What's wrong with a few bends in it? The dodges come with them that way. You won't really have any issues with bump steer being full hydro and treeee linked

Update:

I started to tackle the track bar.  First up was to build the frame side since i had a general idea how i wanted that to look/turn out.  Here is the first iteration in good ole cereal box cardboard.



When i started to look at it more closely, i noticed that it didn't come down low enough.  I wanted to keep the track  bar as flat as i could.  With having it so high, that would require me to either build the axle side bracket to be extremely tall or build the track bar at an angle. 

Here is the next iteration with a slightly lower frame side bracket.  Although, my concern with the bracket at this point was that unless i made a slight bend in the track bar, the bar will hit the steering ram when the suspension fully stuffs.



To better get a visual on how the steering setup will be  (plus the fact that i don't have the ram yet) as well as in an attempt to figure out what size stroke steering ram to run, i made this fancy tie rod. 



I marked it for center (going off of my steering ram template), then measure 4, 4.5, and 5 inches off of that to get an estimate of the ram stroke (for an 8, 9, and 10" stroke ram).

With the steering turned to each of those markings, i was able to drop a plumb bob on each side of the rotor (front and rear) to see what angles i had.  So, going off of this and knowing the factory steering angles, (30 degrees and 40 degrees...with the ackerman steering), this brought me to the conclusion that i could run a 10" stroke ram so get the max angle out of the steering.



It was at this point that the old stinger/front cage was beginning to be a real pain to work around.  So i cut it off...here you can see what it looks like currently plus the frame side track bar bracket in place, a very temp axle side track bar bracket tacked, as well as a mock up track bar.



You'll notice that the track bar isn't flat.  After playing with the numbers in the 3 link calculator and taking several measurements off of the truck; that building the track bar at this angle, can actually completely get rid of any roll over steer that the suspension had.



With the track bar tacked into place enough, it was time to start cycling the suspension.  *insert evil grin*

Passenger side at full stuff and driver side well beyond full droop (16" of droop actually).



Now for the opposite side...same configuration as before.



Everything looked like it cleared without any issues...for the most part.  Upon further inspection, i noticed that the upper link barely touched the frame rail.  Granted, this is with the mock up links...with the actual DOM in place, this will be a pretty big bind due to the larger diameter DOM/link material.  Luckily, this is with the suspension drooping 16" on the passenger side to get the link to touch...right now, i'm only planning on having 10" of droop.

This appears to be caused by the track bar and the axle swinging in that axis???  I wonder what can be done to keep this from occurring...longer track bar perhaps??



With the passenger side drooped 10", this is what it looked like at the frame rail.  There is definitely more clearance and i'm happy with the amount of room.



From the front at 10" droop.



Now, with seeing just how much droop the front end is capable of reaching; i will admit, its starting to make me want longer travel struts up front. 

Once i was happy with the first round of suspension cycling up front, i decided to start to build a proper axle side track bar mount.  The plan is to also tie the new bracket to the tubing around the steering ram mount to add more bracing/strength to the mount.

Top view


Front view


Another thing i was finally able to get to, was heating up the 1/4" plate on the frame side upper link mount and welded that to the frame.

this thing is gonna be a beast! that little 22re is gonna be having fun pushing it all

this thing is gonna be a beast! that little 22re is gonna be having fun pushing it all

Thanks bud.  I don't think she'll have any issues.  It doesn't make big horsepressure but i'll have gearing for days! 

If you look closely she's not a re. She's a rtp. Lol 22r turbo on propane. I drove it around the camp at a local offroad park when it was on 40s with 5.29s. 2nd gear high range rolling about 10 mph I stuck it and  when it got the boost up she was quite impressive.

Now she has a clutch that actually should hold the powa. 

 Looking good cuz! Doesn't Jon have a forklift? All this work with the engine hoist reminds me of how I used to get junk done without a tractor.

Well hell, there went thst easy idea for lifting lol

Idk if you remember my buddy kyle or not, he had that pos mega teuck that stayed at my house for the last year. Anyhow, he's had some dude up in North alabama building a cj7 for him for the last year in secret. He hauled it over to the house yesterday. I was thinking "here we go, Kyle has turned into the mall crawler jeep owner..." I hear his 6.7 coming down the road and I walked out and about pissed on myself. This cat has built a cj7 tub on a full tube chassis 4 linked, Mohawked rocks, 16" big shocks, cut 44 boggers, a vortec 350, 4l60e, ford divorced 205, full cage and plated body... this rig is nasty! Now he wants me to squeeze some power our of it. I didn't get any pictures but I'm sure he put some on his Facebook page go look for him. It's quite impressive.

Progress has been slow lately.  I've quickly come up to the point where i need to find the money tree.  haha
I have been tinkering with a few things and getting a good plan on some other items.  I've moved the rear axle into position and raised it as full stuff.  I couldn't really get a good picture...i have too small of a garage.  Lol  The wheel base is set at roughly 120”.



Here is a close up side shot of the rear axle.  I'm definitely going to have to modify the rear frame rails since the rear strut mounts are directly under the frame.  Not too big of a deal, it'll just be a bit more of a pain in the ass due to the stuff being in the way back there...specifically the bed floor.



Another view from the top of the tcase looking back at the drive line offset.  Moving the drive train over  helped out in many aspects of the build. 



I went ahead and set the front axle on the ground (16” of droop) to get an idea on my drive shaft angle.  With the axle drooping out so far, it only appears to move towards the driver side about 2”.  The engine being offset to the passenger side makes it appear that the axle is a lot farther to the side that what it is.




This is a rough estimate of the tcase output.  I replaced the flange after this picture with the one that will actually stay on the truck (toyota pattern) and the angle at the tcase was roughly 40 degrees.



Here you can see the pinion angle.  This is roughly 28 degrees.



The goal for all of this was trying to figure out what length of strut i can safely run up front.  Since my real only limitations are compression (only allowing for 4”) and the drive line angle, this gave me a good idea on what i can do.  I know tom woods makes a drive shaft that can handle 42 degrees so if i go with a 20” strut, that should be fine.  But i may just run an 18” strut instead and only allow 14” of droop so that the drive shaft angle isn't as close to the max angle.  As always, i'm certainly always up to hear folks thoughts and suggestions.

Fyi:  we can make you a 49 degree cv.   We sell a lot of 42 degree cv shafts and 49 degree cv shafts.  Every once in a while we have sold 80degree cv shafts. Lol. Every once in a while we sell shafts with cv's on both ends. 

Yea the 80 degrees are interesting. Lol

There is a super old article from 2001, about the cv.  I thought i had some pictures on my phone I could have posted but It must have been on my last phone
http://www.fourwheeler.com/how-to/80-degree-driveshaft-high-angle-driveline/

Edit:  im not saying this is what you need or want. I was just sharing an example of cv with even more angle.  You could always call jesse and tell him what you have going on and see what he recommends. 

Nice parts, I'm digging the tsl, and I must say WTF!!! You sold the cummins!?!?!?!? I don't whether to say congratulations or my condolences lol 

So am to start planning a shake down boggs run in a few months?

Lies! All lies! I know how you and Jon work. You guys will pull a few all nighter and have the cab back on it in 2 weeks lol

If you get to a point where you have a pile of stuff and just need hands give me a call. I hate I didn't get the time to come visit last week when I was in Panama city. I need to get over and see you guys.

Update:

Progress has been pretty slow lately.  I decided to move the engine back to clear the axle.  The deciding factor for this was mainly the ability to move the trackbar back closer to the axle center line.  I then set the truck at its new belly height of 27".  The truck now also will have just over 5" of uptravel.  So, she'll have a 27" belly height with 43" tires and mog axles under an old Yota pickup.    The only thing that i'm not completely happy with is now with the lower ride height, my front suspension will have 3degrees of roll under steer.  If i move the lower link mounts farther out from the center of the truck at the frame side, it will pull the roll under steer out but then i'll have clearance issues with the tire at fully lock hitting the link.  But i won't know that for certain until i start cycling the suspension in the next coming days.

But i had to start redoing some work in order to make this work.  The first order of business was to move the motor out of the way so that i could lower the truck.  For now, i just moved the motor back (way more than what it will be at when complete) but it gave me the room to work. 

I then started to rebuild the trackbar and brackets to shorten the axle side bracket from hanging so far forward of the axle center line.  This is what the new track bar looks like from the front.  You can also see the 10" stroke ram that came in as well...all tapped up at the moment.  I do know that i will have to have a bend in the passenger side of the trackbar to clear the new front frame section when the suspension stuffs.  I currently only have about 3" of clearance between the two.



I still need to finish cleaning up the old piece of tubing that went where the frame side trackbar bracket is now.  But for now, its out of the way enough from to mock things up.  Here is the frame side bracket.  Its tieing into the new frame section plus the factory frame section.



This is the new axle side bracket.  Now the trackbar is only 2 3/4" in front of the axle center line in comparison to the 6 3/4 that it was before.



I'm much happier with the new setup.  I still plan to fully box/plate the axle side bracket as well as the frame side bracket.  I'd rather add more strength then skimp out and have it break down the road.

Here is a top side view of the new trackbar.



I ended up ordering the PVC inserts from my H1 wheels.  It was a real pain in the ass to cut and grind the mag inserts that i have to ensure there was enough clearance to keep from cutting the tire.  Plus, i would have had to grind the sides down in order to fit the thickness of the SX beads.  So, PVC inserts were purchased.  lol  They arrived so i was able to mock up the sexy ass tire i have here in the garage!  I cannot wait to see this thing when its all said and done!



Also recently delivered, was the NWFab Dana 300 twin cable flip kit that i ordered.  I'm really please with the setup.  Don't mind the treats in the picture...gotta have snacks for the little eater.  lol



I also ordered my front ORI struts (16" travel in orange with the small reservoir) as well as the dual fill kit since i'll need that.  So far, the dual fill kit showed up yesterday afternoon and the struts are estimated to show up after thanksgiving.  I was too excited to get to work on the trackbar so i failed to take a picture of the dual fill kit though.