Ruslow

Congrads on the design!I thought of that same idea back 4 years ago but with a different upper link.Why not use a link that has a spring on it.that way you can change the spring and it will change the bite of the rear as well as make it more user friendly and track tuneable?also not to start a war but i would also brace the attachment points for the watts since the frame is weak in torsional strength by trianglulating[sp] it.That way you will help in the turn in feel of the truck and make a much stronger mounting point for the bar.Good work!!Stan

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NLOC Member;#419

Tim Skelton

Yup. I didn't mention roll steer because it's not particularly relevant in a straight line.

Sportruk

Excellent job. Mounting the coilovers on the outside of the frame gives it the best stability. It's rare to see a 3 link on a fullsize. That's a typical setup for the S10's with a triangulated upper link.
Myself, I would have boxed the forward stock crossmember and did a bit more reinforcement for the bar between the upper shock mounts, but without looking at it hands on, it's just armchair quarterbacking. With what I can see, it looks like you know what you are doing.
The only comment I can make is, make sure you have some good high tensile bolts holding the rear dif cover on.
BTW, I'm looking forward to seeing your design in the Gen1 IFS.

Tim Skelton

How about some good high tensile strength welds?

Sportruk

Yes, the welding is nice, but unless my eyes are seeing something different, the main 3/8" mounting plate is sandwiched between the rear cover and the housing and held together with the 8 mm cover bolts.

race-rodz

yes, its sandwiched between the cover and the housing. the bolts are the highest grade available in a "flange" head bolt(grade 8 equal), and the 4 bolts holding the watts link are even higher rated allen heads(grade 10 equal). and alum cover is on the "to-do" list, as its gonna be a lot stronger than the stamped cover for helping hold everything together.

ruslow, i did contemplate doin and sprung top link, but simply put, i didnt have the parts on hand, and didnt have time to order them. this truck will see mostly street duty, so the addition tuning aspect really isnt needed.

the watts link frame mounts... on the "long" side, the mount ties accross the bottom and outside of the frame, and spreads in a "V", then that is tied together to make an "I" which ties into the lower outer corner of the rail. the "short" side is just tied accross the bottom of the rail and ties into the boxxing plates. those plates go from the sway bar mounting hole forward past the shock mounting, then the tube tieing them together is set about 1" from the back of the housing, directly in-line with the shock location.

the bed floor support was trimmed to clear the housing end of the upper link mount, there is 1/4 of clearance there when the suspension is fully compressed on the bump stops(no springs), this is also the same point where the drive shaft runs out of clearance to the rear cab crossmember. it pretty much makes use of all available room.

got the intial road test report from pops, says the truck responds amazing, feels very "planted" while goin through "flat" sharp 45mph corners with the CC set at 75. the rear suspension makes the steering feel considerably better, truck wants to turn in instead of push. said he was happy with the ride quality, even when he hit the bad sections of freeway construction.

FordFanStan

I see what sportruk is saying, the welded plate only reinforces the thrid upper link. As far as the torsional reinforcment, only the rearend cover bolts hold the watts link in place. either way, IMO, which isn't much, I think it looks like he does great work... Stan

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FordFanStan

Ahh you you hit reply before me haha. So a T/A rear girdle is going on? Looks like it might not fit in betten that rearend housing and the watts link center support. Either way, like I said it looks absolutely wonderful and I bet it handles exceptionally well. Awesome work... Stan

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02silverbullet

Dayumn! I love it! Dude if you could reproduce this as a kit with adjustability, less shocks and springs and paint/powdercoat for around a grand including a panhard bar i would be interested. right now the toss up is between something like this or the home made 4 link from another member if he still makes them. I want a setup to better handle road and turns than anything on the open market. Nice work. also if you could make the wats link included in the kit for more i would be interested in that too.

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'02 silver lightning #2983 SCT x-cal II, KB 2.3, 4lb'er 3.25 upper= 15psi, 60lb injectors, 255 pumps, JLP plenum, accufab sbtb, sct2600 maf, mac intake, bassani ss system, hotchkis springs, DMP VB.
'86 Honda TRX250R, '89 Yamaha Banshee
'95 Yamaha fx-1 stand up
'85 Toyota sr5 pickup; allpro offroad 4wd conversion/ sas swap, bilstien shocks 30+" articulation, marlin crawler dual case, 4.56 gears, lock-right locker, 2.7 stroker all forged internals

race-rodz

i will make a new pivot support to fit the alum cover, however pops had to get home, so this should work fine temp. gotta do what ya can with what ya got. this whole project took 4 1/2 days, most of that was in designing/fabbing the actual parts. actual "bolt-on" install was probably about 1/2 day.

thanks for all the positive comments..... i will look into making it kit form, i really dunno if i can make it affordable at this point.... its not like it would ever be a mass produced set-up...so the cost would reflect that. expect a few months worth of wear-n-tear to see if any issues need to be worked out.

Sportruk

If you got one of those girdle covers, you could make a simple bracket to bolt onto the raised girdle section.

Pitstain

I look foward to hearing the updates on the real world testing, I will be starting my build around late feb, so hopefully I can get my stuff in order over the winter.

Thanks again for posting up, you have officially kicked off the age of the gen2 3-link.

02silverbullet

Same here I was hoping to finish my suspension before april...
plan is:

WMS complete front and rack setup
3 or 4 link rear
shocks plan was for QA1's but Pit you say no go?
sway bars
frame notch
trutrack


leading to the end of the year with the most bad@$$ wheel and tire package ever to be squeezed on a L!

than a tce front and rear brake kit. providing thestock bottom end holds if not all plans will have to be put on hold but more power is always ok!

Tim Skelton

I'm not engineer, but it since the bolts are mostly in tension (watts link lateral loading aside), and threaded into cast iron, wouldn't the threads in the cast iron give up before the bolts would fail?

Here is a maintance tip: I have a RUSlow PHB mounted to a cast aluminum diff cover. The bolts need to be checked and tightened from time to time. For some reason, the bolts loosen up just a little over time, and I can't torque the snot out of them both because of the o-ring seal. I suppose a little blue Loctite would solve the problem, but I'm under there all the time anyway.

Tim Skelton

No offense to WMS, but if you are on a budget, I would forego the control arm/steering rack for now and put the money in the rear suspension. The stock front suspension is a relatively modern unequal length arm, while the rear is Model T spec. Based on my experience, and assuming that you'd like to open track your truck, $0K front/$4K rear will leave you with a better handling (and riding) setup than $3K front / $1K rear. I'm sure that the WMS rack would add great steering feel, but I'm talking pure road-gripping handling.

The only thing that's been holding me back is a suitable road racing rear suspension. Stan Martin's one-off IRS is probably the ultimate, but he has nearly $10K in that, and hours of experimentation and re-fabrication, much of which is beyond my capabilities. Plus, it's just not available any more. This is by far the best non-IRS Lightning suspension setup I've ever seen.