely well and in some cases better than a SA. Case in point, out in Hungry Valley's 4x4 practice course, they have a rock climbing section, my rig negotiated the run, easier and better than the 2 SA PU's that did it after me. We all have 35's, so that being equal, why did I do better? Two reasons, the first being I have a crawlbox, so therefore much greater control and the second, the Total Chaos Long Tavel lower a-arms have a plate underneath that act like skids and with a full skidplates under the driveline, getting hung up on rocks never happens, the front simply slides over them, whereas the SA trucks, kept getting hung up on their front diffs.

The reason SA rigs perform better, initally is because of breakover clearance, but when it comes to driving sideways on a slope with a rig like Breezy's, I guarrantee he couldn't follow me. The major incentive of doing a SAS is for strength, but if your careful and know the limits of the IFS, you can make it hold up just fine. I broke a right front axle going up sledgehammer, this could have been avoided, I felt the strain in my steering and told my spotter, but he thought that it would make it, so I listen to him. In a way I didn't mind breaking, because now I know exactly how much stress it'll take. In the future, my axle breakages will most likely be due to wear and not abuse.

I am not a big fan of the fabtech type lift system, all it does is increase your chances of rolling over, if had to choose between the two, I'd go SAS.

 

Some good points for sure Bruce! I'm just wanting to be higher up so I can clear the bigger rocks. I agree about the crossmembers and gas tank being a major problem with out rigs, and we both alread have plans to fix that as we've discussed before. I'm a bit premature talking about the Tuff Country kit for adding this height, because if needed, it will be one of the last things I do to my rig. I just want to be able to run every trail at Tellico and Windrock, and right now ground clearance is my main obstacle.

Chris

 

There was a time that 33's was as large as you needed to go, even now 35's are almost too small. The trails keep getting rutted out by the rigs with larger and larger tires, soon you'll need 44's to go wheelin

 

i think that 11.25 was just a measure of droop, after looking at that picture with that caption i don't think he was measuring compression with that.

 

I found a couple of axles: should I go with the DANA or the Toyota
and what do I need to look for? thanks

Dana 44 front from a Wagoneer, drive drop, complete locking hub to locking hub disc & drag NO VAC 307 ratio $125

Toy axles front and rear unknown year 410's welded rear, complete $100

 

You'll have more work with a TOY axle because the diff is on the wrong side.

That D44 sounds like pretty damn good deal! I'd rebuild it either way...but $125 is pretty good...I paid like $200 for mine

 

if you actually considered the Toyota 8" front axle, you havent been doing your homework.

 

Ryan's saying the Toy axle is the wrong side drop.

 

Don't worry all of you guys have given me a lot to think about. So I'm just going to chew it over for a few weeks before I decide to do something.

I'm still in the "deciding what to do" phase. Then theres the "sit down and read through the pages and pages of what others have done" phase. I just happened to run into a guy with some parts for cheap. So I decided I would ask, and not let a potential good oppurtunity pass.

 

Stock Mini Toy front is near the worst possible option. At this point, any stock Toy axle would really make for a tough install.

Do some more homework and chew on some different stuff.

 

Tundra IFS.

 

I'd follow......

 

what are you trying to say? Does anyone know how similar the front mounts are for the control arms between the tundra/tacoma/4runner? I have always kinda wandered that because it seems that the added width of the tundra is all in the control arms and that the frame widths should be similar between the three.

 

I think if he wants to stand out, a more logical solution would be a Total Chaos "real live" long travel IFS.

It uses Tundra front axles. If I had 5 Grand to burn I'd get one, but so far I have been able to wheel all the places I have wanted to with just the ATS arms & Frankenstein shocks.

In additon it DOES NOT kill the resale value of the vehicle. Bruce and Myself clearly showed that it's crawler (ultimate), gears and lockers that matter NOT your front axle on Aftershock. There were 20 vehicles, of that 20, 4 were IFS. 10 did not make it past depreciation knob out of fear or break downs, Of the 10 that ran the entire trail, the 4 IFS trucks were still in the pack. That means that out of 16 SA vehicles only 6 of the 10 made it. Out of 4 IFS vehilces 4 made it.

Like I said: Call Marlin. Get the Ultimate. For a 2002 you'll have to buy the older 2000 stlye auto tranny.

*** Here is some food for thought on an SAS, what are you going to do about the ABS? Even Front Range Fab does not have that one figured out yet. ***

 

Do the Tacos that getting SASed have 4 wheel ABS? If so then what did they do? Worse case scenario it would be just rear ABS like the 2nd gen runners.

Even if I do the long travel kits I would still have to watch the lines I took so that I don't break a CV right. You can do the same trails, you just have to be careful. Out of those 16 trucks that didn't make it, what was the drivers experience, also their willingness to accept body damage as a cost of this sport? I'll be the first in line to tell you I don't have much experience, I go one one or two runs a month, and thats about it.

Resale value is a nonissue here ... I'm not looking to sell

lots of reading to do still ... :pat: