Long Travel BS Thread

all stock parts?

 

No me first

 

Yes. Aside from the Howe pump. Approximately 190k. My odometer is out and everything gutted out of the cab. Never corrected for larger tires for way too long.

 

Trails are finally starting to dry up

 

TE design?

 

Yeeeeee

 

I finished building something this weekend.

 

stole @906taco steering idea and made it sketchy haha

2.5x8 ram steers 37s below 10psi with a front locker easily. Stock steering pump keeps up pretty well with drilled out ports coming out of the servo.

the only time it bound up is when I put a sidewall into a rock or wall and try to turn and push the vehicle over.

Steering feel is a lot different, stiffer steering and less feedback and return to center, think it is all from all the drag in the ram.

still can drive 80 with one hand, but I feel like I’m steering back and forth more, maybe I just notice it because the steering wheel requires more input.

 

So would you say the street-ability is worse than just a stock rack?
Would love to set something up like this, but the on-road feel is important since I don't trailer my truck.

Could you eliminate the rack if you took the steering input straight into a load reaction orbital valve and still have the return to center function?

 

Also don't know if you've seen this thread, but you can increase the pressure of the stock pump with some mods

 

Hello all, I am looking to long travel my 96 Tacoma and keep it 4wd. I found some used parts (upper control arm, lower control arm and spindle) for sale near me that were off a 2wd LT Tacoma. Is it possible to make it a 4x just by adding in an extended cv or is there more work that needs to be put into it? Or is it even possible with a 2wd kit because of the spindle? Thanks for any and all tips or ideas! I am new to long travel and still learning!

 

What was your method of joining the two together? How did you depower the factory rack? And is the factory rack still on rubber or is it solid mounted? Hopefully you did limit the ram travel, as well.

All of these will play part in steering feel etc. and it’s possible you may just need to refine things along the way. The 2.5x8 simply has too much volume which is going to make the steering feel tight while also impacting return to center as there is too much fluid to push back through the servo quick enough. However, if you made large diameter stops to eat up some of the fluid capacity, it may help to some degree. But it is good to know it does work as expected.

 

I think in my case street-ability is very slightly worse (10% ish?)… but I also haven’t driven this in a long time so I may just be used to a much better driving vehicle.

I could get rid of the rack and replace the servo with an orbital but I really like the idea of a mechanical connection. Its kept me on a stock rack for a few years every time I think about just doing full hydro.

I have a bunch of oem ps pumps and I don’t think they have the same valve as the aftermarket pumps shown in that thread.

2x.250 tube sleeved over ram rod with a plate inside to bolt up to the end of the ram. 1.25” Tube with a 1/2-20 bung coming off the 2” tube with gussets that bolts up to the bolt that goes through the tie rod clevis. 1/2” bolt is likely the biggest weak point but I was too lazy to drill out stuff to 5/8 or 3/4”


I took off the stock lines that exit the servo, drilled out those ports on the servo to make it flow easier, and replaced them with adapters to -6 then ran lines straight to the ram. The factory rack ps ports are just left open for now.

rack is still rubber mounted. I hope this may keep it intact better and make the ram take more of the force idk. Also just too lazy and impatient to make solid mounts for a first gen rack. I also think this gives me a little wiggle room before bind if the rack and ram are not 100% parallel

ram is not limited. Has not given me an issue yet, I think because the steering wheel cannot turn past the factory stops in the rack. Even if I get to full lock and lean into the wheel it is a very hard stop. I figure since the servo can’t turn any past the factory stop, the ram doesn’t get anymore fluid to push past the 6” that it is using.

psc 2.5” ram with 1.5” rod only takes 5% more fluid to move one inch than a psc 2.25” ram with 1.125” rod, so I chose the 2.5 because I figured it would be stiffer from bending etc. with the larger rod. Mounting blocks are also all the same size and that is the bigger limiting factor on how much space it takes up. I however did not think about added friction inside the 2.5 ram with a significantly larger rod and I think that may play into the stiffer steering and less return to center.


I do plan to limit the ram but I wanted to see how it acted without, and was impatient to drive it. I dinged up the rod some as well so that could make it harder to steer, and I should probably replace it when I limit the ram.

 

Need to remember, the piston internally limits the factory rack. Not the pinion. If you lean into the wheel you are going to put an extreme amount of pressure on things without stops.

Also, depending on how you depowered. It is likely to cause significant drag in its self. Internal modification is necessary for properly depowering a rack. (Used to do this to “race cars” to eliminate the drag from an PS pump) And could be some of the return to center issues.

Solid mounting will decrease bind as well. You don’t want one solid and one on rubber, though it will still work. It’s not ideal.

While crunching numbers on servo flow based on opening ports on BOTH the servo and servo housing to the largest you can based on spacing between seals, a 2.25” ram is right on the line of being too much.

I’m sure with some time refining things you will get it dialed in regardless.

You can see here how extreme I went on opening the ports on my servo to compensate for the assist and quick 1 turn steering on my truck.

 

that and having the ram solid with the rack on rubber could be part of your over steering, since the ram will be able to push the rack side to side if there’s latitudinal forces against the wheel before it can overcome and than turn.

 

Thanks for the suggestions.

Interested to see how well you can get it dialed in with a more professional job Cory.

 

I wouldn’t call it professional, rather a science experiment at this point!

I’ll let you know what we come up with on this side!

 

It's not "done" yet but the main structure is there. I'm happy with it so far.

 

Got a wee bit carried away on the aesthetics on the Mrs bumper. That was a whole lot of time blending everything in.