Marlin Crawler's New Rock Crawling Long Travel IFS Suspension System (#RCLT)

I missed it. Maybe his channel will be like Max Powell, where the sponsors have left, and we just see his day to day. Hope things are well with him, and that us forum people weren't too hard on him

 

Maybe he's setting up a competitor to bleepingjeep. Like f'ingyota.

 

Lol.

 

naa. hes a hardcore jeep guy. besides the RCLT, he has dogged that tacoma since he bought it. some of it is warranted but think he seemed to go overboard on somethings

 

Yea I know that was a joke. He started out on bleepingjeep. 3rd gens are piles of shit though, so he's probably right.

 

Hey, that's offensive. He had a good platform to start with, but he managed to make it a pile of dog shit.

 

Screw that dude..

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuOF-NDz2tc

 

Last week I got RCLT HD on Metal Cloak's Corner Travel Index (CTI)/articulation trailer for the first time and was very pleased with the results. Nice to have actual matter-of-fact numbers and the tech/operator being impressed with IFS was the cherry on the top. Please note this is our +3.50" version that I and four others are prototyping in preparation for production, so it has an inch or so more down travel than our +2.75" kit.

The way they score this is they lift opposite corners until at least one tire comes off the trailer, then they measure the height of both blue pedestals for a static score at each corner. They can do this for all four (run the test twice using both opposite corners), but for sake of time due to how many rigs were out there lined up every day (this was at the Easter Jeep Safari, Moab), they just did one opposite corner lift and then doubled the score. Then, they multiply that score by 20 to have a final score approaching (and sometimes exceeding) "1,000" to be comparable to a Ramp Travel Index (RTI) score. The main benefit of CTI over RTI is that it removes wheel base from the equation, so the front and rear suspension are isolated to articulate as well as they can without any wheelbase factor playing a roll (they do not measure anyone's wheelbase).

In my case, the passenger front tire raised 20" above the trailer deck and the driver rear raised 21". They then add the two together which is 41. They then multiply this by 20, which results in a CTI score of 820. For reference, according to Metal Cloak the best full F&R suspension kit on the market for a Jeep JK Wrangler scores 905 and a stock JK scores 540. I think there is about another 1" more to gain in the front and 1 to 2" more to gain in the rear, so a CTI score of 880 is mayyyyyybe possible. I also noticed a few rigs in our group were only running around 20? PSI tire pressure, whereas I was at 32, and having your tires squat makes a difference. For example, if each tire bulges only just 1", this would add 40 points to the score (1" front tire + 1" rear tire = 2 * 20 = 40).

I think I was most shocked about how my rear 3-link, which runs 47" main links & 14" shocks, was only able to achieve 1" more travel than this prototype +3.50" RCLT HD. I think IFS does flex pretty well, more than people give it credit for, it just looks strange because the tires remain vertical, especially with the stable geometry of RCLT HD.

Jason from AutoEdits posted a video from the experience which I turned into a short 1.5 min snippet for our channel:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00wKv07d12w


...and here is the full 12-min version. The Suburban with front 4-link and rear leafs was no joke, that thing is beautiful and scored an insane 1,010 CTI which they said was one of the highest of the day! Get this: It weighs just over 8,000 lbs as shown!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZ7lqCThxgg

 

Cool to see you back in here promoting the kit. Looks great on the ramp. I posted in the RCLT Owner's forum under the "Known Issues" thread on April 3, then followed up on April 12, then sent an email to customer service on April 18... and have yet to receive a reply to my query. I think it is an important issue related to metal on metal contact during turning and I was curious if a solution was found to avoid the problem. Hope you can get back to me soon.

 

Don’t hold your breath

 

Hey SR! Sorry we never got back to this! Metal-on-metal steering-stop contact exists with factory Toyota IFS. Our setup instead relies on the large steering rack + lower stainless steel ball joints as a steering stop, so once the lower stainless steel uniball has broken-in with its stainless steel misalignment spacers, the metal contact at the upper uniball cup will no longer be an issue. Once everything breaks-in, you can add touch-up paint to the upper uniball cup so you won't have to worry about rust issues. (I expect RCLT HD to have less rust issues than the stock Toyota IFS.) I'll update the Owners Club this evening or weekend, haven't posted to our forum since before leaving for Moab!

How's everything else coming along with it? Kyle pointed out to me that it was ME who provided the incorrect brake caliper hardline part numbers from an email we sent out last year where I included the incorrect SKUsWere you able to get those caliper lines sorted out?

Regards,
BigMike

Edit: I am slowly working on the next Instructions update and will include this paint/rust info in the break-in procedure. (I'll be in Moab again next week and plan to get this update pushed the first week of May.) (I'll be in Moab a 3rd time the last week of May -- Events are finally happening thanks to the drop-off in Covid regulations!)

 

Good to see good articulation on that @BigMike . I think I understand that 20" in front and 21" in the rear indicates well balanced F-R spring rates. Is that a correct read of the situation? What is the current limiting factor to your front up travel?

 

does King shocks make a LT shock that's compatible?

• Long Travel Coil-overs
2.5-inch LT coil-over with a 24.5" extended length and 8" stroke, or equivalent.

 

I wonder if they would get the same from each corner if only one corner was done at a time.

 

Short answer: yes
Long answer: People need to get past nonsensical terms like "long-travel" because they don't exist. You simply have different length shocks and coilovers all of which can be made to whatever spec you want.

OEM replacements are about a 5" stroke.

 

Hi, first time posting here. Feel free to tear me apart. I was installing the passenger side UCA and the bolt slides smoothly thru until it got about halfway into the rear lug. I tried beating it in and finagling for a long time with no progress. I decided to run the bolt thru with the UCA off and found the the rear lug is terribly misaligned. The picture where I thread the bolt from the rear lug shows how off it is from the front lug.

Has anyone had a similar issue? I have already emailed Marlin. Thanks for your time.

edit: the first picture is the furthest the bolt will go in from the front to the rear.

 

Do you have a straight edge that you can verify the bolt is straight? Mine were tweaked when I did my JD kit install.

edit- bought new ones I didn’t have trouble with one of the sides anymore.

 

$7000 and they can’t give you a new $10 bolt?