37's and Shock Travel

[Freakazoid]

I am redoing my radius arms. Too expensive to get ones from your end of the world and thought seeing as there are quite a few of new ideas I'd give it a bash as well. I want to combine drop boxes with longer radius arms. I want to move the mounting point to behind the gearbox crossmember, this increases the length by about 350mm. My question is this. How much up and down travel should I allow for the front suspension if I have shocks with 10" stroke. Should it be 6" up and 4 down? Currently with these shocks installed there is 2" of uptravel left from stock. If I lift by 4" this gives me the 6" up and 4 down without having to move shock mounting points. This should make the 37's fit. I will also be moving the axle forward by a yet to be decided amount, maybe around 30mm.

[Freakazoid]

OK, maybe different approach.

Is it OK if I set the suspension up so that the shocks travel 6" up and 4" down?

[ELF_83]

4 more inches in the coils won't give you 4 inches of upwards travel it will probably give you less cause the coils will be a thicker wire and you will get coil bind a lot earlier in the stroke.

[Nelso]

If you move the front axle forward the 37s will fit on the front but you will have to trim a little off the guards and extend your bumpstops on the rear. I would go 5 inches up and down if you insist on keeping the same shocks. Mine are longer shocks and I have set it up with 5 inches of up travel and a longer down travel and it's fine.

[dano80]

Can't you adjust how much travel it would have by adjusting air pressure to your airsprings........Or are you strictly speaking of setting up shocks only????

Cheers, Dano.

PS. Hello from OZ.

[Freakazoid]

I can set the level with the air springs almost anywhere in the 10"stroke. I am looking for a good position for general setup and then I will set the castor up at that same position. The biggest problem I have founbd with the air setup that is so easily adjustable is that you need to pay a lot more attention to the castor. I suppose a 5 link would be better as it would keep the castor more or less correct through the suspension sycle.

If a 50/50 setup is better I'll set the castor up for that. Just thought it makes sense to have a bit more on the upward than the downward. Any mor esuggestions as to the ratio between up and down stroke?

[Nelso]

Just depends on what you are driving. For high speed stuff you want a bit more up travel, but for crawling you don't need much up travel.

[Freakazoid]

I reckon then for Hig Speed stuff a 60% up and 40% down would be good and then set up the castor at 2 degrees for this situation. If I then drop the susspension 1" I get a 50/0 ratio but my castor increases a bit which I suppose isn't that bad when crawling. Or is it?

[90Mav]

I have heard of people running over 10deg of castor with no problems, so i would advise setting castor at 2deg at the highest setting you will run, and let the rest take care of its self.

[Freakazoid]

Thanks, it seems better to rather overdo the castor than not. I must say, I have found that too little castor can be quite scary.