80 Spring Spacers

[Chris]

Having fitted my Insa Turbos I have found that the side lugs catch the plastic flares pretty badly. I did have Roughtrax spacers fitted too and the modular steels have an additional 7mm on the offset. Having whipped the spacers off, I found it a great deal better. Then taking some of the heaviest kit out of the boot helped even more. It was equivalent to having an adult sitting on the rear bumper. I have the Ironman B set up. It's a bit stiffer on the back end now, but it doesn't seem to catch. But I am about to fit drawers etc so some of that rubbing will probably come back when articulating hard.

I thought that spring spacers might help to give a little more clearance. I rang West Coast and they do a set for the 80 in both 15mm and 30mm. I don't want to fall into any traps that people have sprung before with these. I feel it's a bit of a bodge to be fair, but what is the net effect of fitting these things. I did put some on Lil Blue at the back to level it up and it didn't seem to do anything odd. I am contemplating a mild body lift too which will raise the arches a little so that the arc of the wheel falls inside the arch rather than directly onto it.

Anyone got any spacers going begging?

Chris

 

[Jon Wildsmith]

I'd do a small BL and air bags till you know what spring rate you need to cope with the heavy things you're going to add. Even if you later go for stiffer springs the air bags will let you choose a good compromise for loaded vs unloaded. Do ironman publish any specs for their springs or just a letter? What's the wire diameter on them? (usually a good rough guide to spring rate).

 

[Chris]

Thanks Jon. I really don't think that I need to go to the lengths of airbags. It's much easier to take some of the ironmongery out of the boot. There were two bags of recovery equipment that my Missus couldn't even lift. These were right against the tailgate so well past the rear axle which made a huge difference. I'm happy with the suspension set up. It's these new tyres have horns on them that stick out such a long way. It's not that the springs can't cope. They're fine; it's the width of the tyre that's the issue. I think that if Chas at JCS hadn't set me up with the extra 7mm offset, I'd have been fine. He was worried that we might catch the radius arms. But there's tones of clearance. The easy answer is to plop the tyres onto one of my many sets of spare 80 alloys! But I'd rather not. So I think a mild BL would help as you say but I was wondering about just adding a little height to the springs too.

I do think that I should extend the bump stops by the same as the SL though. Pretty easy - 40mm box stuck in between the stop and the chassis. I wouldn't want to over compress things and bend stuff.

Chris

 

[Paul_Humphreys]

I have 25mm spring spacers on the front of mine. No problem, even when I had the 35" tyres on.

Paul