To the OP. I only attempted to illustrate to you what I seen as structural weaknesses in design. For whatever reason either I did not explain myself adequately or you just refuse to accept anything that questions your work.
Jamie. If you check some of his videos you will see what I am saying. Instead of utilizing the main mounting bolts to tie the crossmember to the top as well as the bottom of the rail he is using the shock tower supports as the upper tie. My guess is unintentionally. The angle on the upper shock tower supports is now running upward away from the shock tower creating a mounting area that does not sit flat on the top of the rail. When pulled down tight with bolts the only place of "give" is the upper portion of the original rail creating a situation with the top of the rail wanting to return to normal thus pulling at the top of the shock tower in an upward direction. The direction of force from the shock? Upward. So now the upper shock tower supports are creating a situation of potentially causing breakage in the upper shock tower instead of tieing the shock tower to the rail (and since it is to the top of the main mounting bolts) is tied to the both the top and lower portion of the frame rail. In original configuration the shock tower support is horizontal creating the situation of force generated upward against the shock tower is controlled in a better manner thus forcing the spring to absorb instead of the potential of the shock tower moving.
Those of us who do this swap to lower from what I have seen documented maintain this mounting of the shock tower support. Either through building a new spacer for the top of the rail or as I did utilizing the original spacers and cut accordingly. He has moved the crossmember down yet did not move the shock tower support mounting down to match.
elgemcdlf wrote:To the OP. I only attempted to illustrate to you what I seen as structural weaknesses in design. For whatever reason either I did not explain myself adequately or you just refuse to accept anything that questions your work.
Jamie. If you check some of his videos you will see what I am saying. Instead of utilizing the main mounting bolts to tie the crossmember to the top as well as the bottom of the rail he is using the shock tower supports as the upper tie. My guess is unintentionally. The angle on the upper shock tower supports is now running upward away from the shock tower creating a mounting area that does not sit flat on the top of the rail. When pulled down tight with bolts the only place of "give" is the upper portion of the original rail creating a situation with the top of the rail wanting to return to normal thus pulling at the top of the shock tower in an upward direction. The direction of force from the shock? Upward. So now the upper shock tower supports are creating a situation of potentially causing breakage in the upper shock tower instead of tieing the shock tower to the rail (and since it is to the top of the main mounting bolts) is tied to the both the top and lower portion of the frame rail. In original configuration the shock tower support is horizontal creating the situation of force generated upward against the shock tower is controlled in a better manner thus forcing the spring to absorb instead of the potential of the shock tower moving.
Those of us who do this swap to lower from what I have seen documented maintain this mounting of the shock tower support. Either through building a new spacer for the top of the rail or as I did utilizing the original spacers and cut accordingly. He has moved the crossmember down yet did not move the shock tower support mounting down to match.
I'm sorry man I guess I misunderstood what you were talking about. When you said you agreed with carcraft (or what ever his user name is) on this that is what through me off. I think his problem with this was I did not weld a big plate over the spacer and the frame rail. The photo I had on there of the top bracket was not the finish product. We modified the bracket so it would sit on top of the frame flat but upside down then bolted it down with grade 8 bolts. Not sure if that would fix the problem you describe here but like I said earlier 30,000 miles and 2 years and no issue with this. The truck also drives almost as good as my 01 Crown-Vic. I will do some more research on what you brought up and talk to the folks who has been consulting me on this and see
Ok, my only concern with these swaps is the integral strength of the frame rails and how they support the crossmember. Compared so the fully boxed and articulated CV frame, our trucks are probably pretty flexible when you concider the only strength is the front bumper and old radius rod crossmember. There's not much rigidity there. I see the fact that these swaps are holding up rely more on the crossmember being way over engineered vs. any frame support.
On the box tubing under the rail it could be boxed and use longer bolts but I would definately want to see sleeves between the tubing so the bolts don't collapse the tubing. It looks like 3/16 or 1/4" material so it should handle any shear stresses without deflecting. I would suspect the bolts would fail in a catastrophic accident before anything else.
On the top cap, my take is as long as the bolt mating surfaces are flat it should work. An angle between the bolt head or nut and the mounting surface can lead to the bolt failing. It's hard to tell from the picture how well everything fit together. As said above, I think the crossmember is toughter than the frame rail and I feel the bolt will deflect and shear into the other members before the crossmember will deflect.
As bad as it looks leaving the old steel crossmember in between the top and bottom of the frame rail probably adds some strength too.
Ok, my only concern with these swaps is the integral strength of the frame rails and how they support the crossmember. Compared so the fully boxed and articulated CV frame, our trucks are probably pretty flexible when you concider the only strength is the front bumper and old radius rod crossmember. There's not much rigidity there. I see the fact that these swaps are holding up rely more on the crossmember being way over engineered vs. any frame support.
On the box tubing under the rail it could be boxed and use longer bolts but I would definately want to see sleeves between the tubing so the bolts don't collapse the tubing. It looks like 3/16 or 1/4" material so it should handle any shear stresses without deflecting. I would suspect the bolts would fail in a catastrophic accident before anything else.
On the top cap, my take is as long as the bolt mating surfaces are flat it should work. An angle between the bolt head or nut and the mounting surface can lead to the bolt failing. It's hard to tell from the picture how well everything fit together. As said above, I think the crossmember is toughter than the frame rail and I feel the bolt will deflect and shear into the other members before the crossmember will deflect.
As bad as it looks leaving the old steel crossmember in between the top and bottom of the frame rail probably adds some strength too.
Thank you for your in put on this. The only thing I see with you have said here (and correct me if I am misunderstanding here we don't want to go down that road again LOL) The bolts for the box or channel tubing. I did not use 2 longer bolts in each spacer. Instead I used 2 upper and 2 lower grade 8 bolts. So unless I replace the 4 shorter bolts with 2 longer ones that go all the way through I can't put sleeve in them as you describe. The reason I didn't box the tubing is for alignment purposes. I can loosen this back up if needed when I have it on our alignment machine but we had it right when we got it up there so I suppose I could box them up but they have shown no signs of them starting to collapse. Leaving remains of the old crossmember was the exact reason you said for more stringent. Yes I doesn't look pretty but it's not that visible once the truck is back together.
Yep, if you had chosen to use longer bolt and go through the spacer tubing, then sleeves would have been in order. I wouldn't box the ends of the tubing with the shorter bolts, be a bit difficult to disassemble later.
The pic of the CV is the wrong CV. That is an earlier model. The second pic shows the angle the upper shock tower support is at but even without that pic. To maintain correct mounting geometry the mounting point for the support brackets would need to be lowered the same amount as the spacer added below. The first pic also shows it. They almost look as though they have been turned upside down. Can't see well enough. If so this would reverse the angle of mount changing the angle of support. In the CV the main mounting bolts go through to the top of the rail sandwiching the frame inside the crossmember and the top of the mounting point. Tieing the top and bottom of the rail together. The mount shown her is only mounted to the lower portion of the frame rail. The bolts also look too small. I would be curious as to bolt size (Dia). Very important when considering sheer factor.
I pulled the pic down and zoomed in on it. I am pretty certain the upper shock tower supports are installed wrong (upside down).
elgemcdlf wrote:The pic of the CV is the wrong CV. That is an earlier model. The second pic shows the angle the upper shock tower support is at but even without that pic. To maintain correct mounting geometry the mounting point for the support brackets would need to be lowered the same amount as the spacer added below. The first pic also shows it. They almost look as though they have been turned upside down. Can't see well enough. If so this would reverse the angle of mount changing the angle of support. In the CV the main mounting bolts go through to the top of the rail sandwiching the frame inside the crossmember and the top of the mounting point. Tieing the top and bottom of the rail together. The mount shown her is only mounted to the lower portion of the frame rail. The bolts also look too small. I would be curious as to bolt size (Dia). Very important when considering sheer factor.
I pulled the pic down and zoomed in on it. I am pretty certain the upper shock tower supports are installed wrong (upside down).
Well that photo the mounts are just laying there we haven't bolted up at that point and yes they are upside down. After that photo we modified the bracket where they would lay down flat on top of the frame and bolted them down. Didn't know any other way to do that with out notching out the top of the frame rail and I did not want to go there. Anyway it's worked fine for all this time and mileage so like the old saying if it aint broke you know the rest. The bolts are slightly bigger than what Ford used on the C/V. I say slightly because the ones off the C/V were metric and I went with a stander size the closest I could find. Can't remember what size that was 2 1/2 years ago. I think we used a 15/16 wrench with an impact to put them on.
The original bolts are real close to 5/8" D. If the bracket was modified from the pic I am looking at I can't say anything in that area as I have not seen the finished. If it sat flat on top of the rail on it's own then the additional stress I questioned earlier would not exist. Food for thought for any future installs like this. It might be easier to just fab some ears, weld to the side of the frame and use short brackets going horizontal from the shock tower. I have been following some guys on another forum discussing the frame flex and it's impact on this type of crossmember. The CV is designed not to flex where the truck frame is. Personally I would still be looking into boxing the rails to decrease the amount of flex & find a way to tie the crossmember to the top of the rail as well as the bottom. If you have the original bolts replacing your spacer mount to frame bolts with the originals running through spacers inside the rail. This would allow the transfer of stress to the entire frame instead of just the bottom of the rail.
The other forum almost has me ready to start looking for a different front suspension BUT a couple things I noticed. Some of the complaints I do not consider important. Hub to hub width limiting the type of wheels you can use. Not important to me. Some talk about it not being strong enough to handle a truck. A CV is a pretty stout car. My unit is a PI so I know the cars can handle abuse. The main issue I am watching is the expected failure which I am starting to think might be simply that it bolts in instead of welded in. Not that it would fail just that they may believe that is the reason for failure. Believe me I am asking tons of questions! I am no lightweight when it comes to suspension and they have some good guys over there too.
Ya'll should see what this mans school looked like the day after this...I did! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bl62PwjURMM
My Uncle there lost the family's farm that had been in our family for over 60 years.
Kudos to you my friend for continuing to do an unforgiving job that hardly no one wants / with little to no resources you are given / yet everyone want to critique!
Just remember that your students might have been dealing drugs, (if not for you to help guide them)! There are many that are glad you're there on that mountain doing what you do, I'm one of them.
And I'll quote an old Cherokee blessing also:
"Oh Great Spirit...pray that I may not criticize my neighbor until I have walked a mile in his moccasins".
Jeff http://www.fordification.com/forum/view ... 22&t=46251
SOLD-71 F-350 dually flatbed, 302 / .030 over V-8 with a "baby"C-6, B & M truckshifter, Dana70/4.11 ratio, intermittent wipers, tilt steering, full LED lighting on the flat bed, and no stereo yet (this way I can hear the rattles to diagnose)! SOLD!
Many Ford bumps / one 76' EB / and several dents through the years.
A lot of "oddball" Ford parts collected from working on them for 34 years now!
2008 Ford Escape 4 x 4
