My Ultimate HP 60 Build

this build isn't as ultimate as I expected
 
2.5* doesn't seem like an awful lot of caster to me...

I'd probably shoot for twice that amount if you're going to be driving it on the street at all.

I forget, are you running lockouts or going to flanges?

According to a friend, it depends on the tire size.

Richard, can you elaborate? I have had a few brews and can only think of it in terms of rake on a bicycle :doh:
 
I've run as little as 3* and it was OK, fine on the street. I think 5* is what to short for, handles well and not too hard to steer off road. Stock is 7*, but a few degrees less works fine. I think 3* would be a minimum......
 
According to a friend, it depends on the tire size.

Richard, can you elaborate? I have had a few brews and can only think of it in terms of rake on a bicycle :doh:


since when does cracker drink? lol.
 
Few things I can add.

2.5 caster is not enough. Should drive nice at slower speeds, but touchy on the highway. I am at 6 now. The way mine is set up now, I can take my hands of the wheel for miles if the road is straight.

I have broke 3 shafts on one detroit, 1 on another. No broken parts. The first two times I took it apart to check, After that, I didnt bother. All 35 spline stuff in the buggy.

I have beat the front of my xj on 37s pretty hard this summer. No issues from it. All stock 89 shafts. I would not run flanges unless you pinion angle is perfect.

I have a problem with overheating the T-case on the highway with 538s. Anything over 75 burns the fluid. I think drive flanges would make it even worse. More turning parts in the case.

What are you using for a backspace on the wheels? I am full width with h2 wheels. I hit the lower control arms, almost inner fendar/frame, before the factory steering stops. I wanted to narrow it the 3.5 or so, but didnt want to give up the steering.

Make sure that truss is burned in well over the short side. Friend of mine broke the tube out of the housing after cutting it back and welding it like that. One that clayton put togethere.

Have fun.
 
2.5 caster is not enough. Should drive nice at slower speeds, but touchy on the highway. I am at 6 now. The way mine is set up now, I can take my hands of the wheel for miles if the road is straight.

I have beat the front of my xj on 37s pretty hard this summer. No issues from it. All stock 89 shafts. I would not run flanges unless you pinion angle is perfect.

I have a problem with overheating the T-case on the highway with 538s. Anything over 75 burns the fluid. I think drive flanges would make it even worse. More turning parts in the case.

What are you using for a backspace on the wheels? I am full width with h2 wheels. I hit the lower control arms, almost inner fendar/frame, before the factory steering stops. I wanted to narrow it the 3.5 or so, but didnt want to give up the steering.

Make sure that truss is burned in well over the short side. Friend of mine broke the tube out of the housing after cutting it back and welding it like that. One that clayton put togethere.


Thanks Sean, youve got some good info there. Hopefully, id like to try and be in the same boat as you are, youve got a nice setup.

Once i start to mock the axle up under the jeep, i should be able to squeeze a few more degrees outta the caster. this is jsut where i set it up to begin with for now. Having hubs would deffiently help me with this. im still one the fence about them though, if im gunna drop the coin for a nice set of 35 spline warns, i could jsut get some flanges, save a few bucks, and be stronger. i was also thinking of just getting a set of flanges that have the slug eliminater and just swap them at the trail head. for wheels, ill end up with some 8" or 10" wide steelies with 4" of backspacing. even if i clear, i was planning on reworking the inner fenders a little bit.
 
yes. stocks 30 spine stubs. I can break 35 spline stuff at will with krawlers, but I can lay into the go pedal all day with this thing with no worries. I am sure if I tried to wedge the front end, I could break it, but with 37 dot tires its not a worry.

I went on a NE jeep run up to swanzy,NH. Had the front end 3 ft off the ground bouncing around and never had a worry in mind. I feel the weak link in my xj is the 231 t case by far. Unless you do something really odd, you will take out the front output on the t case before a front axle.

And on another note. If you are going to 35 spline. Just run dana 70 stubs. Stock dana spicer and cut them down to fit. I have had much better luck with spicer than yukon. I got yukon inner, outters, and super joints for the front axle in my buggy. broke all of them in the first season. Everything in my buggy is dana spicer now. You would really have to be trying hard, very hard to break a stock shaft on 35s or 37 dot tires. if you went to spicer dana 70 shafts with spicer life series u joints. I would never worry about it.

I beat my buggy all year with no issue with dana spicer rear axles (rear steer). before the last comp, I put in a set of 35 spline yukon stubs( just becasue I had them) and broke one on the first coarse. at idle with low traction. Never again.

And another thing. The front in mine is spooled/welded now. We got 2 inches of snow on slick roads today. I locked in the hubs and took it for a ride today. It drove way, and I mean way better than it did with a detroit in the front. Now if I had hit clear roads or dry roads it would have been different. If that was the case, there would be no reason for 4 wheel drive. On and off the throttle with the front and rear detroit would put you in the woods in you were not holding the wheel tight with two hands.
 
And on another note. If you are going to 35 spline. Just run dana 70 stubs. Stock dana spicer and cut them down to fit. I have had much better luck with spicer than yukon. I got yukon inner, outters, and super joints for the front axle in my buggy. broke all of them in the first season. Everything in my buggy is dana spicer now. You would really have to be trying hard, very hard to break a stock shaft on 35s or 37 dot tires. if you went to spicer dana 70 shafts with spicer life series u joints. I would never worry about it.


And another thing. The front in mine is spooled/welded now. We got 2 inches of snow on slick roads today. I locked in the hubs and took it for a ride today. It drove way, and I mean way better than it did with a detroit in the front.


Hmm, this is some good stuff to know. I just never wanna have to worry about the front end......again.....ever. :puke:Yukon's. I was looking at a set of TEN factory shafts for the front. I'd like to at least get 35 spline outers done the first time around. maybe ill just run some stocker d70 or TEN stubs with the stock inners. Im still on the fence about the whole hubs/spool and flanges/locker thing.
 
I went on a NE jeep run up to swanzy,NH. Had the front end 3 ft off the ground bouncing around and never had a worry in mind. I feel the weak link in my xj is the 231 t case by far. Unless you do something really odd, you will take out the front output on the t case before a front axle.

i love that place, plus its like 15mins from my house. question, did you cut away any at the housing to make room for control arm monts on your 60? and if so how much?
 
I went on a NE jeep run up to swanzy,NH. Had the front end 3 ft off the ground bouncing around and never had a worry in mind. I feel the weak link in my xj is the 231 t case by far. Unless you do something really odd, you will take out the front output on the t case before a front axle.

1310 CV will go before the 231 will in a battle for the weaker link.
 
1310 CV will go before the 231 will in a battle for the weaker link.

Magorly depends on the axle ratio. higher gears, 410 ect are harder on t case and driveshafts. I have a friend that blows off 231 front outputs quite offen in a buggy. 538s blow aparts axle shafts. I have yet to loose a 1310 cv, but have blow apart a few 231s
 
i love that place, plus its like 15mins from my house. question, did you cut away any at the housing to make room for control arm monts on your 60? and if so how much?

I left the housing alone on the xj along with the one in my new buggy. Both with the large balistic joints.
theres enough room to fit the bracket in there and then weld it on the inside of the bracket. Then weld it to the housing and the C just for good measure.
 
Looking back, i probably coulda gotten away just fine with leaving most of the leaf spring mount there and just trimming the top of it a little bit for the truss/coil buckets.
 
Well, work has been pretty busy lately. Unfortunately its hasnt been on the 60 that much. I did cut the truss back off again and changes my angles a little bit. With the truss sitting at 0*, I now have 5* of caster. I'll probably just run the pinion angle at whatever it comes out as. Did a little grinding again and tacked the truss back on. This should be the last time I do. Found some free time and decided to get started on the coil/LCA mounts.



In came the grinder, out came pieces of truss.


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Smoothed out the cuts and made the buckets even with the truss.


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Then made some cardboard templates and got the shape for the LCA mounts figured up. I cut the rough shapes out, welded them all together, and drilled and ground them all to the same shape/fit.


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Made some more templates and tied it all together.


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Threw the RuffStuff cover on cause I wanted it to look cool. Had a slight clearence issue with one of the inside edges hitting the carrier cap on the PS. Nothing a quick flap wheel couldnt solve. I wanna do something kinda cool and unnecessary on the front edge of the coil bucket where it hangs over the front of the truss. Something like some cool gussets to support the front edge or box it in with some triangle pieces for a pointed sorta look.

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A rainy Sunday update, woke up to find a dead sump pump and 6" of water in the basement with everything floating around. After we couldnt find our backup one and a trip to Home Depot, the water line has receded.


Made the upper control arm mount for the PS. Boxed up some 1/4" and added in a piece of 1 3/4" DOM to tie it all together. The mount will be cut into the back of the truss and extend all the way down to the tube. Once the axle is under the jeep, ill set the mount up in the spot i want and burn it all home.

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Next up came the fun stuff, welding the truss and everything up. Colin (MoparManic) came over because he wanted me to get his new Miller 210 DVI up and running, I figured Id use it to do the welding since it can put out a few more amps then my Miller 180 and has a little higher duty cycle. Nothing special down, simply jumped all around the axle and welded a few inches at a time with plenty of wait time in between.

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For the center section area, I decided to TIG weld the dissimilar metals. Borrowed my nieghbors rosebud head to put on my torch to pre-heat the housing. Got everything glowing red and went to town. I was using Mark's (Begster) Miller Econotig so I was really pushing the limit of the machine, it had enough amps to do the job just a low duty cycle since i was on full power. A couple beer breaks and some extra torch heating give the welder time to catch up. Once I was finished welding, it was time to post-heat. I went over the housing with the torch again to make sure everything was uniform temp, then gave it all a sand bath.


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Got to be a pirate and dug up buried treasure!!!!

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Capped the ends of the truss and got the coil buckets in place. Center of the bucket plates were drilled out and a 1/2" Grade 8 nut was welded to the bottom side. These will serve as the coil bucket/coil/bumpstop hold down. Burned them in and tie them into the LCA mounts.

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Next up with playing with the knuckles. Ill be running crossover high steer so I wanted to ditch the stock steering arms and plate the knuckles up. Now that I have my bridgeport running, Ill be adding a keyway and/or 5th stud to the knuckles along with making my own high steer arms.

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