97 4Runner Crawler

I went that route to save a little time. Haven’t beat on it at an off-road park yet, but so far I like it. The Johnny joints are a plus since mine will see the road. Uptravel is limited by the upper link hitting the round crossmember which no one seems to mention….i squeezed 14” smoothies in there, but 12” would have been a lot easier and no body lift.

 

I feel like you could fit coilovers on mine with an extra 1.5” wide per side at the wheels and if you notched out damn near all the frame. Tower would have to be more stout than the relocate I have.

As someone who four linked the front and rear of a Tacoma, I can safely say anything’s possible, but be prepared to move and cut and have hairs worth of clearance lol

that being said, maybe it’s me, but I blame this on the three link- when I flex out in the 4Runner I swear the whole truck turns. I had long double triangulated links on the Tacoma so it had very very little rear steer. I’d definitely shoot for that if you go that route. Move the gas tank and it’s pretty wide open back there. Build a custom crossmember and triangulate heavy. Axle side if your uppers are on the pumpkin it’s gonna be a tight fit fully stuffed. May not get a lot of separation.

 

How long are the links on the LT3 kit? And any pics showing where bump is limited by the crossmember?

Links still look 30” or smaller to me which would be a big improvement over ~23” lowers now but I think a diy kit would be better with the different axle.

it will be out of a gx so I don’t think any of the mount placement will work. I could change axle mounts to make it work but I’m kinda missing out on all the pre built geometry then.

So a diy kit with ~36” lowers is possible to get a little less rear steer and that way I can tuck up the lower mounts at least partially next to the frame instead of below.

That just leaves the issue of uptravel with the crossmember. I can notch it and reinforce if needed, and I really don’t plan on crazy uptravel anyways since I would have to get crazy with a tub job.

kinda leaning towards trying to figure out a cantilever kit then use 10” coilovers I already have. Would keep it somewhat hidden compared to trailing arms

 

Lowers are about 32” eye to eye fully threaded in. I had to move the upper link to the bottom mounting option to help clear the crossmember. Would probably be easier to cut it out and rebuilt something. It doesn’t stop it by much, but if I wanted to get every fraction of an inch or use the top frame side mount then I’d have to do something about it. That being said, I don’t think my panhard will go up much further without hitting the frame. Not a great picture, but don’t have anything from cycling it-

 

Well I tried to be lazy and see how far the mounts on this axle were from bolting up. Looked close but it would be a bit more work than I want to deal with, and I don’t have time before a trip if I want to drive this.

it’s a bolt in gx470 9.5” axle that had the lower links moved and was used with a 3 link. If I bolted it in, shocks would be at crazy angles and hit the lower links, everything else could work, just don’t know if it’s worth the work just to be lazy and have 10” upper links still. Spring perches are 31.5 wide vs 30 stock, upper links are 18.5 vs 18 wide, lower links are 42 vs 38 wide, shock mounts are 52 vs 47. I might be able to make it work as is if I move the pin top shocks to tabs on the outside of the frame. Passenger upper hit the panhard crossmember but I think it will clear with the axle forward where it should be.

Will be nice to have the discs from the 470 too, I’ll probably have to get into the brakes under the hood so I gotta learn what the deal with that stuff is, but I’m hoping to keep the same MC and maybe remove the abs stuff for a manual proportioning valve if needed?

looking around at how it looked under there, I don’t want to mess with trailing arms or cantilever because it would be a ton of work. If I lean that way I will find a tacoma.

 

Had a few uneventful wheeling trips including taking it back to St. Louis over the holidays. Finally got it up a nasty waterfall I haven’t driven since it got washed out a couple years ago. Not many pics so here is me about flipping it not paying attention while backing up



Took it apart again last week since I was bored. Really been avoiding any projects on it because my mind is stuck on a Tacoma. Glad I did tear it apart since the passenger lbj bolts were all backed out and could be undone by hand.

Pulled the steering rack to see if I can swap it for some better road manners, 7 or whatever years is pretty impressive but I’m sure it was leaking and it shows some signs of wear. Pinion chewed up, guide worn down and rubbing the steel, rod scored from it, and the rack was separating where the tube meets the casting.





Thinking I may order a hydraulic ram to setup behind the steering rack, powered through the rack servo and connected to the rack like a slider. I have the ports on a new rack drilled out to try and get good enough flow.

There should be enough room to tuck a ram above the skid on a new crossmember that helps support the skid. I’ll have to straighten out the skid some since it looks like a banana but maybe a piece of dom in there will help keep it in place. Got a tube bender and I am itching for a project with it anyways.



or I just need to slow down because these skids are getting pretty rough.

 

Do you run the rack without a bellows on it like that?

 

Yes, that one went for over 2 years like that. I'm sure that's what caused a lot of the wear and it was probably leaking somewhere but I never noticed it loosing and PS fluid from the reservoir level so its a non issue in my book.

Most of what I wheel is sandy clay stuff so probably just about worse case for destroying a rack like that. Bellows or not I'm impressed it lasted that long, and it was still fine to keep using in my book but street drivability isn't high on my list haha

 

Ram fits decent, hangs down lower than I would like. Plan on a tube bent down between the frame rails welded to a plate that goes forward to the crossmember. ill have to reform the skids and the mount will need to hold up to a good impact for when I drop on it.

Plan to drill out steering clevises for a 3/4 bolt and thread that bolt into something that is attached to the ram to attach the two.

Going to give it a shot with the stock steering pump before swapping to see how well it flows, ram will take double about the flow rate of the rack, but have twice the power. If it doesn’t work then an upgraded pump should have about 30% more powder as well.

Taking some measurements, it seems like the rack is 1/4” or so off center… don’t know if it’s just from of abuse or they are just like that, if anyone can check theirs that would be nice. Pics from the back where I can see LCA bolts or alignment tabs might be able to do it.

 

Is that the NAPA rack I put in 7 years ago still?

 

Yep… pretty impressive it is still functional after all that

Probably broke a dozen or more tie rods with it haha

 

We should both figure out exactly how much hard wheeling we did with it. Then get some photos together of those trips and send it all to NAPA. It could get you brand ambassador status which would be free racks and rods for life. At the very least it should get a spot on the wall of fame. Suck it all you OEM only fools. lol

 

I’m not Instagram famous enough for that shit haha

 

DE ram behind the rack is done, took it on the first test drive and it is an odd feeling because there is almost zero feedback. Getting used to it fast though.

stock steering pump keeps up pretty well unless I try to rip the wheel over. Going to stick with stock pump for a bit then maybe upgrade.

wheeling tomorrow to really test it, but for now stationary with the front locked I can steer with one finger on dry concrete.

 

Didn’t break anything wheeling so I’m happy.

Steering worked well. Best way I can think to describe the feeling is it takes more input force to steer but it stays much more constant unless you really bind it up. Higher speeds it does feel a touch more twitchy but I don’t know how much of this is just me being aware of adjustments I make because it requires a little more input on the wheel. Still can steer with one hand relaxed cruising at 70-80. I can feel some feedback and it has some return to center but it doesn't take the wheel all the way back like it used to. Could be a bad alignment though because I never checked toe with the new rack. I think pretty much all of this is just caused by the drag in the big ram.

Offroad the only time I bound up the steering when testing in a rock garden is when my sidewall was pushed into a rock and it would have to push the whole vehicle over or rip the bead off to steer. I never bound it up when wheeling normally.

I do also have torque seal on a bunch of stuff up front and have not seen anything come loose yet in ~150 miles

Honestly don’t remember how hard it was to steer locked up on concrete before but it steers no problem now.

97 4runner steering 2.5x8” ram assist
https://youtube.com/shorts/nEgm9nHtetw?feature=share

Overall scope of the project if someone wants to replicate:

Drill out rack servo ports to 1/4” if I remember right

1 3/4 tube crossmember below trans with a 1/4” plate bridging the gap to the rear ifs crossmember, I reinforced this pretty significantly because I’m sure I will drop on it hard.

Ram is mounted on the 1/4” plate ~4.2” behind the rack measuring from the centers of the rods

I used two washers under the rear diff mount to get a bit more clearance for the ram on the u joint

2x.250 tube fits super tight over the 1.5” rod of the 2.5x8 ram, I .5” from the end of a 6.5” tube I cut 3/4 of the way through the tube, put in a 1/4” plate with a 3/4 hole drilled and bolted it up to the ram to center it in the tube then welded it to the tube. So .5” of the tube sleeves over the ram rod, then 1/4” plate bolted to the ram, then the rest of the tube extends out.

I just kept the 1/2” size bolts the camburg clevis is made for, but swapped to fine thread. Got 12pt hardware but don’t want to be stuck without a 1/2” 12pt socket and be SOL so I stuck with normal 1/2-20 grade 8 bolts. These are only in single shear between ram and rack so they could for sure break.

To connect the ram to rack u got some 1/2-20 bung things that were 1” diameter and 1” long off McMaster and welded them into a tube that I welded to the 2x.250 tube and reinforced that with some plate.

PS lines, got some m14 o ring to -6 adapters off summit and got some -6 hoses made to go to the ram. No ps lines are run to the piston area on the rack, just through the servo.

My ram is also not limited. I will limit to 6” of stroke in the future probably but it doesn’t seem to be an issue. I can only turn the steering wheel so far because of the stops inside the rack, so I figure it won’t be pushing any more fluid to the ram past that because the servo won’t turn.