SJ410 -1985 'Cabrio', engine rebuild

[binge]

Shot round to the SJ this afternoon while we had a bit of daylight after I finished work.
Dropped the gearbox and Transfer box off the bottom, along with all the props and shock absorbers too.

Quite pleasantly surprised that one of the 12 previous owners have undersealed it quite well. A few bits of underseal came away when I jacked it up high and jet washed underneath.

I'm in two minds whether to make a rad fit on the cage on the back, or fit the standard rad back under the bonnet.
We have endless radiators at work out of all different cars, so I'm very tempted to mount a nice big ally rad with an electric fan on it, in the back. Will have to work something out.

Sounds mad, but has anyone ever mounted a spare wheel under the bonnet, where the rad once was?
Is there enough upright room for it?








I've got a set of 4, Missing link shackles coming next week, so once they are here, I will work out the shocks I require front and rear.

I see a lot of these shock relocation brackets cropping up on FB. What is the advantage of this?
Will I need to weld some brackets on the axle too? Or does it just move the tops of the rear shocks further in?


Another question about suspension... I'm undecided on what to do with the 'lift'.
These missing link shackles will give me around a 1" lift as standard. Which will bring the truck back down by 1" compared to what it's like in the picture.

Should I do a 1" body lift? Is it worth it?
I really don't want it to be one of these trucks that are sky high on stilts. They just look like roll-over machines, and cartoon like, so a 2" lift, plus the 1" shackle lift, may put it up a bit too high.

In terms of the shackle lift, guy making them says they will give about 5" of 'droop'. What sort of prop spacers will I need?
Is there a way of measuring this?

[twiss]

Looks pretty good underneath!

The thing with the rear rad it that you have to run water pipes from the front to the back... either under or inside the car... not really too keen on the idea myself lol

My truck is on 2" lift springs and 1/2" lift shackles and it seems pretty good on my 31s...
Another 1/2" wouldn't hurt I don't think but I'm not a fan of the missing link shackles really. Its personal preference as I drive mine on the road a lot.

I don't think you will need the body lift though...

[binge]

See although this is road legal, with TAX and insurance, I use my Mk6 Transit as my daily driver, and also have a car trailer to transport the SJ to any pay-and-play days that are far away.
So I don't mind it being quite off-road orientated.
The lift shackles (once currently on it) made the thing drive HORRIBLE. Pitch angle on the diffs is all wrong, and the steering caster went all p*ssed making it handle really weird on the road.
It also gave me a rock hard ride too.

I read so many different opinions on what's good and bad. Body lift (to me) makes the most sense, as it keeps the weight of the ladder nice and low, yet gives more clearance for the bigger tyres.
Could be on the wrong tracks there, but that's how it seems in my mind.

Where as doing a shackle lift, if pushing EVERYTHING, bar the tyres and wheels upwards.

[twiss]

Well your front springs are pretty flat at the minute, they may look a bit better with standard length shackles, but you don't really want to be flexing them upwards more...

Most people do a virtual lift (re-weld the arches higher up) rather than a body lift

[binge]

The springs are flat because of the shackle lift, and probably because they are old/worn out.
With the standard shackle set up, they had a better curve to them.

[ScottieJ]

Looks good.

If the tyres fit and don't catch don't bother with the body lift, if you want bigger tyres there's always the option of doing a virtual lift by cutting the arches out, you should be able to run up to 30x9.5" or 235/75r15 tyres easily though as it is because you don't have the original front bumper.

Main benefit of tilting the shocks in is so that you can run longer shocks without going through the rear bed, however the further you tilt them the more the dampening is reduced.

Adapter bars are a 10min job to make if you can weld, wouldn't bother buying one, the ones that always pop up for sale just come with mk2 astra shocks normally and you can pick those up for around £15 each new, the kyb nitrogen filled shocks are the best option. The part number is posted up somewhere on here. Depending how much uptravel you have you might need to raise the front upper shock mounts to properly run astra shocks on the front though so they don't bottom out.

You'll need to run longer shocks like astras to make the most of the added droop from the missing links.

[twiss]

I'll have to get a part number off one of my front shocks, they are gas filled, look like kyb ones, but the Astra ones usually have a ring on both ends (suitable for rear)
I dread to say it but they may be off a land rover haha

[ScottieJ]

I'll have to get a part number off one of my front shocks, they are gas filled, look like kyb ones, but the Astra ones usually have a ring on both ends (suitable for rear)
I dread to say it but they may be off a land rover haha

Astra shocks have a pin on the top twiss they only have a ring on the top when you cut the pin off and weld one on like I did

http://forum.suzukiclubuk.co.uk/vi ... =15&t=3653

Kyb excel-g twin tube gas shocks part number is 343047

[dan_2k_uk]

Looks like you a getting along nicely.

Your current 2" shackles won't actually provide that much lift as they only move one end of the spring so you will probably fin it won't actually reduce the ride height too much by fitting the missing links and will probably improve the castor angle and flange alignemt a bit.

[twiss]

Astra shocks have a pin on the top twiss they only have a ring on the top when you cut the pin off and weld one on like I did

Actually Astra Mk 3, 4 and 5 rear shocks are rings on both ends... thats what I've got on the back I think
Which Astra model do those come off? Guess its a mk1 or mk2 rear shocker, as the fronts are IFS type struts