billj

I "was" going to close and paint the front axle yesterday, but I screwed up and broke the ARB air tubing that goes inside the diff......:mad3: Now I´ll have to re-do the silver solder connection...... But I still wanted to get the axle under the rig to look for clearance issues. Everything looks OK......... The tires are just placed to see how it will look....:cool: Decent angle of attack...... Small, shrt and lightweight, just the ticket for rockcrawlin´....

I put the other seat and harnesses in, as well as the dash and steering valve, just to see how it´d all look. Nothing´s bolted in permanent yet, I´ll do that after getting the drivetrain installed. The engine and tranny are in there, but I forgot to take pics.........

No hydraulic cylinder switch, hand pumped every bend....

As incredulous as it might sound, my factory coiled Samurai was nicknamed "Spider" in early 1998 by a freind who commented during a trail run that the rig "looked like a spider", never lifting a tire off the ground. The name stuck and I´ve been using it before I had even heard of Spidertrax or Spyder Customs....

The main hoops are 42 mm x 3,25 wall tube, actually 1 1/4" Schedule.

Like the Beetle look???........:grin:

Prefabbed my rump roast, it was hand bent one tube at a time on one of these..... The problem is not bending one tube, it´s making the other side exactly symetrical.... You can see the bad boy bender there in the backgound....

Air shocks are nothing more than nitrogen charged gas springs, with shock oil for dampening. They are tricky to set up and tune, but once you get the hang of it, they are really sweet. On this rig, I´ve chosen shocks with 14" travel and have set them up for 5" uptravel and 9" drop, which is good for rockcrawling. If you´re pre running, it´s better to split the travel half and half. The air cylinder is to suck the suspension down to minimize body roll on sidehill obstacles and to reduce the chances of going endo on steep up or down hills. Usually a winch is used for this, just running the cable from the chasis to the axle. However, I decided on air cylinders because of the added benefit of being able to lift the suspension as well, something that a winch can´t do. This will help me get off high-centering rocks with a flick of a valve........

Just the one pulling winch in the front...........

I measured the crap out of the engine ans tranny to make the drawing....

Thread started.......

The drivetrain will be going in next week, I´ll be bugging you guys with some questions to get it running.........

Assembly time: The air cylinder´s not connected at the bottom yet, I need to make an extension for the shaft so that it´s mid-stroke at ride height.

Got some paint on the chassi on Saturday: