srmitchell
NAXJA Forum User
- Location
- Mckinleyville (Humboldt) CA
IDK... this guy seems legit. :gag:
-
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Iron Rock Long Arm Upgrade
- Thread starter 98XJLimitedNateWV
- Start date
IDK... this guy seems legit. :gag:
- Location
- Columbus, In
- Location
- San Diego
fwiw i have drilled out my stock upper control arm bushings to accept 1/2" bolts no problem. the rubber is fine...
- Location
- San Diego
1. its an internet forum, get your panties out of a wad. I wasn't actually calling you retarded.
2. before I went to JJ uppers I drilled out mine. it was very very very easy.
yes, I understand where the heat comes from when drilling. I am saying that unless you go full retard and try to drill then entire sleeve out of the bushing you aren't going to get enough heat produced by drilling out the small dimples inside the bushing.
and yes I understand that the bold does not spin, but the rubber moves against the CA itself, creating heat due to the friction, a lot of heat actually. do me a favor, go find a stock XJ, drive it around for a couple of hours and then grab the UCA right at the bushing. they get pretty warm.
Like I said before I went to JJ uppers I drilled out mine...
methinks that those of you having problems "melting" your joints, already have worn out joints and the rotational force of the bit against the sleeve is just tearing them. I could see that happening.
twodoorXJ
NAXJA Forum User
- Location
- northern new jersey
This thread is hilarious.
- Location
- Sheboygan, WI
I am not going to read the whole thread but a good way to machine soft bushings is to freeze them first. If a regular freezer will not get them hard enough, try to get some liquid nitrogen.
That is what we did to machine delrin for our A-arm bushing on my Baja SAE team. and a Very very sharp drill bit, I forgot the angle we used.
That is what we did to machine delrin for our A-arm bushing on my Baja SAE team. and a Very very sharp drill bit, I forgot the angle we used.
jeeperjohn
NAXJA Forum User
- Location
- Temecula, CA
I find the best way to drill out the dimples in the bushings is with a carbide rotary file that makes a 1/2" hole. The metal of the bushings is kinda hard and I have broken drill bits trying to drill it. A carbide rotary file makes a quick job of it.
brianglawson
NAXJA Forum User
- Location
- Greensboro, NC
...EDITED
- Location
- Rainy side of Washington
Oh really now?
The "revolutionary" caster adjuster just last week got a friend of mine into his first ever at-fault accident. He mostly daily drives the vehicle and installed it properly with all the hardware they supply, using the torque specs they give. He's lucky it failed at 20mph instead of a few minutes earlier at 60 or someone might have died.
You can claim that all you want and I am still going to say what I have always said. IT IS A WEAK, SUBPAR DESIGN, AND IT IS ONLY A MATTER OF TIME UNTIL SOMEONE DIES BECAUSE OF IT.
Sorry you don't understand this.
Three of my friends have now had the stupid hinky adjuster thingus fail in exactly the same way, and it is exactly how I and everyone who recommends against the IRO kit says it will fail. Not that I think this will sway anyone's opinion, but I'll be damned if I don't at least try.
The "revolutionary" caster adjuster just last week got a friend of mine into his first ever at-fault accident. He mostly daily drives the vehicle and installed it properly with all the hardware they supply, using the torque specs they give. He's lucky it failed at 20mph instead of a few minutes earlier at 60 or someone might have died.
You can claim that all you want and I am still going to say what I have always said. IT IS A WEAK, SUBPAR DESIGN, AND IT IS ONLY A MATTER OF TIME UNTIL SOMEONE DIES BECAUSE OF IT.
Sorry you don't understand this.
Three of my friends have now had the stupid hinky adjuster thingus fail in exactly the same way, and it is exactly how I and everyone who recommends against the IRO kit says it will fail. Not that I think this will sway anyone's opinion, but I'll be damned if I don't at least try.
- Location
- Rainy side of Washington
Something like that.
My semi-professional (I am an engineer, and I have a decent amount of mechanical fabrication/design experience even though I'm not a mechanical engineer. I regularly see flaws in mechanical design reviews at work that mechanical engineers miss, in fact) opinion is that because the adjuster uses a fundamentally flawed design (two pieces of metal with slots cut in them crossing) the contact area between the bracket and the ends of the UCA bushing inner sleeve that is actually effectively preloaded by the bolt is severely reduced from the factory design. Since they also remove one UCA from the equation, you end up with significantly less safety margin between the breaking limit of the design and the conditions it operates under. It's a bad combination of factors and I'm surprised more haven't failed, honestly.
Not sure whether the bolt breaks or comes loose - my suspicion is that between the lack of contact area and the shape of the bracket, as well as the fact that one of the parts has its contact surfaces either powdercoated or painted, the bolt loses preload, then shears (bolts are designed to transfer force by pinching parts together enough that the friction between the parts carries the load - NOT as shear pins! If your design has the bolt under shear, you probably shouldn't be designing suspension systems) or the nut vibrates loose. The worst part of the design is that once the bolt works its way loose somehow, the only thing keeping the axle located is the spindly section of caster adjuster between the slot and the edge of that piece of metal stock. So as the axle pitches forward and back under acceleration and braking, it beats on that little piece of metal until it spreads the caster adjuster slot out (every single failed IRO kit I've seen has this symptom!) and at that point, the bolt is sliding back and forth and impacting the bracketry as it reaches each end of its travel. You can only do that to a bolt so many times before it eventually work hardens and breaks, even if the nut doesn't come off first.
Basically it's just not a mechanically sound design. There are ways to make it one, but by the time you've done so, it's even more complicated than just using an adjustable link from the UCA mount to some tabs on the LCA, which is what most other radius arm LA kits do.
My semi-professional (I am an engineer, and I have a decent amount of mechanical fabrication/design experience even though I'm not a mechanical engineer. I regularly see flaws in mechanical design reviews at work that mechanical engineers miss, in fact) opinion is that because the adjuster uses a fundamentally flawed design (two pieces of metal with slots cut in them crossing) the contact area between the bracket and the ends of the UCA bushing inner sleeve that is actually effectively preloaded by the bolt is severely reduced from the factory design. Since they also remove one UCA from the equation, you end up with significantly less safety margin between the breaking limit of the design and the conditions it operates under. It's a bad combination of factors and I'm surprised more haven't failed, honestly.
Not sure whether the bolt breaks or comes loose - my suspicion is that between the lack of contact area and the shape of the bracket, as well as the fact that one of the parts has its contact surfaces either powdercoated or painted, the bolt loses preload, then shears (bolts are designed to transfer force by pinching parts together enough that the friction between the parts carries the load - NOT as shear pins! If your design has the bolt under shear, you probably shouldn't be designing suspension systems) or the nut vibrates loose. The worst part of the design is that once the bolt works its way loose somehow, the only thing keeping the axle located is the spindly section of caster adjuster between the slot and the edge of that piece of metal stock. So as the axle pitches forward and back under acceleration and braking, it beats on that little piece of metal until it spreads the caster adjuster slot out (every single failed IRO kit I've seen has this symptom!) and at that point, the bolt is sliding back and forth and impacting the bracketry as it reaches each end of its travel. You can only do that to a bolt so many times before it eventually work hardens and breaks, even if the nut doesn't come off first.
Basically it's just not a mechanically sound design. There are ways to make it one, but by the time you've done so, it's even more complicated than just using an adjustable link from the UCA mount to some tabs on the LCA, which is what most other radius arm LA kits do.
- Location
- Rainy side of Washington
I don't have to, because my suspension was designed by a competent engineer and doesn't have a flaw that requires a special extra hard bolt, extra high torque, and doesn't have a tendency to loosen bolts up by itself. 
- Location
- San Diego
but that wouldn't be "revolutionary" :roflmao:
yossarian19
NAXJA Forum User
- Location
- Grass Valley, CA
I generally like most of IRO's product line...
That caster adjustment just doesn't seem up to par.
Any suspension component outside of Jeepspeed that requires regular attention, is a bad component.
OEM stuff is set up once and you can successfully ignore it for 100K miles. To me, that's the benchmark to hit.
That caster adjustment just doesn't seem up to par.
Any suspension component outside of Jeepspeed that requires regular attention, is a bad component.
OEM stuff is set up once and you can successfully ignore it for 100K miles. To me, that's the benchmark to hit.
- Location
- Rainy side of Washington
They call it revolutionary because eventually, it allows your axle to revolve about its axis :scottm:
- Location
- San Diego
I'm not so sure. I'd say your bench mark is off by a factor of 10...
we use our vehicles and their suspensions to a much greater degree than the factory ever intended.
I tend to check the major wear items and suspension components after every hard wheeling trip.
I have never found a loose bolt in one of my CAs, but it doesn't stop me from checking them from time to time.
XJLI
NAXJA Forum User
- Location
- Long Island, NY
exactly. from time to time, not every weekend.
yossarian19
NAXJA Forum User
- Location
- Grass Valley, CA
It may not be feasible to build an XJ to do what you are asking of it without maintenance. Fair enough.
Doing what I do, it went more than 100K on stock parts. Maybe I replaced a sway link set before then. For me, factory type junk has done very well and most of my headaches have come directly from trying to "upgrade" things.
