• NAXJA is having its 18th annual March Membership Drive!!!
    Everyone who joins or renews during March will be entered into a drawing!
    More Information - Join/Renew
  • Welcome to the new NAXJA Forum! If your password does not work, please use "Forgot your password?" link on the log-in page. Please feel free to reach out to [email protected] if we can provide any assistance.

Leaf spring sliders for desert use???

9T3XJ

NAXJA Forum User
Location
FoCo, Colorado
I've been things about putting leaf spring sliders on the rear springs of my jeep:

http://www.pirate4x4.com/forum/showthread.php?t=836831&highlight=leaf+spring+sliders

What's your guys thoughts on them for a desert/prerunner type set up? And why don't you see them on more desert trucks? It seems like sliders would allow for more travel then a shackle and offer more lateral stability.

I'm not setting up my suspension specifically to be a desert/prerunner but I would still like it haul through the rough stuff every now and then.
 
Id say the nylon bushing would smash out of them from the hard maxing out... but I do have a one in my shop that Im going to use in place of the shackle for a traction bar setup on the rear of mine but it wont be maxing out so it shouldnt do any harm to it
 
Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't bumpstops there so your bushings / leaves don't take the full force of a hard shot?
I don't see why a slider setup would be any weaker than shackles... It doesn't seem like you could get the same flex out of them, since the end of the leaf travels in a linear path rather than an arc...
Run it and update us.
 
Bumpstops are so the shock dont bottom out and take a full force hit, they have nothing to do with the spring travel. Im not saying they wouldnt work because they might, but why reinvent the wheel when shackles work just fine
 
Bumpstops are so the shock dont bottom out and take a full force hit, they have nothing to do with the spring travel. Im not saying they wouldnt work because they might, but why reinvent the wheel when shackles work just fine

Really? I was pretty sure you didn't want to invert your leaves and bumpstopped accordingly. I could be wrong.
 
Another point to ponder. The slider may loose articulation over a shackle.

With a shackle, the back of the spring is supported through 2 bushings, both deform as the spring drops. You can see it in pictures, where the shackle seems to swing sideways when one tire drops.

With a slider, there's only one bushing, and it's hard mounted to the frame.
 
Really? I was pretty sure you didn't want to invert your leaves and bumpstopped accordingly. I could be wrong.


If your shocks are short enough travel to allow the leaves to invert I could see that but all our springs are arched enough that the amount of travel the leave can put out before it inverts is greater than the travel the shock has to give so in most cases the shock will bottom out before the leave inverts.
 
Last edited:
because in stock form, they dont work so fine? maybe for mod tech, but not here in this forums sense.

so theres no upgraded shackles other than stock form? Of course stock shackles are gonna suck...theyre stock. Vehicles dont come stock with shackles allowing more than a couple inchs of travel in them for saftey reasons. IMO for the money you would have in these, and the install, you would still benefit more with a good set of Boomerang shackles. Just my .02, you guys are talking like Im not letting you do it, go ahead, if ya want, its not my project Im just happy with mine.
 
Id say the nylon bushing would smash out of them from the hard maxing out... but I do have a one in my shop that Im going to use in place of the shackle for a traction bar setup on the rear of mine but it wont be maxing out so it shouldnt do any harm to it

When I had leaf springs, I used one for a traction bar, and it worked awesome. I did have to make a lower guide for the plastic block though. Mine came with only a top guide that made the block wear quickly from being unsupported on the bottom, Once I put that lower guide on, they were trouble free.

I made it before I got into using my jeep for prerunning. After the repeated abuse of hitting whoops on a regular basis, the traction bar made the axle tube start to rotate in the housing, and the plug welds at the housing were driven under the cast part, cracking the housing. If you're going to use a traction bar for desert duty, you may want to think about putting one on each side of the diff or try to control the wrap from the housing rather than the tubes some how.

The sliders on the springs may actually work well for the higher speed stuff and cornering because the roll center of the springs is staying pretty linear compared to a longer shackle. That's why they were designed in the first place.

-Dan
 
A couple of my thoughts on it:

If your read through the thread I posted and the other links in that thread, there are a couple of Jeeps (Timmy's in particular) that use most of there 14" travel shocks. This is much better than I am getting right now.

Sure shackles work for locating the leaf and allowing them to move, but they also effect spring rate. And to get the most out of your leafs you want long shackles, which on a cherokee means moving the the spring way down.

Most sliders use delrin bushings, which is already used in a lot of desert applications. I don't think wear or "mashing" is something to worry a whole lot about.

To me, it seems like sliders would provide a much more consistent rear suspension, with all the benefits Dan mentioned.

So why don't you see them more in desert setups? I know they are prohibited in many classes, but it seems like they might work pretty good for a prerunner set up.
 
Another point to ponder. The slider may loose articulation over a shackle.

With a shackle, the back of the spring is supported through 2 bushings, both deform as the spring drops. You can see it in pictures, where the shackle seems to swing sideways when one tire drops.

With a slider, there's only one bushing, and it's hard mounted to the frame.

Look at some of the links in that thread, many people are angling the slot to account for this.
 
If your shocks are short enough travel to allow the leaves to invert I could see that but all our springs are arched enough that the amount of travel the leave can put out before it inverts is greater than the travel the shock has to give so in most cases the shock will bottom out before the leave inverts.
Not necessarily, ideally you set your shocks and bumps up for your springs. You arch the spring flat and set the shock to almost bottom right there, set your bump at the same spot and you'll never go into negative arch. This is harder to do with a stock style shock setup but can be done.

As for the bushings, they look like they could definitely work well, especially at the angle, just not sure if there'd be any sort of advantage over a good shackle.
 
Not necessarily, ideally you set your shocks and bumps up for your springs. You arch the spring flat and set the shock to almost bottom right there, set your bump at the same spot and you'll never go into negative arch. This is harder to do with a stock style shock setup but can be done.

As for the bushings, they look like they could definitely work well, especially at the angle, just not sure if there'd be any sort of advantage over a good shackle.

After thinking about it some more and doing more research I agree with you to a point. If you're able to run a really long shackle (the longer the shackle the flatter the arc; isn't that the point for longer shackles?) you could get similar characteristics.

The advantage I see to sliders is that you get similar characteristics while being able to keep the jeep low. If I'm correct longer shackles increase anti-squat in the rear, which isn't what you want.

Anybody have any good links or info on calculating suspension characteristics of leaf sprung suspensions?
 
You do have a point... I'm curious to see if someone wanted to put the work in to get a longer spring, move the front spring mounts about 3-4" further forward, go spring under, and get a longer spring slider for the rear. It would probably work pretty well, but it'd be a lot of work if it didn't.
 
bumping this up. anyone done this?

I think I am going through with a leaf slider setup with a pair of Deavers in the next week or so, was curious if anyone else had results to report as far as going fast
 
Sliders don't hold up. We had them on a racer that had a 4-link - leaf setup with slider at each end and 4-link to hold it all in place. The sliders destructed themselves in testing. We ended up putting a shackle at each end.
 
After thinking about it some more and doing more research I agree with you to a point. If you're able to run a really long shackle (the longer the shackle the flatter the arc; isn't that the point for longer shackles?) you could get similar characteristics.

We design our shackle length to keep things from binding throughout the travel. Longer creates instability - the farther the spring end is from the static end, the more lateral movement you get. The point is to keep it as short as possible while allowing the spring to do what it needs to do.
 
Back
Top