Off-Roading with your Daily Driver?

With adjustable 5100s, you do not need new coils in the front. They are made to work with the stock coils up to the top setting (though the higher ring you set it to, the more it will increase ride stiffness), and stock UCAs. That's the point of the 5100s, to get some lift and an improved shock without having to replace any other parts.

I have the 5100s, set to the 3rd ring. When I was shopping for them I confirmed they could be set to the highest setting without replacing the coils or the UCAs, with Josh from Wheeler's offroad. Further research elsewhere confirmed this.

Once you lift above 2.5-3" you will need to replace other parts, like the coils and UCAs.

 

Watch a drag racer tire in super slow mo. The tires are so big because they need to be to handle the sheer amount of power being sent to them. Somewhere around 10,000 HP and 7,500 tq. And that's all at once. It's not like on our trucks were it has to build up the rev range. Those cars are dump clutch- 100% of engine power trying to spin the wheels.
It's also the heat they create. Or more accurately, the heat they create in the tire. The tire pressure is super low on them when they take off and it builds as they go because of the heat created. When watching the slow-mo of the tire flex, you'll notice the tire gets taller too as the air heats up to fill the tire.

 

If you are doing the work yourself, I think it's better to get everything at once.
If you are replacing the shocks on the front, you have to take the spring off of the original and put it on the new one correct? You need special tools for that to do it safely. New OME springs with the 5100's and an add a leaf isn't much more expensive. I'm a cheapskate but I'f I'm upgrading my suspension, I'm doing it right and not reusing stock parts when replacing them is fairly cheap. I'd rather do it all at once, than have to take it all apart again because I don't like the way it rode afterwords.

 

Thats totally fair. I plan on keeping my setup the way it is for long time. When the time comes, I'll replace and upgrade more stuff.

As for needing special tools to remove the coil, I did it with the floor jack/LCA method, without any problems. If thats considered "unsafe" then I took a risk... lol but it worked without any issues.

 

That's technically true, but having a lift does help you get over bigger objects. The more clearance to the body/frame allows you to put your tire on the object that would hang up on your axle. It also helps with your approach and departure angle. On an IFS truck it helps with ground clearance in the front. So there are benefits to a lift even if your rear axle still hangs low.

 

Yup, i was referencing shoes and PSI they exert on the ground. As for flotation, skinnys are good in snow, and wider tires on sharp rocks.

 

Why are wider tire good on sharp rocks?

 

I am assuming more surface area distributes pressure more evenly?

 

But that example doesn't translate to vehicles in the snow. A snowshoe is used to literally keep people on top of the snow. There's this notion that wider tires make vehicles float over terrain; I don't think these people realize that theyre suggesting a 285 tire would help a 4000+ lbs vehicle float on anything.

What a wide tire does in snow and sand is keep more of it plowing in front of the vehicle than a thinner tire.

 

Less gouging, punctures, etc. Lower PSI per square area will be pushing
down less on rocks. Aired down skinnys with the same ground patch area will see the same benefit.

 

Not technically true, but you can think of it that way and it practically works. More surface area allows the force (truck weight) to disperse. So when you hit something sharp, there is less force from the tire contacting that point (less chance of puncture).

I was reading through this thread and I wanted to pull my hair out with some of the physics logic throughout this.

Source: BS in Physics and MS in Eng.

 

Like which part?

So wider tires help with puncture resistance? I thought the claim was that they give you better traction? I think we went over there a few pages back.

 

I don't want to rehash, I know it settled down. Not looking to start argument, but will chime in now.

Why not both? Why is traction and puncture resistance mutually exclusive?

 

Not necessarily evenly but more area reduces ground pressure.

Tanks in WWII would increase track width with weight of the tanks to help with ground pressure to help prevent them from sinking in mud

 

The tire question isn't an easy one to answer.
It's actually a very difficult concept and comes down to the atoms/molecules at the interface of both parts touching (viscolasticity) and the resistance to frictional shearing. Look up tire load sensitivity.
It's hard to explain by using the basic physic-mechanic formulas people talk about. These formulas don't show the full picture. They are limited and do not apply to certain things.
One of the things that does not apply to this formula are tires.


The friction force formula you see online is correct: Friction_force=N*mu. We do not see area in this. It is false to say that the area does not affect the friction.

What if I said the area is actually hidden inside the coefficient of kinetic friction,mu?

The most simple basic way to explain.
Lets start here:
The coefficient of friction is affected by pressure. As pressure increases resistance to frictional shearing decreases. That means that your mu decreases as pressure increases. This can be explained by reading into viscoelasticity but it is a very complicated subject that deals with the atoms and molecules at the interface of both materials.

So how do you reduce pressure to increase your friction coefficient therefore increasing “grip”?

You increase you area. (Contact patch) Same vehicle weight, more area. Less pressure.

There you have it. I spent way too much time trying to put this into words. Hopefully it can help someone.

 

What is crunching? Best bet is learning how to drive off-road better and knowing your limits. I did same trail as buddy with TRD pro with full skids. I have stock OR. He scraped all over the place. I was able to finesse it. That being said he had more fun knowing all the crunching he experienced was on things meant to be crunched on.

Also TRD off-road is just a marketing term. Don’t think it means anything other than a few extra grand.

 

A marketing term that comes with an electronic locker among other things....

Money well spent..

 

If I would have known locker was limited to 4lo I wouldn’t have gotten it.

 

I’m in the same exact situation.