Ed's Baja Bug build.

[Ol'fogasaurus]

I'd be concerned about the "keep your A-bows on the ta-bo" meaning the springs sitting so close to the setee! Are you going to provide arm restraints? I'd be concerned that the rider leaves a mess of walnut shells on the floor from using the springs to crack them.

[no1clyde]

Lee the back is not a seat but just room for camping gear, no one will be back there. I still am going to be covering the springs, I just have not gotten to that yet. Right now I am just getting it ready for this 900 mile trip and will go back to real work on the car this winter. I have been driving it quite a bit for testing though and it is getting more comfortable all the time

Ed

[Ol'fogasaurus]

Ed, I was just trying to make a funny. Sorry 'bout that.

Lee

[no1clyde]

No problem Lee . I did like the cracking of the walnuts though, I never would have thought of that You know if you could work around the diagonal back there it would be a nice place to sit

Ed

[no1clyde]

Well my car did awesome on the EBA and did 968 miles and while I did weld up one crack in Yerington and have one more to fix here I did not have to put a wrench on it Also I jumped it on one cattle guard farther than I have ever flown a car before

Ed

[no1clyde]

Well after the EBA I have been working on fixing the front arms that got some small cracks in the shock mounts when I bottomed it out with Nate with me. It was a very hard hit and my fault for pushing on to fast on a road I have never been on before. With all that and seeing that I will be beating the car harder and harder I have made the decision to move on from my motorcycle shocks, they have done a awesome job but I have passed their abilities. After I got home I ordered some 10" travel Fox shocks and have been trying to figure out how I will use them. I have some ideas that are a little different and I did discuss them with Dusty in Bodie and I have started on the change so there will be more to come.

Ed

[Ol'fogasaurus]

Good idea Ed. The distruction of shock towers and the shocks is something I was also thinking about last night.

[no1clyde]

Lee my shock towers and shocks took everything fine but lower arm mounts I made flexed just enough to crack but they would have made the trip without welding in Yerington. My next setup will be far more progressive in the shock action and also will have the second spring rate at the end of the travel.

I have been watching your ball joint beam work and I like what you have done to your shock towers It is good we have these hobbies to keep us thinking and moving and not just setting around getting older

Ed

[Ol'fogasaurus]

Lee my shock towers and shocks took everything fine but lower arm mounts I made flexed just enough to crack but they would have made the trip without welding in Yerington. Ed

What I have seen in the K&L beams is the shock (not motorcycle shocks as I don't know lengths and innards) but with stock/OEM shocks when they hit a hard bump the hard compression will knock the stock bump stops completely off or at least loosen it up enough that it dangles. Then, because the stop is gone, the shocks bottom out and put a hell of a load on the top of the shock tower where the bolt goes through. The load is enough to cause the shock bolt to cause the top of the shock tower to bend over enough for the shock tower to crease just below the bolt and fold over destroying the shock tower.

As a matter of fact, I have one of those beams here but the shock tower had been cut off. It was on the first rail my oldest stepson bought. I took some video (long lost I think) of him coming off a hill and going through the whoops at the transition of the dune and the flat area. It shows just what the torsion springs do w/o the shocks/dampeners on the beam. The front end sure bounced a lot and for much longer than one would think.

Its funny: you see guys trailer in a new (to them anyway) rail, pay camping fees, unload the rail (all excited); be gone about an hour then come back in (dejected) with a/the shock tower destroyed, leave the camping area and the rail soon comes up on Craig's List for sale. Usually it is the first jump they try that does it. Seen that happen more than a couple of times.

W/ball-joint beams they seem to be a bit more careful but the lack of suspension travel gets to them quickly and they come up for sale cheap (after long stays on Craig's list) too. Since the BJ beams don't have stops the shock towers can get loaded quite often. Even with hook and pin stops added if they upgrade their shocks (better internally valved) the shock tower is still going to get flexed hence the continued addition of the "strong back". One of the reasons I am doing the build and asking for input is to help others and get a good build for myself.

Lee

[no1clyde]

You are doing a good job on yours Lee. My beam is home made and the droop and bump are not like VW at all but my tower was so strong that it was not fazed but the mount on my home made arms were but not bad enough to even slow us down. I am just moving on to what will be the last big modification to the car I think. I will be doing other things through the years like a 2.5 Subaru to replace my 2.2 Subaru and things like that but I am thinking this will be the last change of the original build.

Ed

[no1clyde]

Lee this is my mock up of what I am building.



In this pic I have 6 holes in the tower and 6 holes in the lower arm so I can work out the best position for the shock while cycling the shock. It is sort of like a 12" travel class 5 unlimited front suspension and kept under my finders. It would not fit under the finders with out the 3" body lift though. I am not changing my travel or ride height with this just the shock action.

Ed

[Ol'fogasaurus]

The mount looks pretty good. It looks like you took some care in its design.

I'm just not sure about the motorcycle shocks as I know they are different that auto shocks in many ways. The last three 'cycles I owned was in some time in the '62 to '64 year range; a '36 Harley, a '48 Harley and a early '60s 55cc Honda. Not one of those trail only POSs but the dual purpose bike that was only a bit better then a scooter. I had got into an accident while I was in CA (long sad story) and was told by the Vets in emergency that my bike days were over due to the damage done to me. Luckily the borrowed bike wasn't damaged and had "crash bars" on it which protected me a lot.

[no1clyde]

These are 10" travel Fox shocks, my motorcycle shocks were off of a 1999 KX 250 that I revalved and resprug and they work very well as anyone how rode in the car would tell you but I just could not get the bottoming control out of them I want. I have put a lot of thought into these new mounts and this setup. I am looking forward to testing this out

Ed

[dustymojave]

Modern dirt bike shocks (since the late 70s) are very similar to Fox, King or other serious re-buildable offroad car shocks. They're a lot different from street shocks.

Lee, one of the problems with many newbies around offroading is that they spend a few to many thousands of dollars on a new toy, then think they can go out the 1st time and drive it like they're in a video game or what they see on TV or YouTube. Then reality strikes. People get real disappointed when they learn they aren't Evel Knievel or Travis Pastrana. It didn't used to be so bad in the 50s through the 70s. Then people were afraid to go too fast and it took quite a leap of faith to go fast enough to fly from the top of one whoop to land on top of the next and survive. Suspension didn't allow a whole lot of that then. But I learned to do it on my 1970 Ossa Stiletto 250 with 4.5" of rear travel. Now, knuckleheads think anybody can do it no sweat.

BTW...Panhead Harleys with crash bars never were offroad vehicles.

[TimS]

Also I jumped it on one cattle guard farther than I have ever flown a car before

Ed

I'm glad Nate was the one to experience this. He tells the story well, and I didn't have to almost die.

Looks like an engineering marvel, Ed. You are just a hibachi away from awesomeness.