I came across your channel last week in search of ideas for building flat beds. Your vids are perfect for the people who are just learning how to fab! So happy i found you on you tube. The 2end gen build is looking AWESOME! I cant wait to see how the new flat bed looks on it. P.S i wish the trucks up here in Michigan looked that clean... The trucks up here are rust buckets lol
You can't run all heims on them arms. At least the axle mount points need to be bushings. Or both ends of the short control arm on top even. There's has to be flex at that point or you will break axle tube welds somewhere. One wheel up, and one down will twist the axle tube. A radius arm set up like that you'd even be fine just leaving one of the short uppers off completely. Research it and you'll find a lot about this. Just a heads up.
Any chance you still have the measurements for your front end fab written down and could upload a pic? Love your videos, man. They are precise and well done. Restoring a reg cab 12v flat bed and you've inspired a lot of my project.
What brackets did you use for your axles and frame. Where did your DOM tubing come from too. I am about to start on 68’ international with 2nd gen running gear. Axles, driveline, engine and trans.
@@j_moffitt this is a 8 door international. We will be using it to pull a car trailer. On average, no more than 5500lbs. Would you suggest the Johnny joints with bushings over heim joints? Planned on doing custom long arm kit in the rear for support and help with axle wrap. 12V will have some work done to it
Anything greasable is better, heims probably weren’t the best move on my part for longevity and I will probably be swapping heims for poly bushings or Johnny joints in the future.
Hey I'm just curious to know what kind of bag you are using for this setup? I really like how you do things. Your methods are really nice and comprehendible.
Quality of the welding and fab work is great, but I just thought I'd give you a heads up on one thing, written below too. Solid bushings with radius arms. If you picture the axle on the shop floor apart from the truck, tires on it, radius arms bolted up, when it articulates, that's like you grabbing one arm and pulling it up, while holding the other arm down. Obviously you wouldn't be able to do that, because you'd either be twisting the tubes, or bending the radius arms. If you look at factory radius arm setups, they run bushings to allow flex where the arms attach. You might think "Well, I don't need much flex anyway, this isn't any kind of rock crawler", but with solid bushings, any articulation will likely be accommodated by vertical deflection of your lower tubes after the triangulated section. I just figured I'd give you something to think about. You might be able to replace the heims fairly easily with johnny joints, I don't know. But if one of those lower links breaks due to metal fatigue one day when you're cruising down the highway, you could have a real bad day.
Hindsight being 20/20 I should have gone with some bushings in it, I understand your argument 100% but at the same time there are lots of heim joints for plenty of articulation and who knows maybe I’ll change it up maybe I’ll just run it and learn the hard way, Edison had fail before he got the lightbulb just right
@@j_moffitt I know it sucks to put all that work into something, even the work into editing and posting the video, just to have some random dork like me criticizing it, haha, but yeah, there are some damn good suspension guys here on youtube, you could see what they say, you sure don't have to listen to me. Lol. Even Edison, he was working hard, but while he was experimenting with incandescent lighting, Tesla had achieved wireless transmission of electricity, designed the 3 phase electric motor, etc. He even had all kinds of secret stuff the government took and hid from us. Edison could have just asked Tesla how to design a light bulb, we probably would have had something like metal halides instead of incandescent bulbs! Lol.
Like I said probably should have gone a bit different but first setup that comes to mind is Darrell’s red 4 door first gen, we’ve all seen that truck and the only rubber bushings he has on the truck are where the bars mount the the frame every other connection is heim joints, not saying “he did it so it should be fine for me” but we all kno he ain’t afraid to drive that truck lol
@@j_moffitt I hadn't seen it, I just checked it out, damn that truck is sweet. Makes me want to take my parts from my chevy cummins and swap them into a 1st gen dodge. But if you did want to give a little flex to your setup, I might be wrong, but I think you can get johnny joints that will thread right into your link ends to replace the heims on the axle side. If you're unfamiliar with them, Johnny joints are like big heims but instead of having steel on teflon, they have a replaceable poly bushing around the inner ball. I think other companies are copying the design now too, but John Currie was the original designer.
You need to tack your rod ends in, then remove em so you dont ruin any Teflon lining. A lot of people complain that (rod ends) get sloppy & noisy on the street. I believe most people put about 10 - 20 years of wear while welding them, but there STILL better than crappy ass "ball joints". Nice set up, should be nice.....
Jay Dee I would quench just the Teflon part of the rod end after each pass to keep it at a tolerable temp, I wanted to keep them threaded in for a heat sink but knew I had to keep the ends cool
do you have a link for this front kit? how is the articulation with this kit? I am looking to do something for a rock crawler but if it doesnt articulate i cant do it. Thanks
This isn’t a kit I just pieced together parts from ruff stuff specialties but as far as articulation, I haven’t tested it to the extent of a rock crawler because that’s not the goal of this truck but you probably want to do something of a triangulated 4 link on the front and run hydraulic steering, that will get you your most flex and articulation
jim fowler yes and no, the ones I used to mock up the rear I used for the front and those are staying, and I purchased the same size bags just a shorter overall extend and height bag for the rear but not sure if they will work yet or not
Thanks for the quick answer. As you are essentially doing the beta testing for me, I will keep watching your channel to see how it all unfolds. I have concerns going full air, but there is a lot of "opinion" out there regarding body roll and ride quality. Seems your project is a real world example that has the potential to settle such questions. Carry on!
What I'm attempting is to put a 12 valve and a set of one tons in a short bed 1977 f150. Sway bars aren't a part of the original package so I'm thinking a manly set of those and stepping up my shock game can't possibly leave me any worse off than I am now. Rear may, or may not be triangulated, but an adjustable radius arm makes too much sense to go any other direction in the front.
