Intender build

picked up the rear axle today on the way home from windrock. He also hooked me up with a 100% duty cycle viar pump and a regulator. Now I just need more time and money so I can all this stuff installed.

Hows it been going man long time no talk? You going to WENT this year?

I was thinking the same thing! WHERE YOU ATTTT??

Wow, been busy the last few months. Unfortunately I will not be going to WENT this year. The wife wasnt too happy with the idea of me leaving her with a 4 year old and a baby while I went to play in the woods. I tried to work it out so I could maybe come just friday and saturday, but too many things are in the way of it happening this year. I have been busy remodeling my old house to try and get it sold, and I have a 3 month old that takes up a lot of my time. Good news is we are closing on the house a week from today, so I dont have to spend any more time or money on it. The bad new is the truck is still not in proper running condition, much less in any kind of shape to wheel it. The house I am living in now has no where to work on the truck at. I tried working on it in the gravel driveway, but I had issues with the truck trying to fall off the jack stands when the boards I had the stands on would start sinking onto the gravel. Decided it wasnt worth dying for to try and work on it now. I could drive up the road and use my brother in laws garage, but it needs to be cleaned out before anything can go in there and neither of us have had time to work on that. And on top of everything else since our house sold fast, we are going to start building our new house in November, but with that comes making a 20% down payment on the house loan, which basically means no extra money for anything fun till we get that finished. I have also had some health issues in the last month or so that we are waiting on the bill for, and who knows how much I will end up owing for that.

Hopefully life will slow down a little and I can start posting some, or at least use my computer more often. This is the first time I have turned on my computer in about 2 months.

Intender said:

Wow, been busy the last few months. Unfortunately I will not be going to WENT this year. The wife wasnt too happy with the idea of me leaving her with a 4 year old and a baby while I went to play in the woods. I tried to work it out so I could maybe come just friday and saturday, but too many things are in the way of it happening this year. I have been busy remodeling my old house to try and get it sold, and I have a 3 month old that takes up a lot of my time. Good news is we are closing on the house a week from today, so I dont have to spend any more time or money on it. The bad new is the truck is still not in proper running condition, much less in any kind of shape to wheel it. The house I am living in now has no where to work on the truck at. I tried working on it in the gravel driveway, but I had issues with the truck trying to fall off the jack stands when the boards I had the stands on would start sinking onto the gravel. Decided it wasnt worth dying for to try and work on it now. I could drive up the road and use my brother in laws garage, but it needs to be cleaned out before anything can go in there and neither of us have had time to work on that. And on top of everything else since our house sold fast, we are going to start building our new house in November, but with that comes making a 20% down payment on the house loan, which basically means no extra money for anything fun till we get that finished. I have also had some health issues in the last month or so that we are waiting on the bill for, and who knows how much I will end up owing for that.

Hopefully life will slow down a little and I can start posting some, or at least use my computer more often. This is the first time I have turned on my computer in about 2 months.

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WOw man...hope everything works out for you and your X getting back into tip top health.

I hate that, man. Good luck getting everything straightened out! Hope to see you on the trails soon

My personal health is just kind of a game of wait and see. I have had a few times in the last 6 months, and a hand full of times since I was about 20 (35 now) where I would get a rapid irregular heartbeat that last for about 15 minutes, and I almost pass out and end up having a headache for a couple days after. I would have shorter episodes that only lasted a few seconds or so a couple of times a week on a regular basis. I saw a cardiologists years ago after the first couple times it happened and they basically told me I was too young to have heart problems and it was probably anxiety. After that I just ingored it because it was usually just kind of a light headed feeling and it only lasted a few seconds, but a couple months ago I had my kids in the car and it started happening and my face and tongue went numb and I started getting tunnel vision with things going black. Luckily I never went all the way out, and managed to pull of the side of the road until it passed, but it scared me enough to go back to the cardiologist. ekg was normal, blood work was good, echo of the heart was good. I have a slowish heartbeat, but I have always had a slower than average heartbeat, so the doc ruled that out. He ended up having an implantable heart monitor put in to try and catch it the next time it happens. The battery lasts for about 3 years so hopefully they will figure out whats going on in that amount of time. I have cut out caffeine, and pretty much anything else that can be a stimulant and that has helped a lot with the day to day stuff. I am just afraid to see the hospital bill for all this stuff when I get it.

As for the truck, hopefully I will be able to get my truck running in the next couple of months. I was hoping to have my truck going by now and have my arb and lokka installed, but things just dont always work out as planned. the guy I am planning on buying from front diff from had a baby a week before me so I know he probably hasnt had much time to start tearing his truck apart to get it out, and as much as I would love to get it from him tomorrow so I could have it in hand, it wouldnt do me any good other than just sitting around until I get somewhere to work on my truck. Hopefully I can get all that worked out so I can get my lockers installed before winter hits.

I went out the other day and cleaned a few bird nests out of my grill, and a had two rats nests in my engine bay that I had to clean up. It hadnt moved since april, and the battery was completely dead. I charged the battery and cranked the truck and left it running and went back out a few hours later and it was dead. I cranked it and it started back up and ran fine so I left and went back to doing other stuff and checked a while later and it was dead. after the third time it died I decided to get in the truck and sit in it to wait on it to die instead of going back in the house, and realized it was completely out of gas. that was a face palm moment. I had just leaned in the truck the other times and cranked it and walked away so I never saw the gas gauge. and of course all my gas cans are still at the other house so I need to get one so I can fill it up.

no good on the heart issues. Sounds like what my Dad has almost...atrial fibulation, but he has an irregularly fast hart beat. Hope you get it figure out. I know he had to cut out all caffeine and is on blood thinners constantly.

As much fun as trucks are...real life has to come first. It's the nature of the game.

Ya, the doc said he thinks from what I described its either afib, or pvc's. They talked about putting a holter monitor on me, but he said if the times it happens more often only last a few seconds it wouldnt pick up enough data to diagnose anything. they need to catch one of the longer events to really figure it out, but since I have only had maybe 8 of those in 15 years the odds of catching one without the implant would be next to zero. And the cost of the hospital bills isnt going to hurt us, its just that I hate spending money on medical stuff. . I have been type 1 diabetic for 15 years, and it still pisses me off every month when I go get my insulin and supplies for my insulin pump. I had the same reaction the other day when I went to get the registration for all 3 of our cars and they reminded me that you have to pay your property taxes with your registration now. That was $300 I wasnt expecting to pay. When stuff like that happens in my mind I am always like, I could buy a new tv or skids plates for what I spend every 6 months or so in medical bills. Fortunately since I spend so much on my diabetic supplies, by this time of year I have already met my deductible on my insurance so that should keep it from making me too upset when I get the bill.

Take care of yourself and the family. The truck can wait because it will always be around. Family and life first then trucking. Hope you get better.

Well I finally talked to one of my friends that lives about 20 minutes from me and he made a spot for my truck in his garage, so I am getting ready to try and get my truck running and drive to his house so I can work on it some this morning. if all goes well today I will take it thursday and get my alignment and inspection done.

Sweet!

no real progress today. realized it was really unsafe to continue working on my truck using stacks of 2x6's to make my jack stands tall enough to keep my truck off the ground when one of them split right after I put weight on it. Second times thats happened, but this time I called it quits and ordered a set of 12 ton stands from northern tool. should be able to pick them up in a couple days.

so this happened today


didnt finish it up, went to put the ring gear back on and realized I didnt have any thread lock. by then it was 10PM, about 35 degrees so I didnt even bother to look around my buddies shop to see if he had any. One thing I did notice is that I had some water in my front diff. looked almost like it might have been condensation as it was mostly just water droplets inside, but I am going to redo the breather hose for the front just to be safe. tomorrow I will try and get it done.

I got the front diff reassembled tonight, but didnt put it back in yet. I pulled the upper ball joints and upper control arms off to replace the upper ball joints and upper control arm bushings. One of the upper ball joints popped out with one good whack with a hammer, but the other one took me about an hour to get out. sanded down the upper control arms and got a couple of coats of paint on one of them and primered the other one. If the wife gets home early enough tomorrow, I should get it put back together.

Nice! Can't wait to see that thing in action again

Well the cool humid weather isnt helping my uca dry any faster. Went out to reassemble it all and stil had tacky paint. So that pretty much put meat a stand still. I cleaned up the uca mounts and painted over a bit of rust I found here and there. Did a bit of inspecting and measuring for my next step to relocate the lower shock tabs onto the axle. Maybe Saturday will be more productive.

Well this weeks progress included

Front end reassembled, and lokka is functioning properly.
worked on aligning it a bit so I can take it to get a proper alignment done. still seems off a lot though
New shock tabs welded on the to rear axle to get more flex from revolvers.
realized drive shaft is now hitting gas tank cross member
ordered limiting straps to keep from destroying drive shaft
started ordering the rest of the parts I need to finish my on board air setup so that its all ready to go whenever I get my arb third member installed.

Edit
Oh, also picked up some used warn manual hubs. Got them all cleaned up and ready to put on.

Little flex from the new setup




I think I could get an inch or so more but thats about it without hitting the drive shaft

That's awesome! Now if you can make the front end flex like that... Then you'll be in business!

Really stretching some legs there.. I think revolvers are on the to do list..

Forgot to say that when I swapped out my hubs that the drivers side auto hub came out in pieces, so I guess its a good thing I bought those manual hubs.

Hopefully I will get to test out the revolvers this weekend.

I call riding behind you haha

You just want a front row seat to my axle ripping itself in half on my cross member.

Hopefully not! But if it has to happen... I wanna see it live, first person haha

You should be able to get a lot more rear travel with the Revolvers, w/o hitting the shaft on the cross member. I didn't need to air hammer out a gulley in the cross member until it dropped maybe another coupla inches than that.






The leaf packs tend to not flex evenly though, so one is probably binding/fanning differently...which shifts the shaft towards the gas tank, etc.

The binding/not fanning pack is also probably one of your droop limiting factors.



This is almost all the way drooped, you can see the remaining Revolver Angle, and the drive shaft is still clear of the cross member. I preferred to make a gulley in the cross member than to rob myself of some of the hard fought wheel travel with a strap.

Also notice the leaf fanning that allows the added travel....I took off and/or loosened strategic leaf clamps to allow the fuller droop w/o loosing the pack, etc.












My biggest headache was the math to get a shock that could get long enough to allow the droop while ALSO getting short enough to allow full stuffage. By making the shock a hypotenuse in the equation, I could get maximum travel out of it. (Thanks to the Scarecrow)

Before I had done all that, I was over compressing shocks and breaking mounts off, (Darlington's) etc.

I was told to STAY AWAY from using revolver shackles due to them having the ability to flip the other way. Is this true?? People have had bad experiences.

xterraminator said:

I was told to STAY AWAY from using revolver shackles due to them having the ability to flip the other way. Is this true?? People have had bad experiences.

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No, those are myths.

Essentially, the physics of how they work confuses people. They talk about "unloading" and things that indicate that they get how they don't flip with coils, but don't get the same physics with revolvers. Part of it was the dogma spouted about revolvers when they first came out, also from those who didn't understand how they worked, and that was just parroted by others until it became "a fact", the way tomatoes were poisonous became a fact, etc. (If everyone says its true, it must be true)

A lot of people (Its human nature) also have a tendency to ascribe cause and effect relationships to things that happen in sequence. For example, "I wore these socks when the Mets won the series, so, I always wear them for games now", or, "I switched to synthetic oil and then my timing belt snapped, so I only use dino juice oils now", or, "I added revolver shackles and then flipped over at Moab, so I went back to regular shackles", and so forth.

People historically convince themselves of these sequences and rationalize what they need to to preserve the relationship. Its human nature, and, it should be expected.




In real life, they work EXACTLY like regular shackles that are simply longer than normal when needed. They don't "flip", they unfold when the axle's weight pulls them down, and then swing in, exactly like a normal shackle does.
There is no "other way" they can "flip", etc. Just like a regular shackle, they swing in/out to allow the leaf pack to bow/droop...they just allow it to droop further.

If you brake, or are going down a steep slope, etc, they work exactly like regular shackles. When tested on an RTI ramp with a scale, they tire weighting for revolvers was better than with regular shackles....with more weight on the drooped tire with revolvers for better traction.

The main thing that confuses people is the way a live axle works, in that there is leverage exerted on the drooped side by the raising of the stuffed side. Too many THINK that there's no weight pushing down the tire unless there's a spring, etc, forcing it down on the drooped side. In reality, by the time a coil is drooped, there's almost no down force being exerted at all by the drooped side's coil...its uncoiled. By the time a leaf pack is drooped, its actually PULLING the axle back UP rather than pushing it down.

So the drooped side's tire weighting for a coil sprung live axle is similar to a revolvered live axle, until the revolver is fully unfolded and acts as a regular shackle. This is in fact why a coil sprung live axle works better off road...more downforce on the drooped tire w/o the leaf pack pulling up/fighting it.

The revolver is simply a way for a leaf packed rig to get closer to that performance.

I'm having flashback nightmares of that revolver shackle thread. They're fine, use them. End of story.

Prime said:

I'm having flashback nightmares of that revolver shackle thread. They're fine, use them. End of story.

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Amen Brother

Tj, my current droop is limited by my shock. You have to remember that i am still running the shocks for a 3 inch lift. They only opened about 2 inches before i moved them up to the axle.

If I flex like I did in the pic where one rear wheel is stuffed and the other is drooped to the shocks limit I dont make any contact with the drive shaft. Its when I get into situations where the rear suspension is unloading is where I am afriad of damaging the drive shaft. If I lift the rear of the truck up so unload the suspension I start to hit the cross member with an inch or so left to droop.

Prime said:

I'm having flashback nightmares of that revolver shackle thread. They're fine, use them. End of story.

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Amen Brother...LOL


Looking good Intender!

Passed inspection and got an alignment. On my way now to get my truck and start loading some gear for ure.

Intender said:

Passed inspection and got an alignment. On my way now to get my truck and start loading some gear for ure.

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You a little late on inspection? Wake county was due in May!

I have a tie rod adjuster for you!

County I live in you just have to get it before you can get your registraction and sticker. So if your tags expire in November thats when your inspection is due. Granted mine was due in September but the truck wasnt running then.

haha...well good...glad you weren't riding dirty!

Intender said:

Tj, my current droop is limited by my shock. You have to remember that i am still running the shocks for a 3 inch lift. They only opened about 2 inches before i moved them up to the axle.

If I flex like I did in the pic where one rear wheel is stuffed and the other is drooped to the shocks limit I dont make any contact with the drive shaft. Its when I get into situations where the rear suspension is unloading is where I am afriad of damaging the drive shaft. If I lift the rear of the truck up so unload the suspension I start to hit the cross member with an inch or so left to droop.

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I guess its time to gulley the cross member then.



And get longer shocks that still compress short enough. (And/or move the shock mount points enough to make the shocks work, etc...)

First wheeling trip with the lokka and new shock setup went really well. Thought I was going to flip at one point but got through it. Steering with the lokka is a pain.

Went this morning and picked up a used power steering gear box two power steering pumps and some power steering hoses from a guy from NOAS. Need to rebuild the gear box (gave me the kit with it) and one of the power steering pumps and then im going to mod one of the pumps for higher psi and flow to help with steering the front lokka in the rocks.

I am also going to box my pitman arm and idler arm pretty soon. The steering box came with a pitman arm on it so that gives me something to practice welding on so I dont screw it up to bad.

Why not just gut one of the power steering pumps and run it as a dummy box on the passenger side in place of the idler arm? Then you don't need to try and box the idler arm... Pitman arms are plenty strong

Not sure how I would get a stock xterra box to bolt up on the passenger side but I guess I could look into it eventually if needed. I have the steel laying around for boxing the idler arm. So I will just do that first and see how it goes.