Squeaky Penguin's (Trip Reports) Build Thread

Ah yes. I remember this spot very well. Going up I hugged the wall. Coming back down I put all 4 on the lower line. Was very close to the drop off. I think Monte thought I was crazy. Butt clencher for sure.

 

Would still net you more travel...not a ton. But some.

 

True, but you will be changing the balance of up and down travel in favor of down unless you have a ton of lift.

 

How's the snow up in your area, Brett? Rough total of base remaining at this point?

 

There is a couole feet. We got another 12-14 inches between last Thursday and Saturday. If you wanted to hike you could ski the top of the mountain.

 

Just checking in...

This post is funny. Toyota guys are excited about converting to SUA and Jeep guys are excited to convert to SOA. I have my opinions but, since my leaf spring builds are in the rear view mirror, I'm sure you guys are way ahead of me on that.

 

Everybody wants a rock to wind a piece of string around.

 

What Leo said. More than average for this time of year. Don't think I've seen any bare spots on the upper mountain yet. Few feet base up top still.

A Jeep with SOA is built to serve an entirely different purpose than a Toyota with SUA. What are you going to be doing with your rig and how do you want it to perform? It's a balancing act when it comes to leafs.

I'm not saying I'm way ahead of you, but maybe the way I use my truck is different than you. I like to go as fast as comfortable on the backroads with my setup. Longer spring kept SOA would be detrimental to this, even though they would be beneficial for crawling.

 

No. I think it lightened up a slight bit with the new pump, but the old pump was still 'working' just sounded horrible. Guessing it wouldn't have lasted much longer, however.

 

SOA is an attempt to gain lift and reduce the amount of crap hanging below the axle.
Popular with Jeeps and Scouts as it is basically a "free" lift. Comes with a shit load of problems that need addressed afterward.

SUA is an attempt to combat axle wrap and nothing more. In the case of long travel, it does allow more droop and interesting shackle designs.

 

I'll agree with all of you guys. In my experience, I like a flatter SOA leaf that's as long as I can get. If the F/R mounting points are the same, I've see the best flex out of a leaf setup that way. (I only rock crawl... not desert stuff) With crazy long shackles, you can get lots of droop, just from the shackle length. But, if you keep the spring nearer to flat front to back length change is minimized when compared to the up/down travel at the wheel. Again, you guys have probably already tried these setups and I haven't looked at leafs since the last redesign on my rears in... what was it... 2014?

 

One picture at a time:

Alstrom camp spot (1 of 1) by brettbjorgum, on Flickr


Couldn't figure out this one. Tried a few things and didn't get anywhere,

Alstrom Moon (1 of 1) by brettbjorgum, on Flickr

 

Yeah, that's a shame because it is a beautiful scene.

Not really much you can do with an image with that much grain. If you are in that situation again, extending the exposure time, not raising the ISO, is the key to not getting all that graininess in the dark blues and shadows. Best solution is a tripod. That way you can still shoot at a low ISO setting.

 

Yeah, I need a tripod, but the main problem is the idiot behind the camera using the guess and check method of picture taking.

Thanks for the tip!

 

Tossed all my photos in here:

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/hole-in-the-rock-all-around-powell-north-rim.494357/

 

Wasn't happy with the weight capacity and uptravel loaded down on my last trip. Tossed another leaf in the pack today. Should get me closer to 50/50 up/down travel.

 

just curious, how much did you account for your rear superbumps compressed height? I could never get a real answer, so I went with a half inch. I was just worried about bottoming out my rear shocks, so they are set at 5". 4.5" bump being the minimum. But if I knew how much they compressed, I could dial in the bumps better, and get a little more uptravel out of it. Thanks for your time.

 

Do you overextend the shocks with your setup now? Limit straps?

In the process of re-doing my lower mounts now... getting about 3" up travel and 7" down... with my 10" shock I'm gonna have it strapped with 9.5" shaft showing at vertical droop leaving .5" shaft at full bump.

This was almost vertical with like 2" below the rear end

 

They compress way more than that. 1.5" or more.

Don't know if you read all the stuff I did earlier this year, but my leafs are only good for just over 9" of travel. No need for staps as the Springs limit my downtravel. Have about 5" of shaft showing now, but think my Springs might settle a bit after the changes.

Trick is to get the upper mount as high as possible. I did end up having to hammer the bed up just a bit for the ends of the shocks.

 

Yea I remember vaguely reading it before but these threads move so fast it's hard. My upper mount is about .25" from the bed... my last shocks were angled like / \ but I'll be using more of the shock with a more vertical setup hopefully creating a better ride. Also getting them revalved by my shock dude