Ok so today, Saturday, was spent finishing off the trailing arms. Ordered some 30x30x3 equal angle and with this I strengthened the arms.
Firstly I cut the angle to length and then made a slit in it so I could bend it to the profile of the arm.
Then I stitch welded the angle to the arm.
Making sure that I seam welded around the area that was cut and welded to crank the arm.
Here is what it looked like when painted.
Prior to fitting the arms, I relieved the axle mount so any chances of the trailing arm hitting the axles when fully dropped we're lessened.
Then the arm got a fitted and a final coat of chassis black paint to he protect against the weather and rust.
Once I had tidied my tools up and packed everything away I went to see what effect the cranked arms had. Here is what I found.
Whilst the wheel is off the ground, the limiting factor now is the shock.
I have plus 5" shocks and they are mounted to plus 2" mounts. The springs are plus 3" with plus 2" spacers on the rear to balance up the look of the vehicle.
Unfortunately as I suspected, the spring spacers have meant that the shock is not long enough to allow the spring relocators to catch the springs. I need plus 7" shocks as a minimum now!
Obviously without the spring spacers the rear spring would be caught by the relocators and in essence be more dislocated than they are now. This demonstrates the whole point about the difference in dropping shock mounts and adding spacers.
I have got this issue because the suspension was originally NOT intended to have spacers anywhere. Unfortunately I had to fit them as at the time I did the suspension I didn't have a winch etc up front so the car was front high.
Anyhow the cranked arms have allowed the suspension to drop to its lowest point a lot easier and with a lot less strain on the bushes.
Finally the other side of the axle, well this needs extended bump stops as you can see from the pic below. The relocation cone is almost touching the spring seat and the bump stop is nowhere near!
Oh and the inner arch wants trimming some more as its almost touching the tyre.