long arm kit

long arm kit
S

sbrodacz

Jeeper
Posts
139
Thanks
0
Location
Buffalo Grove, IL
Vehicle(s)
-78 CJ7
-Chevy 350
-TH400
Has anyone done a long arm suspension kit on their CJ? Is it even possible?
 
I think everyone here still runs leaf springs, kind of a cj thing.:D
 
Na, prob'ly not. Keeping the leaf springs saves HUGE work & investment & keeps the resale value up (modded CJs don't sell nearly as well as near-original CJs).
 
I've seen it done in the trade rags, but only on high $$ rigs with lots of custom fab work.
Its pretty much a coil-sprung truck thing, not for a leaf-sprung CJ.
 
! ! ! Gulp! Their basic no-frills suspension kit costs nearly ten times as much as I paid (initially) for either of my CJ5s!
 
I am taking a TJ frame stretching it to101 inches and putting my CJ6 body on it. I figure it will take the summer to get it right. besides having to fab all the body mounts, all the cross members, cut the tub around the rear fenders and make custom body work, set the body and then do trial fitment of the drive train, pulling the body and resetting it as we fab in the drivetrain mounts. Then there is the fact it will take an entire rewire. Oh add the fabbing of the reinforced firewall to hold new pedal structure.
Of course all this is right up my alley and I will have a blast doing it all.
here is the frame already stretched
_771719.jpg

where I stretched the frame
_685556.jpg

the lift is a Nth degree short arm gyro joint with all the bells and whistles from my old TJ
 
TDHofstetter said:
! ! ! Gulp! Their basic no-frills suspension kit costs nearly ten times as much as I paid (initially) for either of my CJ5s!
Click to expand...
yea. I had over 10 grand in lift on my TJ after I took everything and :dung: canned what did not work and fabbed up pieces to replace it, then buying related parts to trick it out, plus all the custom parts I made to tune in the suspension. I tell you those kits like Rubicon Express and all are just starter kits, there are so many places you need to tune up and custom fab bracket and arms and stuff it is ridiculous. I had one of the sweetest TJs out there and really felt bad the night I went down the freeway for AMC 150 yards upside down and topless at 70 mph till it stopped. If it had not been for the custom roll cage I had built, I would not be here, the factory TJ cage is a joke. I regret the most was I had a 1600 watt stereo system in there that is now sitting in my garage till I get time to shoe horn it into the 67 CJ5 . I believe in letting the guys in the Jeep behind me go deaf.
 
sbrodacz said:
Has anyone done a long arm suspension kit on their CJ? Is it even possible?
Click to expand...
why a long arm? Long arm lifts are for Mall crawlers, I live in rock crawler heaven and no one serious about rocks runs a long arm kit. they get hung up on everything. bend at every corner and the braking nose dives are just scary. But the Magazines love them cause the advertisers make tons off them.
 
BajaEdition said:
why a long arm? Long arm lifts are for Mall crawlers, I live in rock crawler heaven and no one serious about rocks runs a long arm kit. they get hung up on everything. bend at every corner and the braking nose dives are just scary. But the Magazines love them cause the advertisers make tons off them.
Click to expand...

I didn't know that. I always though they were the best route to take suspension wise. So the leaf springs are the best option?
 
sbrodacz said:
I didn't know that. I always though they were the best route to take suspension wise. So the leaf springs are the best option?
Click to expand...
Long arm lits were developed to deal with lifts on a 4 link system, as you lift more and more the angle of the arms drops down till you start to get a system where the front tires are going backward to go forward on big bumps, so instead of dealing properly with the problem, they extended the arms and set them so far back stock angles were again present. What they did in reality was to make the frame sit on a A frame instead of a table set up. Now you get a extreme amount of travel on road as the controling arms meet in the middle so yo need stronger springs and shocks to compensate. However if you put the stronger stuff on you lose articulation as you make the fulcrum blocked from moving. Not only that but you make long and spindling control arms that are subject to bend easily, and being so long and hanging so low they catch up on rocks a lot and the rocks get jambed in there and rip the mounts off.
However the Lift companies can not admit this as the long arms are the premiere most expensive lifts they offer. So they deny the fact that a A frame set up causes nose dive during braking and squat during acceleration till the public argues with them not wanting to admit they were taken.
Rock crawlers know better and use a few different methods to fix the short arm system, Curries J arm or Nths and DCs dropping the bracket lower for the arms, Nth went as far to raise the place the lower arms hit the axles.
this had very good results as the factory angles were present and the axles worked as stock. Nice. In the rear there were several methods invented to get rid of the upper control arms, I like the Nth setup with Rubicon express control arms. The Nth method uses a triangle shaped traction bar to the center of the pumpkin to control axle wrap, oh with leaf springs axle wrap is almost imposible to get rid of with out this method.
Now what is best leafs or coil?
Leafs are a ancient design form the horse and buggy days, and need a lot of work to track, control axle wrap, articulate, etc that a 4 link coil spring system has controled stock, however to lift a 4 link coil spring system you need to spend a lot of money and do custom work to get it right as no manufacturer of lifts has it correct. Remember they are competing for a price point you can afford and so the systems are a good compromise that most wheelers will never out wheel. Fact of the matter over 1/2 of them will never get away from the mall.
A Cj is an antique, you do not get one to go out wheeling without the understanding that you bought something that needs a lot of work to get it to wheel and not rip to pieces. In a day of lockers, which were a dream product in the day, and trails designed to bend frames, all this not in the realm in the days of CJs. Most Cjs are bought to be street queens or light wheelers. Those who want to go out and abuse their CJs, such as I will spend a lot of time and money prepping them. I have just spent 6 months and close to 15 grand setting up a CJ5 to rock crawl on leaf springs. Axles fully locked, rear converted to a full floater, front set up with a auto locker, chrome moly axles, new tranny with hardened gears, rebuild the t case with larger bearings and new gears, new axles with upgraded u joints, center force clutch system, roller chain clutch linkage, GM truck disc brakes, ford truck MC, upgrded brake plumbing and this is just the drive train, add springs and welding custom brackets, a Warn powerplant winch custom bumper and planning a custom rear bumper/carier and you can see why it cost so much, I still need to fab a traction bar for the rear diff and finish boxing the frame, CJ frames are so light they twist up under the loads of modern wheeling.
My Advice to anyone wanting to get a CJ to wheel hard.is that if they do not have a good welding skills and great fab skills is to sell it and get a Wrangler. Look at what some members have done to get them ready for mud here and you will see that they are not cheap to wheel.
I hope this helps to answer the question that a TJ or JK is miles ahead of a CJ in suspension. But are pricey to lift correctly as they take so much more to do.
 
Last edited:
To do an acceptable job of what you propose the percentage of jeep parts that would be left would amount to a CJ body cut up and butchered to set on top of the fabricated frame. Buying a CJ to throw most of it away to build a vehicle you could never drive on the street ? should have picked up a fiberglass tub or a wrangler tub, a lot more cost effective. :cool:
But as always, it's yours, you own it, you can fill it with horse manure and plant roses in it if thats what trips your trigger.:D

sbrodacz said:
I didn't know that. I always though they were the best route to take suspension wise. So the leaf springs are the best option?
Click to expand...
 
BajaEdition said:
Long arm lits were developed to deal with lifts on a 4 link system, as you lift more and more the angle of the arms drops down till you start to get a system where the front tires are going backward to go forward on big bumps, so instead of dealing properly with the problem, they extended the arms and set them so far back stock angles were again present. What they did in reality was to make the frame sit on a A frame instead of a table set up. Now you get a extreme amount of travel on road as the controling arms meet in the middle so yo need stronger springs and shocks to compensate. However if you put the stronger stuff on you lose articulation as you make the fulcrum blocked from moving. Not only that but you make long and spindling control arms that are subject to bend easily, and being so long and hanging so low they catch up on rocks a lot and the rocks get jambed in there and rip the mounts off.
However the Lift companies can not admit this as the long arms are the premiere most expensive lifts they offer. So they deny the fact that a A frame set up causes nose dive during braking and squat during acceleration till the public argues with them not wanting to admit they were taken.
Rock crawlers know better and use a few different methods to fix the short arm system, Curries J arm or Nths and DCs dropping the bracket lower for the arms, Nth went as far to raise the place the lower arms hit the axles.
this had very good results as the factory angles were present and the axles worked as stock. Nice. In the rear there were several methods invented to get rid of the upper control arms, I like the Nth setup with Rubicon express control arms. The Nth method uses a triangle shaped traction bar to the center of the pumpkin to control axle wrap, oh with leaf springs axle wrap is almost imposible to get rid of with out this method.
Now what is best leafs or coil?
Leafs are a ancient design form the horse and buggy days, and need a lot of work to track, control axle wrap, articulate, etc that a 4 link coil spring system has controled stock, however to lift a 4 link coil spring system you need to spend a lot of money and do custom work to get it right as no manufacturer of lifts has it correct. Remember they are competing for a price point you can afford and so the systems are a good compromise that most wheelers will never out wheel. Fact of the matter over 1/2 of them will never get away from the mall.
A Cj is an antique, you do not get one to go out wheeling without the understanding that you bought something that needs a lot of work to get it to wheel and not rip to pieces. In a day of lockers, which were a dream product in the day, and trails designed to bend frames, all this not in the realm in the days of CJs. Most Cjs are bought to be street queens or light wheelers. Those who want to go out and abuse their CJs, such as I will spend a lot of time and money prepping them. I have just spent 6 months and close to 15 grand setting up a CJ5 to rock crawl on leaf springs. Axles fully locked, rear converted to a full floater, front set up with a auto locker, chrome moly axles, new tranny with hardened gears, rebuild the t case with larger bearings and new gears, new axles with upgraded u joints, center force clutch system, roller chain clutch linkage, GM truck disc brakes, ford truck MC, upgrded brake plumbing and this is just the drive train, add springs and welding custom brackets, a Warn powerplant winch custom bumper and planning a custom rear bumper/carier and you can see why it cost so much, I still need to fab a traction bar for the rear diff and finish boxing the frame, CJ frames are so light they twist up under the loads of modern wheeling.
My Advice to anyone wanting to get a CJ to wheel hard.is that if they do not have a good welding skills and great fab skills is to sell it and get a Wrangler. Look at what some members have done to get them ready for mud here and you will see that they are not cheap to wheel.
I hope this helps to answer the question that a TJ or JK is miles ahead of a CJ in suspension. But are pricey to lift correctly as they take so much more to do.
Click to expand...

Very nicely written. I guess I am getting a bit ahead of myself. It would never really be that extreme. I have Cliffs Insane Terrain an hour and half and way and The Bad Lands four hours away. There would be little to know rocks, mainly dirt and mud obstacles.
 
IOPort51 said:
To do an acceptable job of what you propose the percentage of jeep parts that would be left would amount to a CJ body cut up and butchered to set on top of the fabricated frame.
Click to expand...
yes But I have the skills to do this to my CJ6 :chug:
 
sbrodacz said:
Very nicely written. I guess I am getting a bit ahead of myself. It would never really be that extreme. I have Cliffs Insane Terrain an hour and half and way and The Bad Lands four hours away. There would be little to know rocks, mainly dirt and mud obstacles.
Click to expand...
get a good set of springs, a setof beefy axles, 35s and a v8, tune the lift so the huge wide tirs do not rub the frame and put the pedal to the metal mud bogging it and have a blast, Leaf springs work great in the Mud
 
you know, I can get to a show in my CJ6 on 31s, park nect to a extremely tricked out Wrangler and get 3 times the attention he does. Makes those guys so envious they turn green as my little CJ is more of a crowd gatherer than their Money pit chromed beast. Why? CJs are just so much cooler, but then they also will not do what he can.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Jeep-CJ Donation Drive

Help support Jeep-CJ.com by making a contribution.

Help support Jeep-CJ.com by making a contribution.
Goal
$200.00
Earned
$25.00
This donation drive ends in
Contribute
Back
Top Bottom