Long Arm Lifts vs. Short Arm Lifts
- Thread starter Stox5225
- Start date
I have yet to find or see any suspension climb better with more stability.
Agreed.
It's like the guys who put on the Currie Antirocks and then complain about the excess body roll over the stock sway bar. Some people can deal with it, others can't. I'll trade that little extra body roll for the rest, no question about it.
I look at it from an on road handling perspective. Keeping the track bar allows independent control of roll center and in certain packaging scenarios more roll center height than you can get otherwise. Once you go to a triangulated suspension your control arms are now controlling roll center in addition to antisquat.
It all comes down to compromise and an understanding of what your are trying to accomplish. I have thought many times going down the mid arm road but the question always comes back to how much would I gain for the effort required.
I keep exploring a mid arm three link with a track bar, but packaging the front upper control arm mount is a challenge.
Granted I've only had my Savvy mid-arm on for 3 weeks or so now, I will say that I primarily drive my TJ on-road.
In no way whatsoever do I feel that the road manners are worse. In fact, with the Fox shocks @pcoplin tuned for me, I would say that it has better road manners now than it did before. Perhaps some of that extra body roll has been dialed out with the shocks, I'm not sure.
Yes, there is a bit more body roll that is noticeable around corners, but it's really nothing that alarms me or feels dangerous in any way. As previously mentioned though, everyone is going to have a different opinion on what is "acceptable" in terms of body roll.
Keep in mind that I've been driving it for 3-weeks without any rear sway bar at all! I have a rear Currie Antirock waiting to go on, and my guess is that once that's on, it's going to even further improve the body roll.
Truth be told, had I been building my TJ years ago before the Savvy mid-arm even came into existence, I probably would have gone an entirely different route. I kept reading rave reviews about it though, so I'm glad I followed through with it.
Just some persnickety little details and persistence is all it takes to do it. We've done them with Currie's VXR front housing and notching the bottom of the frame side motor mount. It isn't difficult, just a bit fiddly.
I know a little secret...
For a rear three link? Do tell.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
I can do the 3 link with rear trackbar, easily. The problem is getting that into some sort of a kit that deals with the exhaust over the crossmember that has to be there, the upper link mount which has to fight for real estate with the trackbar mount and then get a solid TB mount that does some good and gets you the handling you are after. It turns into quite the ordeal to get it all dialed in.
I can just as easily toss a rear AR on with a .950 front AR bar and go have a blast with some good shocks.
I think I misworded. I was thinking of a rear three link with panhard. You already figured out the front and I would just be reinventing the wheel if I tried to do anything different.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Right. It is always about packaging and if the rewards are worth the cost and effort.
I don't have an actual example, you need to move both ends of it to get a good roll center and make it as long as possible to slow down axle shift under articulation. That needs to be behind the single upper mount for the control arm, but if you get it too far back, then you run the risk of clearance issues with the gas tank. Over the axle and you are in the way of the upper arm mount. Everything wants to live in the same spot.
I wonder since the front and rear track bars from the factory are nearly the same length if making one bar substantially longer than the other might induce something into the chassis that would be an issue? Or did Jeep just pick the length out of the air and call it a day.
I suspect that it is both. You can only make them so long and keep them under the rig. You want them as long as possible to minimize the forces since it is rare to be able to keep them horizontal which is ideal.
Watts links are very interesting and also very complicated to make work with the amount of axle travel we desire. I know that Full Traction has a kit to put one on a JK. Lots of moving parts to contend with.