So you push your 1st gen offroad - what cracks next?

I welded mine on and made some side plate. Not nearly as elegant as what Ryan did.

 

Interesting! Most of us have seen that failure/fatigue on the passenger side first. I would encourage you to add limit straps to eliminate the yanking energy the shock and LCA are putting on the coil bucket.

 

Yeah, I can see the benefit of limit straps. I've always associated them with long travel or SAS...which I know very very little about.
It looks pretty straight forward. Run the bottom of the strap from a longer lower shock bolt to a welded tab?

 

Yes, pretty much. I attached the lower end to my unused sway bar mount.

 

Ahhh! That makes sense! I also have an unused sway bar mount.

 

That's a beefy shock bucket.

 

What length did you get? Thinking of getting some straps to prevent any of this

 

7" Karteks are the way to go.

 

I still haven't strapped my front since ADS said not to. Wonder if I'll regret that...

 

Did they give a reason why?

 

Said with the "top out protection" it would end up limiting the travel/not letting it do what it's supposed to do.

 

What is this magical top out protection of which you speak? Is there evidence it will somehow keep coil buckets from shattering?

 

Old school air shock tech in oem ADS coilovers, yours probably have it. It's an internal spring to slow the last 1-2 inch of droop.

 

I wonder how much it actually helps with top out forces.
Is ADS the only ones that do that? Does Fox?

 

Wouldn't it still transmit energy up thru the top hat? A strap stops all that.

Edit: To say it better...

Wouldn't it still transmit energy down thru the top hat and therefore yank on the CB?

 

yup since the 70's or 80's on 2.0 air shocks to lessen the top out feeling on very light vehicles. Current FOX OEM is a small rubber bumper on the back of the seal head that breaks apart if you top out enough.

I assume its still pulling down on the coil bucket at droop, they all do it. The droop spring lessens the full droop yank you feel. Limit straps are the way to go to help with the failure you experienced.

 

In order to do straps, I would still need to limit the shock before it fully reaches the end of it's travel right? And either way straps do nothing for the upward forces the coil bucket experiences. If anything straps and a cross brace are the only true solution to help mitigate the forces on the buckets, even with decent bump stops. I'll definitely be interested to see how the buckets hold up now that I have been going much faster.

 

How did you go about fixing this? Just noticed a crack on my 02 in the same spot

 

I cut out a section and boxed it back in with 3/16" plate. There were also cracks starting by all the other bed mounts. So lots of other little welds, reinforcements, and rivets used throughout. No issues thus far.

 

Wow looks great! Thanks for the quick reply!