Greetings from me and LoBird

Man, I just looked at some of your pictures. Is that ride height legal? Utah must be flat. Do you have skid plates? Is it as rough as those mini-trucks used to be?

 

It's fully adjustable, got a hydro set up front and rear, but I ran accumulators on the pumps so it rides big and floaty like it originally did. Both pumps are seperate so no lines running under the unibody. One under the hood and one in the rear facing passengers foot area. Initially wanted air ride but up front the control arms are too narrow and too close together to accomodate them. So when I encounter a speed bump or steep driveway I just lift up her skirts!

Oh yeah PS: Utah is not flat at all...ha ha ha!

 

If you don't mind me asking, was that expensive? Technical?

 

You can sort of see the flexibility of dewsat's suspension from his pix....

 

Don't mind at all, as far as expense wise the two pumps, 4 rams, lines, one battery (the front pump runs off the cars battery) accumulators, and misc. parts I would say all totalled $1550.00. The technical aspects are a bit trickier, I did all the work myself and drew from a good 20 plus years of building mini's. The rams are pretty much in the stock shock positions aside from the rear which required a change of geometry after experiencing some binding issues from axle sway. The axle sway was fairly easily corrected by the Toyota Tundra overloads. A panard bar was also added from a 69 chevy pickup, had to shorten it about 6" and build attach points on either end but that was fairly simple too. The accumulators act like shocks on steroids for the most part but make it possible not to have an under coil spring design that you see all the "hoppers" with. It's easy on the suspension parts and like I mentioned the ride is superior in every way. In front the bottom mount pretty much the same as the stock shock except beefed up with a 1/2" case hardened bolt, and then the factory torsion bars were completely removed, on the top side the upper control arm was cut out with a plazma cutter just big enough to stop on the rams collar. Another hole was cut in the inner fender upper control arm access panel to accomodate the top of the ram. In the end the only thing visible under the hood were the hydraulic lines and of course the big chrome pump mounted front right corner. My engine pic shows it pretty well as well as the black accumulator mounted right on the pump itself.

When the front is dumped out while driving it produces quite a fireworks show, but not from the undercarrige scraping but from two ball hitches mounted upside down that contact the road without much friction and produce a beautiful shower of blue sparks...just for fun.

 

Thanks Fox! Very good visual! Car goes up...car goes down...car goes up...car goes down.

 

I used to do that a lot.

 

Freaks people out a little...I love it!

 

Ok now I get it! Makes sense. I also did not see the picture with the system aired up. Very nice. Add this to my plans.

 

If you have other questions as you move along I will be glad to help if I can.

 

Thanks a ton. I am sure I will have multiple questions.

 

k...i had to say to you..
Ive got a few falcon wagons....so...birds of a feather...bla bla

if you ever have any questions man...just fire away

 

What's up REV! Thanks for the greeting. I am excited to be here and look forward to all of the cool wagons. I am still stumbling around the site checking out what is going on. I love it!