installing rustys 6.5 la - I'm scared!!

Well not really scared, just nervous. For those who have installed it, how did you get manage to drill a 1/2 inch hole through the inner and outer frame rails and get them to line up?

For those who dk what I'm talking about, the rustys kit has an inside and outside plate on each frame rail and you have to drill a 1/2 in hole through both sides of the frame rail and they have to line up because there is a sleeve that goes right through. i can't see just 'eyeballing' it because if you are off.....its not going to line up....and you will have to make the inner hole bigger to line up that plate.

I'm thinking of drilling pilot holes on the outside (using the outer plate as a template) then clamp the inner plate on the outside of my frame rail and use a really looooooong drill bit through the sleeves, into my pilot hole and through the inner rail. The sleeve should keep the drill bit straight.

Any other suggestions of btdt's?

Thanks

Home Depot has a real long 1/2" drill bit.

drill the hole all the way through with a pilot bit. then use a holesaw on the thin metal inside the frame rail.

I installed a TnT Y-Link which has you do the same thing. I used a tape measure, small square and a level to ensure proper alignment on both sides. Then drilled a small pilot hole from each side. Once I knew I was lined up, I drilled them to size. It worked like a champ.

Good luck, Z

aszaunmi said:

I installed a TnT Y-Link which has you do the same thing. I used a tape measure, small square and a level to ensure proper alignment on both sides. Then drilled a small pilot hole from each side. Once I knew I was lined up, I drilled them to size. It worked like a champ.

Good luck, Z

Click to expand...

Thanks - I was thinking of doing that too - measuring from both sides. the beauty of it is that I would only have to measure the side to side as the plate fits in there quite snug and there is no up/down movement because of that little lip at the bottom of the frame rail.

Thanks for all the suggestions guys (and gals?). If my clamping the inside plate and using the sleeve as a guide doesn't work, I'll probably go the measure and pilot from each side route.

aszaunmi said:

I installed a TnT Y-Link which has you do the same thing. I used a tape measure, small square and a level to ensure proper alignment on both sides. Then drilled a small pilot hole from each side. Once I knew I was lined up, I drilled them to size. It worked like a champ.

Good luck, Z

Click to expand...

I installed this same system on a friends Jeep last month. After measuring and drilling pilot holes on both sides I used a uni-bit instead of a hole saw to enlarge the holes. I used a right angle drill so I wasn't drilling at an angle. One thing I found (his Jeep is a 2000) is that there was some sort of sound deadening (sp?) material in the frame that had to be dug out so that the brackets would fit properly.

Have fun with the install!

Re: installing rustys 6.5 la - update - done!

It wasn't as bad as I figured once I smartened up.

the inner and outer plates both line up with the edge of a 2nd layer of frame rail steel (this is obvious once you put them in place) so the front to back lining up of the inner bolt hole was very easy. For the up/down, the plated doesn't have much room to move so that is relatively easy too. Once I had a 1/2 hole drilled I used a carbide cutter on a die grinder to enlarge the inner holes. went quite smoothly from there.