Completed Project Turboexplorer's Full Width SAS Build Thread

Hello everybody! It's time to start the SAS on my Explorer. It will be an awesome project and the first project of this type and size that I have ever undertaken. Up to this point the sliders where the hardest thing that I have made myself. I am open to any suggestions and or insights from anyone as the project gets underway. I have bought every last part for the build minus the hard brake lines (axles, and from master to the frame) and the flexible lines that go down to the axles. Those are all easy to make so I am not worried about it for now until I get the axles put together and can see what i want to do with those.

Now for a list of things I will be doing with the project:
1995 F-150 8.8 - I bought this used rear axle that I will strip, lock with a Detroit, convert to Explorer Disc brakes, and mount to the truck. Factory rear sway bar will be used. I will be doing a spring over conversion and will also be remaking the rear V8 anti axle wrap bars to help the leaf springs out with the leverage and TQ the V8 37's and 5.13's will put on them.
1976 F-150 HP Dana 44 - I bought this used axle and will be stripping it of the Ford factory wedges, trussing, and building custom glorified radius arms. Like DB_1 runs and like Rubicon Expresses makes. Front will also have a Detroit Truetrac LSD in it as well. This Dana 44 has 1/2" thick axle tubes.
Fox 14" Remote reservoir coil-overs - I will be building shock hoops for these coil-overs, bracing them, and tying them together across the top of the engine with removable double lock tube clamps.
1995 F-150 Steering box - This will be mounted inside the frame rail and used with the factory PS pump and will build a custom steering link from the box to the column. I picked this 1 to keep it ALL Ford and 2 because they are fairly cheap and easy and can be tapped for hydro assist at some point if I want or need it. In order to fit this steering gear I also have to remote mount my oil filter so that it has room. I will be getting rid of the factory oil cooler and have a Trans Dapt remote filter relocation kit.

Project Parts Section:
-37X13.50 R17 Interco M-16's
-Fox 14" Remote reservoir coil-overs with Eibach Springs.
-Detroit Locker for the 8.8
-Detroit Truetrac for the Dana 44
-Yukon 5.13 gears for both front and rear.
-Both axles will receive ALL new bearings races and seals u-joints etc.
-All wheel studs front and rear and spindle studs have been replaced for safety reasons. To cheap not to.
-Already had EBC brakes on it so those pads on rear will be reused and new EBC 7000 series pads for the front have been purchased.
-New front rotors wheel bearings and new Spicer ball joints, going to reuse the warn locking hubs as they work great and are in good order and easily changed later if i wanted.
-1978 Ford T-Bird calipers have been bought in place of the factory F-150 ones. They are 17% bigger in piston size so will give me a little more brake up front to help stop those 37's.
-Trans Dapt Oil filter relocation Kit and addition mount to hook to the block at a 90*.
-Currie Johnny Joints and Rubicon Express Clevite bushings for the all the link ends.
-GM 1 ton tre's for the steering with a high angle tre at the pitman arm.
-Front axle truss. (wasn't impressed with it at all so will be making some changes)
-Extending current Expedition rear drive shaft and will have a custom double cardon one made for the front.
-Metal used: 2"X.250 wall DOM for lower links, 1 1/2"X.250 wall DOM used for upper links, 1 1/2"X.375 wall DOM used for trac bar, and ALL tabs and brackets will be made out of 1/4" Flat plate by me.
-Double lock tube clamps for the shock hoop cross brace that uses 2 3/8" bolts on each. These are so It can be removed.
-All Grade 8 hardware will be used.
-All flexible brake lines will be braided stainless steel Teflon lined hoses.

I like to follow others projects and often find myself wanting more pictures so bare with me there will be A LOT of pictures of the build. I hope you enjoy lots of pictures as much as I do.


First some pictures of what the truck was! Then onto some parts pictures. Build will start shortly.
1998 XLT Explorer. 5.0L with the 4R70W trans. I have the 4406 T-Case. 3.73 gears with rear LSD. Goodyear 31's. Rock sliders and front skid plate. Links to those builds are in my signature.

And here is some video links! There are a few videos of me wheeling in CO with nssj2!

 

[james t]

You can try to toe it at 0 an see if that helps, but it sounds more like a tire balance or bent/ out of round wheel issue to me.

 

[turboexplorer]

All 100% new wheels and tires. I called tire shop today and talked to the manager that did them and he says they where all great. Said he remembers them well, only set of M-16's he has ever done.

 

[adamsbro2]

You can try to toe it at 0 an see if that helps, but it sounds more like a tire balance or bent/ out of round wheel issue to me.

I tend to agree! In my little experience the fact that it only appears at higher speeds generally indicates bad balance! But I guess it could be wheel bearings that loosened up or something! Alignment just doesn't seem likely to me!

 

[james t]

Swap front tires out with the rear before you play with the toe and see if the vibe gets better or worse. That will usually tell you if it's tire related.

 

[turboexplorer]

I'll do that today and see what happens. I also noticed last night that when i had my uncle turn the wheel hard back and forth while I tried to find anything that is loose or moving that the tie rod bar that goes from tire to tire twists. because I am running the 1 ton TRE's and the drag link hooks to the one tre as it pushes and pulls it twists the tie rod. And since both ends of the tie rod are level with each other the tie rod twists the full amount of what the ball and sockets allow. That is the ONLY thing I found everything else is very tight no movement any where. So maybe when the tires are at speed its pushing and pulling on the drag link of course to keep the tires straight and its twisting back and forth real hard. I may try to mount my GoPro up so I can watch what it is doing when its shimmying. So what I am going to try to do is first (since it didn't shimmy on the way to get the alignment at all) is then I can mess with a bit more toe in and see where that takes us. Lol, will take as while though everything is so big and heavy and tall its hard to get weight off the axle to change some of these things. Last thing I could also try is taking the camber adjusters out and put back in the dead straight upper ball joint screws. When those are in tires are a bit cambered out but if it stops the shake then so be it.

Will let you know what happens.

 

[DUDER 1]

I think this is my favorite ex now. Nice.

 

[j_mazala]

I've heard of Interco tires being out of round before. Might be something to look into

 

[turboexplorer]

I think this is my favorite ex now. Nice.

Thanks!

I've heard of Interco tires being out of round before. Might be something to look into

I have to, but these are their better ones its a radial not a bias ply. Most of their tires are still bias ply tires. I have a message by one of their head people that if there is any problem being out of round in any way shown by a road force balancer that they will replace any tire in the first 25% of tread wear. Also today I lifted the rear and rolled the tires and the fronts and all are good. I put them all on my uncles bubble balancer to see and they are all good. I also went through every single bolt and nut again and every jam nut and pulled the cotter pins on all steering and checked them. Everything is tight. Only thing I found was the right radius arm jam nut was snug but not tight.

In my previous post I stated how the tie rod bar itself was rotating back and forth as the drag link pushed and pulled on it. Since both tie rod ends where level with each other there was a fair amount of movement. I know that it changes where the tie rod bar sits in relation to the axle because you can here the steering stabilizer oil moving. So what I did was rotate one end as far rearward as possible and the other as far forward as possible and jammed the jam nuts hard as I could. Now the tie rod bar can't rotate at all (1/8" is all now) Now when you turn the wheel hard back and forth the tie rod bar doesn't move.

I really think this was my issue because on the way to work yesterday I heard a light clunking every once in a while would clunk 4 times real fast then stop. Well today when I was under there going over everything I noticed that the trac bars paint was rubbed off and the steering stabilizer had been hitting it. The crazy part is that if I rotated it by hand as hard as I possibly could it was still 3/16" away from the trac bar. Therefore if the steering stab was beating itself against the trac bar then it must have been turning and whipping back and forth fairly hard to reach the trac bar. So I did the twist thing and drove it home from my uncles about 10 miles or so and it felt great and the slight wander it had is now gone. I bet the wander was due to the tie rod bar rotating and slightly changing its relationship with the drag link as I would hold the wheel steady. Granted I took slower roads home to again feel out the rig but sections I was at 45-50ish and its little wander is gone and it didn't give any signs of a shimmy at all. Yesterday on the way home from work at about the same speed it had the slight shimmy so I think if nothing else it was part of the issue. But like I said I went through the whole rig and it is all TIGHT spent 5 hours checking everything. Even everything in the rear.

So time will tell. Also good news my drive shaft should be done Monday!
O and I got the inner fenders trimmed and put in, and got the coolant leak stopped. It had a small leak from the lower radiator hose and I just took off the spring style one and put a worm screw type on and snugged it up nice and tight and that is stopped. Also got all the oil lines and things wrapped in the black perforated plastic and zip tied in place so it wont rub through anywhere.

 

[turboexplorer]

Alright everyone is probably tired of pictures of this truck but heck since I have done pretty well I think showing every thing done on this truck to help others in the future I might as well finish it off strong. Plus I like threads with lots of pictures.

For now here is the front bumper and what I did to it. I think I will have to trim a little more but Will wait until I go wheeling and things to see where my further trim needs are going to be. I didn't have to trim ANY of the backside of the front fenders! Just like I didn't want to do hence pushing the axle center line forward 2"

I tried my best just to follow the fenders wheel opening line for a starting point that turned out looking really good I think.

And a front picture of it. Also have the new hood struts on! SO much better.

 

[turboexplorer]

The drivers side coils were making a little bit of noise and were shuttering as it moved up and down and I noticed that the each coils tangs were opposite each other so I called Dirt Fab and asked them if the coils had a set orientation that they are supposed to be in. They do. So now each tang has 2 1/4" of over lap and now the two coils on each side side nice and straight and aren't pressing on the shock bodies so they are nice and silent and smooth now.

Indexing the coils. Was hard to get the weight off the coils in order to spin them since it has so much down travel.

 

[turboexplorer]

Now for the front gearing pics.

Old pinion still in and steering moved out of the way.

New pinion and new bearings!

Diff ready for all the new parts.

 

[turboexplorer]

Coast side pattern.

Drive side pattern, this one only took .010 more pinion shim and it was right on so these gears only took 45 min to set up.

All locked and loaded!!!!!! Can't wait to see how this TrueTrac does up front. I have heard nothing but great things about it.

 

[DUDER 1]

On the back did you just soa and a shackle and where did you purchase the hardware for the rear soa. Thank you. I have and old 77 axle I was trying to sale but for I'm going to keep it.

 

[turboexplorer]

I bought some universal removable mud flaps from Teraflex down the street and they work great. My budy runs them on his big JK and they are very nice so I got them as well.

Assembling the flaps.

Cutting rear 1/4 panel so flaps can go in.

Mounted up to the frame. You can see the pull pin in there that you can take out then slide the mud flaps out for wheeling. Takes 1 1/2 seconds to take them on and off.

 

[turboexplorer]

From the front looking back at the mud flaps.

Looking at them from the back.

 

[turboexplorer]

More pictures of the flaps. I will cut the chrome plastic section and put them back on so it will look better back there just hadn't got to it yet.

 

[turboexplorer]

On the back did you just soa and a shackle and where did you purchase the hardware for the rear soa. Thank you. I have and old 77 axle I was trying to sale but for I'm going to keep it.

Yes that's all I did. Perches and u bolts were the only things I bought for the rear the rest I made and I got them through ruff stuff specialties. They have an 8.8 swap kit.

 

[DUDER 1]

How much of a lift shackle.

 

[turboexplorer]

Just the warrior 153's I think they are. It was worth about 1 1/4" when I put them on several years ago.

 

[turboexplorer]

And as far as steering I don't remember how many pics I posted of the intermediate shaft but here are some pictures of it in. Again I did not use a rag joint since there was some misalignment needed so I used the double cardan joint that when to the rack and pinion. I can feel the small imperfections in the road a bit more than probably with the rag joint but its dead tight to the steering wheel and box which I like.