Cgalpha08's build

[cgalpha08]

Not too much of an update. I did remove the dana 44 and the 10b, which have been sold to a good home. The h3 is now on jackstands for awhile while I slowly work on her. Parts have been slowly rolling in. I hope to have her on the ground by the end of summer.

 

[Jeeper360]

Not too much of an update. I did remove the dana 44 and the 10b, which have been sold to a good home. The h3 is now on jackstands for awhile while I slowly work on her. Parts have been slowly rolling in. I hope to have her on the ground by the end of summer.

"A GOOD HOME ?" I heard that guy stacks rocks and spits on the grass! I bet he pees on trees in the woods also. the world is ending i say

 

[cgalpha08]

Started working on cleaning up the dana 60 front axle. Slowly but surely grinding away at the axle. The old brackets are all removed. Kingpin lower bearing race and seal are out, still need to remove the upper. It's Slowly looking like a clean axle

 

[cgalpha08]

The coilovers have also arrived. I got these from accutune offroad. Fox 2.5 inch ×12 inch travel. You tell accutune your suspension setup, weight, driving style etc and they custom tune them and recommend a spring rate for you. They sent a pair of 250lb and 325lb springs, which I can swap out as long as they are still new, if those rates don't work out. I've also mocked up roughly where the tube frame mount will sit for the coilovers.

 

[H3Hummer]

oh dude that's gonna flex like an beast

 

[cgalpha08]

Slowly marching forward.
Got the old brackets cleaned off of the frame rails. Also dropped the front axle off with the local gear installer, should hopefully be done soon. Had some time and also installed some underwood KC cyclone lights, these are on magnets so you have some flexibility on where you want them positioned.

 

[cgalpha08]

Awhile back I had dropped off the front axle with the local gear shop. Picked it up today with an eaton E-locker and yukon 5.38 gears installed. Unfortunately for the rear, nobody makes an e locker and arb is out of the question. I'll have to figure out some sort of resistor to attach to the oem harness in the rear to trick the bcm into thinking its on. The front e locker will run off of the factory switch. I know most people would outright bypass it, but I wanted to keep that clean factory look.

 

[cgalpha08]

Next step I took was beginning to rebuild the axle. On GM dana 60s, the kingpin has to be torqued to 500-600 ftlbs, which is dumb tight. I used a 3/4 breaker barx 7/8 allen impact and a torque meter adapter from harbor freight. IMO got it close enough and called it good. Slapped some red loctite in there for good measure as well. Enjoy the following video, where i am literally balancing on top of the axle in order to get the right amount of leverage to tighten them down.

 

[06 H3]

Great idea on the sand bags. I wondered how you would keep the housing from moving without it under the rig

 

[rascole]

I was told to use a 10k resistor for the rear locker.

 

[cgalpha08]

I was told to use a 10k resistor for the rear locker.

Randy, I will give that a go whenever I get to hooking everything back up.

I know Ox locker has been in development of a 14bolt e-locker. Back in may of 2021 they were testing a prototype at Windrock park and broke it on day 3, so its being redesigned. I did email them the other week and the rep said the production run should be later this year. Not sure I will wait around for that, might be a future upgrade at some point.
This was the lastest from back in 2021. Ideally this would be the way i would go. It would maintain the ultra clean look that I like

 

[cgalpha08]

I have made some more progress. Got the rest of the kingpin components install as well as the knuckles and steering arms from solid axle industries.
I also tacked on the trackbar bracket and used some PVC to start finding full bump and seeing how the angles look. So far its ok, however i have a couple of things i need to sort out. The trackbar does hit the diff cover at full bump, now the PVC i am using is technically 1/8 of an inch bigger in diameter than the actual DOM tube. The trackbar is also not as parallel as I would like it to be. The location of the steering arm is much higher on a kingpin axle than the old 44, meaning the axle end of the draglink is higher than the track bar. There are a couple of ways I can solve this, 1, moving the drag link to under the steering arm ( as a benefit, this would also let me stuff the axle higher up towards the frame) or 2, new trackbar bracket.
Solid axle industries knuckle and steering arm:

The bracket that i have currently test fitted is from ruffstuff https://www.ruffstuffspecialties.co...MI9NXh_rnC_gIV4xB9Ch3rSgckEAQYASABEgKWIfD_BwE
This brackets upper hole is 6" from axle center. I am going to try this one from Barnes 4wd next https://barnes4wd.com/products/offset-axle-panhard-bracket-1-4
This brackets upper hole is 7&5/8 from the axle center, however i believe it is more offset forwards than the ruff stuff one, so i will have to be cognizant of that.
The additional height should help both the trackbar angle, so that it is more parallel to the drag link, and help clear the diff cover at full bump.
Here you can kinda see the angles, sorry there is other stuff in the way, but you get the idea.

 

[06 H3]

One thing to figure out is steering box throw. You have undrilled steering arms. The closer they are to kingpin centerline the more steering angle you can achieve and the quicker your steering will feel.

The further away, the slower your steering will feel and the less angle you will get. There is a calculation you can do to get steering angle. When I had mine on the farthest outside hole my steering angle was less than ideal so maybe try and cycle it with the pvc tube slid towards the kingpin a little more

 

[cgalpha08]

One thing to figure out is steering box throw. You have undrilled steering arms. The closer they are to kingpin centerline the more steering angle you can achieve and the quicker your steering will feel.

The further away, the slower your steering will feel and the less angle you will get. There is a calculation you can do to get steering angle. When I had mine on the farthest outside hole my steering angle was less than ideal so maybe try and cycle it with the pvc tube slid towards the kingpin a little more

Good thinking! I had definitely just randomly tossed it on there, ill cycle it in various places to see what inevitably hits.

 

[H3Hummer]

holly shit, those parts look indestructible

 

[cgalpha08]

lowly working through the lower link mount placement. The struggle is not the width but how to package the link and coilover location. I am trying to avoid cutting into the fender, and at the same time keep the ride height low while still having 4-ish inches of uptravel.

I've been experimenting with a few different combos of parts from ruffstuff and Barnes.
The mounts from Barnes keeps the coilover almost directly over the axle, and up high. If I use a behind the axle mount and a lower link mount that's below the axle, I can get the coilover a couple of inches lower, and have plenty of axle separation between the lower and upper.
I have the coilover mount angled rearward about 7 degrees here..

If the combo above doesn't work (I'll test full stuff and droop later this week) I may switch back to the Barnes combo bracket that's below (right side of the pic), however that would mean I sacrifice some link separation and potentially won't be able to keep the ride height as low as I want.

Here is the upper link. I trimmed the top hole off because this sits directly below the engine mount and as you know is absolutely massive on the alphas

 

[cgalpha08]

Got some more work done. Tested my link/coikover combo. Unfortunately before I get to full droop it hits. And yes i need longer links as these are maxed out.

Thinking of chopping the bottom off and seeing if that gives me more clearance.

On another note, I took apart the hubs and drums on my 14b. I needed to do this for 2 reasons.
1. To make sure the spindles are in good condition
2. To get them ready for abs rings.

 

[cgalpha08]

Made some progress on clearancing the coilover mount and lower link setup.
The shaded area is the space the bottom eyelet takes up.

I then cut along the diagonal lines.
here it is compared to the unmodified one:

This is full droop. I also realized after the fact that I failed to take into account the added thickness from the lower link, since it won't be this extended when I get the new ones built.

I had set this again at 7 degrees rearward, and I'm hoping that if I try 5 or 0, that will be enough. I ran out of time so that's all for this update.

In other news, my 14b truss came in, motobuilt simple truss and pinion guard.

 

[H3Hummer]

oh man, that's gonna be serious protections

 

[cgalpha08]

I have switched gears for the time being to work on the rear 14b. Needed a mental break from the front.

I've mocked up the spring perches and the pinion angle. The factory rear gas a 10-11 degree pinion angle up from 90 degrees. So I am going to match that, as the precious axle had that and had 0 vibrations or issues.

Also kept on grinding away the old gook that's on it.

I also started mocking up the motobuilt truss. Had to grind a small amount on the top of the pumpkin to get it to clear

Also picked up my hubs from the machine shop.
I had them machined and pressed on. These are the 55 tooth tone rings from wfo concepts.
(4th hub is in the box)

 

[H3Hummer]

wow, it's gonna be Hulk's H3 dude

 

[06 H3]

are all those kc flex lights magnetic?

 

[cgalpha08]

are all those kc flex lights magnetic?

Chris, sorry I didn't see this, yea they are, kinda nice to be able to move them around a bit. They make a kit that bolts to the lights. I'd imagine you could use just about any neodymium magnet that has a threaded stud.

 

[cgalpha08]

Made some headway on the rear this weekend. Leaf perches on and lined up correctly. Shock mounts and truss tacked on as well. I'll burn it in later this week. Spent most of yesterday practicing my welding as well.
I don't have the wheel bearings and brake parts yet, once I get those I should be able to put the rear on the ground.

 

[cgalpha08]

More progress, 3 link mockup is looking good, the axle is about 1 inch or so further forward than I'd like, so that needs to be adjusted. 14b is all welded up, truss and pinion guard are on, rear is all done minus gears, wheel bearings and brake parts. Once I get the brake and hub parts I can set the rear on the ground.

Also got some work done on the track bar, it will definitely need a bend in order for it to clear the diff housing

Side note, make sure your pvc links are tight or they'll slip off I did end up using my old lower and the upper for mockup after this incident since it was long enough and gave me slightly more confidence in the mock up.