Outer Limits 4x4 Board

I live in SA and I'm looking at buying Suzuki Sierra soon and doing some basic mods including a suspension/ body lift, bigger tyres, rockhopper etc. I want the car to be roadworthy and legal for all my planned mods and I am wondering how to achieve that. If I take the zook to ARB to fit a 2 inch OME suspension lift for eg, will they ensure this complies with the relvant requirements or is that my responsibility to look into this? The reason I'm concerned is that I had a look at the ADR's and they seem quite stringent, eg:


"The overall diameter of a wheel and tyre fitted to a vehicle manufactured on or after 1 January 1973
(ADR 24) must not be more than 15 mm greater than the largest tyre size listed on the tyre placard"

I don't want to fit mods they are potentially deflectable. Is this where I need to talk to an engineer? This will be my first 4wd and I have lots of questions:) If anyone could clarify my confusion and share your thoughts on whats best that would be great!

The best mod you can do is fit some crawler gears. Its the best investment that you will make, gives you great control of your zuk if you get one. Then worrie about lift and bigger wheels.

Graphite2 wrote: I don't want to fit mods they are potentially deflectable. Is this where I need to talk to an engineer?

I think you mean defect, not deflect

Yes, talk to an Engineer first, preferably with a list of what you have in mind so he can steer you in the right direction. Each State has it's own rules pertaining to mods although there is a national code being worked on (NCOP).

In QLD it's the owners responsibility to ensure your vehicle is road legal

To help you keep your car legal (this is my opinion), i would do the following:

- 2" OME Lift (will handle well, and wont attract the wrong attention)
- Dont waste your time with a BL. Generally speaking, people only fit BL's to allow clearance for 31/32/33" tyres, and its almost guaranteed you'll get hassled on it.
- Biggest isn't always best with tyres. Zooks dont need huge rubber to be a capable rig. I've seen stock Zooks with road tyres do some pretty impressive stuff. I would suggest that you go for an agressive tyre that is a similar size to stock (maybe go up one or two profiles if you need).

In theory, you will still need to get all of the above OK'd by officials, however getting a rig as above passed will be a hell of a lot cheaper and easier than one with BL, different rims, big rubber.

Cheers

My suggestion:
Buy the car.
see what it has on it already
drive it, enjoy it..
find what it is lacking in
then start upgrading it.

bogged wrote:My suggestion:
Buy the car.
see what it has on it already
drive it, enjoy it..
find what it is lacking in
then start upgrading it.

x2

Thanks for the replies so far. They're all really helpful. I will definitely drive it around stock for a bit to get a feel for the limits and what needs upgrading. I guess I just wanted to be sure that there were legal avenues for upgrading the vehicle - which I wasn't sure about given that it seems here in SA more than a 15mm increase in tyre diameter is not permissible...