Squeaky Penguin's (Trip Reports) Build Thread

Solid nope!

The wind at Toroweap can be notoriously treacherous.

 

Ah, the rock bench!

That's near the top of the list of awesome campsites. Need to go back!

 

Fuck nope

 

He literally has no wind resistance.

 

Oh wow I didn't realize you were on 700s. How's that ride haha

 

what about the wine bottle opening at the grand canyon?

 

cool. THen don't change it ha

 

well if youre really almost 3k up front 700lbs seems like a good rate.

 

I’ll dig that up tomorrow.

 

I’ll just leave this here for your entertainment purposes.

https://accutuneoffroad.com/articles/coilover-spring-rates-for-toyota-tacoma-4runner/

 

That is super sketch. Freaks me out just to look at it. @Squeaky Penguin And you seemed so nornal when I met and wheeled with you.

Sometimes you make me laugh. Just how does 2700# become 3,000# with a typed post. A 300# difference is huge.

@m3bassman Be careful. Those 700# coils will shatter your shock towers. Or so I've been told.

This guy has some interesting ideas on how preload effects ride. Definitely goes against the TW urban legends on the topic.

 

I enjoy sharing that article for exactly that reason. It’s a company that specializes in custom shock tuning so I trust their opinion a bit more than the typical TW member.

Keep in mind that article is more directed towards 2nd/3rd gen Tacos and 5th gen 4Runners.

 

While I agree that the tune is everything.

I still have yet to find a definitive answer to the simple fact that if you do in fact add preload..the ride still gets worse.

It is unlikely Most are bottoming out the spring to the block height of the coil as we'd see a lot more busted coils as a normal thing.

Too much lift, hell yes that is a factor. But again. Every time I've adjust coil over to just get the ride height back after adding more weight...doesn't ride as smooth as it did before.


I don't have an answer. The math says it shouldn't. Tuners like them say it shouldnt...real world experience says otherwise. Idk.

 

I know a good way to test it, just need two scales and an arbor press.

 

Stiffer springs should help with body roll. I don't think that was mentioned in the article. As far as I'm aware valving can't help body roll in long slow turns. Sharp maneuvers sure.

I think balance of a rig plays a role into spring rates as well. My truck has roughly 300lbs more weight on the rear axle than the front. I'm guessing this is why I don't hate my ride on 500lb springs. I also don't have any cracks on my coil buckets or LCAs yet. Maybe I'll go with 600lb springs whenever I go with Kings in the front.

 

Heres a quick explain of a couple things that contribute to this discussion about theory not matching reality in regards to spring pre-load:

One thing most spring manufacturers don't disclose, and most people don't test is the range of linearity of the labeled spring rate. in offroad applications, the usable range is usually defined as free length to coil bind. In high end street applications, the usable range on a linear spring is "compressed length 1" to "compressed length 2" where the spring does in fact behave linearly.
ex.
If the free length is 14" and coil bind length is 8"; probably around 9.5" spring length, the spring rate is increasing progressively; not linearly, potentially changing the ride rate behavior as the shock approaches max compression.

Also as you add a significant amount of pre-load, you significantly change the way in which your rebound damping can control ride; you top out HARD and likely much more often than with a stiffer spring with little to no pre-load. The shock can be tuned to compensate for this, but if you add pre-load vs what the shock was built/optimized for, this is probably the primary contributing factor to a degradation in ride quality as the high-speed rebound damping rate and working range are not optimized for the wheel travel.

If someone doesn't use much of the available travel, the observable affects will be different...

But if you use the full travel in the shock, depending on the amount of pre-load added vs what the shock was built for, it is possible to have made the ride stiffer at full compression; and under damped as the shock rebounds to full extension, meaning that the range of wheel travel that the shock is working "correctly" is reduced and directionally/positionally dependent.

Any setup with an auxiliary bypass shock can tune this affect on ride out completely, and any shock built with an internal top-out bump stop and more aggressive high-speed rebound will be much more forgiving to significant pre-load adjustments.

Sorry for getting wordy.

 

So that's not on my phone or camera, I'll see if it is on Cat's phone.

 

@Night Eagle

 

Least efficient wine bottle opening ever, but it was effective.