My 1985 LR90 was lifted 3" by the previous owner and since I got it I have found that it's really quite a handful to drive - requiring constant concentration because it's so skittish on the road.
I'm not quite sure how to describe the experience other than "loose". It also seems very much affected by any adverse camber or changes in the road surface.
I replaced the two rear shocks with PROCOMP ES9000 and new bushes and that has helped a bit.
Reading LRO, I see a lot of suspension parts on offer that I was wondering may help with the problem and here I am soliciting advice from the good people of Landyzone!
My thoughts:
1. New front cranked radius arms - to correct my front steering manners - have been looking at QT arms but they only seem to come in 3 degrees for 2 inch lift or 6 degrees for 4 inch lift. Since my vehicle has 3 inch lift what is the right number of degrees of camber correction?
2. Full set of poly bushes - any particular brand or type that I should go for to maintain off road performance (I don't do more than 6 road miles a day on average).
3. Cranked rear trailing arms with new joints - I have been looking at X-eng High Performance Off-Road Engineering is anyone familiar with these - they seem more expensive than most of the rear trailing arms and joints but are they worth the extra? They are £300 for 2 arms and joints. Also, the same company offers an "X-Flex complete kit" that comes with some special springs that go within your rear springs and have a telescopic cone to keep your wheels on the ground at high degrees of articulation and it also comes with a new a frame joint that also allows more articulation. Is it worth going for the full kit at £450?
Am I thinking about the right sort of mods to resolve the problem?
Also, I did have a bit of a feel with some spanners to see how tight the radius arm bolts to the front axle were and I couldn't move them... what tools should I be using?
Is there a tutorial or another thread somewhere that will help me to replace any of these suspension parts? I have 2 axle stands, a trolley jack, high lift jack and a bottle jack so I'm hoping that I'll be able to do the job myself and learn a bit in the process...
Cheers,
Gid
I'm not quite sure how to describe the experience other than "loose". It also seems very much affected by any adverse camber or changes in the road surface.
I replaced the two rear shocks with PROCOMP ES9000 and new bushes and that has helped a bit.
Reading LRO, I see a lot of suspension parts on offer that I was wondering may help with the problem and here I am soliciting advice from the good people of Landyzone!
My thoughts:
1. New front cranked radius arms - to correct my front steering manners - have been looking at QT arms but they only seem to come in 3 degrees for 2 inch lift or 6 degrees for 4 inch lift. Since my vehicle has 3 inch lift what is the right number of degrees of camber correction?
2. Full set of poly bushes - any particular brand or type that I should go for to maintain off road performance (I don't do more than 6 road miles a day on average).
3. Cranked rear trailing arms with new joints - I have been looking at X-eng High Performance Off-Road Engineering is anyone familiar with these - they seem more expensive than most of the rear trailing arms and joints but are they worth the extra? They are £300 for 2 arms and joints. Also, the same company offers an "X-Flex complete kit" that comes with some special springs that go within your rear springs and have a telescopic cone to keep your wheels on the ground at high degrees of articulation and it also comes with a new a frame joint that also allows more articulation. Is it worth going for the full kit at £450?
Am I thinking about the right sort of mods to resolve the problem?
Also, I did have a bit of a feel with some spanners to see how tight the radius arm bolts to the front axle were and I couldn't move them... what tools should I be using?
Is there a tutorial or another thread somewhere that will help me to replace any of these suspension parts? I have 2 axle stands, a trolley jack, high lift jack and a bottle jack so I'm hoping that I'll be able to do the job myself and learn a bit in the process...
Cheers,
Gid