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shackles-other than warrior

aleej

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City, State
north & south brunswick, NJ
Year, Model & Trim Level
97sport/95ram/87trooper
so i want a 4" shackle.. for about a 2" lift in the rear and warrior doesnt make them from what i can see.. so is anyone aware of any other brands that sell shackles for my truck???? and where i can find them
 



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A 4" shackle might be too long -- and a shackle thats too long gets caught on whatever the rear tires just went over. A better approach might be to do a spring over axle (SOA) swap and maybe run mono-leaves if you've switched to the 4-dr pack (to offset the 5 or so inches SOA gives you).
 






I agree.. If your going to be wheeling with those long shackles your gonna dig them into things...

Even with the WAR-153 shackles I was digging them into things.. I finally added little wheels to the shackles so when I came off a rock ledge they wouldn't dig it.. They would roll..

Over the years I've managed to complelty kill two sets of wheels, but they did their job..

You can see one of them in this pic..
1-climb-flex.jpg


~Mark
 












Wow.. thats an old thread.. I posted that pic back in 2000.. I think those are the first wheels I put on....

I fixed the link for the pic (I changed my domain name a couple years ago).. so the pic works again..

I never did run into an issue with them rolling too much.. 'course I never got to Moab. I've only used them on a few Arizona trails and usually I'm going up ledges, not down.. and down is when you hit the shackles.

~Mark
 






And aleej..... to explain further why we're steering you away from 4" shackles:

I was the one that worked with the tech team at Warrior when the shackles were designed and engineered for the first production run. http://explorerforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=13143

There were specific reasons that the shackles ended up being the dimensions that they are. In addition to what has already been mentioned, there is a point of diminishing returns when going up in shackle length. The bottom of the shackle is bolted onto the rear of the leaf in a free-swinging hinge arrangement. Once the shackle length gets longer, very little extra lift is attained because the leaf does not hold its original curve, but rather starts flattening out and pushing the shackle back. Test this by lifting your rear tire off the ground, putting a jackstand under your frame, then using another jack to raise and lower your rear tire. You'll see the leaf arching and flattening while the shackle swings back and forth.

When you go to a longer shackle most of what will happen is just that, and you'll not end up with much (if any) more lift. The Warriors are as long as you can go without hitting that threshold of diminishing returns.

The Warriors aren't 4"; but are still probably 3" longer than yours and will give you about 1.5" lift. To get the rest, install add-a-leafs, or check the sticky at the top of this forum on how to take an old F150 leaf spring from a junkyard and use it in your existing leafpack to finish the lift.

Hope that helps make it a little clearer for you; we're just trying to help you avoid mistakes we've all already made/been there done that/etc. There's no use in others like you wasting money, time, and effort to learn the same thing we already have.
 






<snip>
I was the one that worked with the tech team at Warrior when the shackles were designed and engineered for the first production run. http://explorerforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=13143

<snip>

Ahh.. your the one I get to thank and blame :)

thanks for helping get the war-153 shackles made.. BUT.. are you the one that told them to make 1/2" bolt holes in them? I got one of the early production ones with the 13mm bolt hole instead of the 14mm bolt hole.. :) Just kidding.. WP fixed that issue quickly.. and it wasn't that big of a deal for me.. EDIT: I'm still running 1/2" bolts in there with over 200k miles on them..

The war-153 was one of the early mods we did.. and they are still on the truck..

~Mark
 






Yep truth be told that was my fault. I did mike the original bolt but it was stepped and had different diameters so it was sort of a coin flip whether to make it a 1/2" english or 14mm metric. I guess I should have used another coin :rolleyes:

That caused a stir for some people for awhile, but you know what? I'm still using my 1/2" bolts and can be pretty confident that I've abused them as much or more than anyone else ever has and they're still there after nine years of hardcore wheeling and 200,000 miles. That whole issue was a tempest in a teapot and actually pissed me off a bit. Some of our members called Warrior to chew them out and complain about it when Warrior was the ONLY aftermarket company out of dozens that I contacted to plead and beg to make something for our Explorers, and none of the others had any interest in all at taking the time and trouble to manufacture something for Explorers. The Jeep aftermarket company Warrior stepped up to the plate, did what I think was a fantastic job, and then gets several complaints from our members.... I'm happy they didn't get pissed off at us and join the others by just saying the heck with it we don't want your business. They hung in and the rest, as they say, is history :)
 






Back when that happened, I do remember checking the strength difference between a 1/2" bolt and a 14mm... I cannot remember, but it was basically infinitestimal. The whole "scandal" that some were complaining about was really a total non-issue. And in the end, if anyone would have broken a 1/2" bolt, it would certainly have been me; and like I said, that has never happened even up to today nine years later. I've also still got the bolts residing in the original bushings (even though they do badly need replacing) so the very slight gap in bushing/bolt diameters hasn't made a lick of difference either.

I think we've officially hijacked this thread. I'll leave and let it go back on course :)
 






well thank you guys.. i dont really feel like doing all the work to switch out leave and add them in and bla bla i also dont do rocks.. i like small trails and mudd, but maybe ill just go with the warriors i still havetime to think about it.. thanks guys
 












Since you have a sport, you should just swap your monoleaf for the F150 mod.
 






other than the fact i have no where or time to do all that work.. i am so tight on money right now due to the new apt... i figure i can afford a tt and shackles.. i however do not think i can afford the trip to the jyard the leafpack from the 150 and the trip home.. maybe at a later time once i hvae gotten comfy with how much this hole living on my own thing is really gonna cost the ill think about it... but thanks for the idea aaron

and colin.. same respnce pretty much.. to broke to buy anything else really..
 






Both the add-a-leaf and the F150 mod take just one afternoon (a couple of hours) and cost way less than a tank of gas (about $35). You could drink water or tea instead of coke for a month to pay for it and do it on a Sunday afternoon. If time and money is that tight.... well, concentrate on living on what you make. Best wishes and hope we helped you :)
 






you did and thank you
 












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