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Sequoia Family Crawler

You guys are too kind, I need some criticism to maintain drive.

Funny enough I went to Sand Hollow this passed weekend and rock crawled for the first time ever in a Jeep WJ on 33s. Had quite the variation of rigs with us from 4Runners on leaves to Jeeps on tons and 42s. Main takeaway is the projected 126in wheelbase should help everywhere as long as belly scrapes are planned for and body armor is more important than I realized. Comfortably seating a family of 5 is paramount on this build but the nearly fullsize width is going to be a challenge. Got sketchy a couple times with the family not all too concerned so this may not all be for naught. The wife even seemed generally interested in running The Chute before a monsoon rolled in and chased us out.
 
Motiracer38 said:
You guys are too kind, I need some criticism to maintain drive.

Funny enough I went to Sand Hollow this passed weekend and rock crawled for the first time ever in a Jeep WJ on 33s. Had quite the variation of rigs with us from 4Runners on leaves to Jeeps on tons and 42s. Main takeaway is the projected 126in wheelbase should help everywhere as long as belly scrapes are planned for and body armor is more important than I realized. Comfortably seating a family of 5 is paramount on this build but the nearly fullsize width is going to be a challenge. Got sketchy a couple times with the family not all too concerned so this may not all be for naught. The wife even seemed generally interested in running The Chute before a monsoon rolled in and chased us out.
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That's awesome on the family being comfortable while offroading.
 
thezentree said:
Seriously. My wife wants no part of it. :frown:
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Understandable there for sure. When we get a chance to wheel, we have a mix of wives/lady friends between those wanting to do hard trails and those that want to get out almost immediately once the ground is no longer level.
 
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I think it helps that our last trip was four days at medium speed in the prerunner so having A/C, plenty of snacks, and kids to wrangle helped keep her mind busy.

Power adders are pretty far down the list, need to focus on reliability and cooling as this will be pulling overlander duty more often than not. I do have to re-route the exhaust to get around the front driveshaft and 3rd link so it may pick up some flow there.
 
I've been working through getting the steering built which required building lower links and cycling the suspension to bump. I have a 2x8x1.25 double ended ram mounted to the axle that gets in the way of the of the draglink at full bump, the Toyota box and stock pitman arm only travels 7.5 in so I can't use the same mount on the knuckle. I'm also trying for a flat drag link and panhard bar at ride height to minimize axle walk and raise the roll center so it's all a lot to juggle.
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My first crack at mounting the steering box had it tucked in tight and cleared the axle well but looked fishy for tire clearance. Through a wheel up, trimmed enough sheetmetal to turn to the steering stops and it crashed into the box well shy of full throw. I took a step back, unbolted my newly mounted box and slid it forward enough to clear the full 40deg of steering. It's wild to me how much room is needed even with my narrowed frame. I looked at an inboard box from a WJ from that would have shrunk my radiator room substantially or required removal of the core support to push the cooling package forward which I don't want to commit to yet. The front body mounts were deleted for tire clearance so I may end up there anyways.
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6 inches of up travel and 40 deg of steering led to some copious trimming of the fender but was able to keep the corner marker for now. We'll see what flexxing it out does to it some day.
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Man this thing is cool. Next time you get a chance, post some more pics of the subframe, links, and steering. I'm so jealous of all that uptravel.
 
I'd post more but I'm still scratching my head getting it all together. The panhard bar is the last to get figured out. It'll squeeze between the ram and the oil pan then bend up to mount on the axle and needs to be almost 4ft long to match the drag link.
 
Needs more dimple dies cause they pull bitchs! Or pack with mud, but whatever.

Also needs Hemet arms.
 
what wait a sec..... your not doing high steer with super duty knuckles. i never really looked at them serious yet, but i was thinking the bolt hole was below the axle. and your ram and tie rod would just get destroyed. i like this idea

thats very interesting for sure.
 
do you have a photo of looking head on to the axle, i would like to see how the ram and tie rod are in relation to center line of axle tube
 
I should finish this up in a couple days and get good pictures, my 5/8 drill bit didn't survive drilling out the pitman arm and stopped all progress. It's not much different than the weld on steering arm kits everybody sells with the ram mounted at the stock steering arm level and the draglink connected to a plate spaced off, almost even with the top of the knuckle. This put the ram above the bottom of the axle tubes by an inch or so. I'm not sure how worried about it to be but 'll likely put a bumper on the axle just for paranoia sake.
 
bdkw1 said:
Needs more dimple dies cause they pull bitchs! Or pack with mud, but whatever.

Also needs Hemet arms.
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I despise dimple dies just for the sake of cleaning.

A hemet arm is very tempting and I have drafted a few up but they need a ton of wheel to frame clearance in order to allow full flex but my rear frame is way too wide. I have enough wheelbase to place shocks behind the second row on a trailing arm with a 1.4 motion ratio going just passed 90deg at bump, only problem is the shock will be inside the frame. The lower links are angled quite a bit out so that the axle mount is about a standard width so roll stiffness should be about normal. Sway bars are unknown but with such a big body I don't think I can avoid them for long. Also need to prioritize storage as this is an overlanding vehicle after all. Sacrificing suspension for scottle storage space is the norm.
 
Land the Hemet arm link on the trailing arm, get it down next to the axle and out of the way. Bro! :flipoff2:
 
It's another link mounted to the chassis that mount the shocks to with a link to the axle transferring the load. Not circled in red in the picture below, but the fat one coming from the back. Named after the socal back water dirt ball town many of the early innovators came from. Also called a mezzanine arm since the shocks are mounted up out of the way as if in the mezzanine.
Hemet Arm.jpg


I still prefer my scottle storage area.
 
chaplinfj60 said:
ok

what the heck is a Hemet arm link on the trailing arm

i just dont know. :beer:
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Thanks for asking as I had no idea either.

Motiracer38 said:
It's another link mounted to the chassis that mount the shocks to with a link to the axle transferring the load. Not circled in red in the picture below, but the fat one coming from the back. Named after the socal back water dirt ball town many of the early innovators came from. Also called a mezzanine arm since the shocks are mounted up out of the way as if in the mezzanine.
Hemet Arm.jpg


I still prefer my scottle storage area.
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Thanks for the info, name history :lmao:, and picture. So it's a literal trailing arm then.
 
Motiracer38 said:
It's another link mounted to the chassis that mount the shocks to with a link to the axle transferring the load. Not circled in red in the picture below, but the fat one coming from the back. Named after the socal back water dirt ball town many of the early innovators came from. Also called a mezzanine arm since the shocks are mounted up out of the way as if in the mezzanine.
Hemet Arm.jpg


I still prefer my scottle storage area.
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More like (Barstow) Rick Johnsons TT, keeps the shocks lower down but not as far as the Baldwin TT's.
 
I've seen people with Tundra's and Tacoma's replace the entire front frame rails with them tapered narrower up front for steering box clearance since the sequoia and tundra frames are so wide. I'm excited to see what you do with the rear suspension to maintain the 2nd row seat
 
so this rig back in 2000 did his 3 link front by having one mount attach to axle in front. very wild indeed. not sure where i was going with this but its what i thought of


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So was that forward wishbone the lower links off the front of the axle? That looks like it could work since it would protect high steer with it behind the wishbone. You just gotta make sure that's strong since it will be your front skid plate as well
 
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