Wheel travel

**Bugpac** · 08-31-2006, 11:44 PM

Some one tell me diffrent if i am wrong, Real wheel travel is measured by the disatnce the wheel moves from full droop, to full bump, full bump being were the frame is bottomed at ground or 1-3" above the ground, the wheel extending to bump after the frame hits the ground would be useless correct?

example, car has 8" ground clearance at ride height, 2" of free sag, and shock bottoms out with chasis 2" from ground, how much travel is that, in my math that is equal to 8".

now lets say that when the frame hits the ground, the tire would bump another 2", that would not be wheel travel correct, unless it was advertised as a rock crawler and not a minibuggy?

**K-fab** · 08-31-2006, 11:58 PM

Wheel travel is just that - the amount of travel the wheel can do.

Pick the car off the ground, take the springs off the shocks (or let the N2 outta the air shox), let the suspension droop to full position, that's the starting point.

Pick up on the wheel until it stops moving. The distance traveled by the wheel is the travel.

USEABLE wheel travel is another story. I've seen cars with 20" of wheel travel, but the last four has the frame buried in the sand - so it has a useable travel of 16" and is improperly setup, poorly designed and not much fun...

I wish I could remember the brand of car that came through ATV Racing a few years back for some work. It was very strange and an extremely poor design - in fact, they refused to do anything to it because it was so poorly designed...

It was weird looking, had something like 24" of ground clearance up front, but only 10" or so in the rear - the tranny sat down in this odd pod thingy that hung off the back end.

It had almost three feet of front wheel travel and about 2 feet in the rear. Problem was it was buried a foot into the ground before the wheels would finaly quit moving upward.

**Bugpac** · 09-01-2006, 12:03 AM

Thanks k fab

so point being, do your homework brfore you right the check, someone may claim they have 20 wheel travel, were in reality only 12 is useable..

**hoser** · 09-01-2006, 12:59 AM

Then you get the morons that count seat compression and tire deflection as part of their suspension numbers, some people will do almost anything to extend whats short or lacking, it also seem the farther West you go the BIGGER the (lie) numbers are, sure you remove the shocks and measure how far it will drop and how much it will compress but does it go that far with the shocks on and drive axles in place, same goes with the front suspension ensure the steering linkage is connected and fully functional before getting to excited about someones designs, pictures numbers etc..

**bdkw1** · 09-01-2006, 02:34 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hoser

it also seem the farther West you go the BIGGER the (lie) numbers are

Hey now, I don't think this is a regional think, more of a crackhead fabber thing.

Unfortunantly there are a lot of stupid people out there that think they need 24" of wheel travel on a 1500# car. There are 5500# TT's out there that work wonderfully with less travel than that.

**Bugpac** · 09-01-2006, 02:53 AM

lol, bdk, it is pretty much a fact, that farther west you go, the more builders there are, i dont think that hosers was really to far out of line....

**2lcf** · 09-01-2006, 03:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bugpac

lol, bdk, it is pretty much a fact, that farther west you go, the more builders there are, i dont think that hosers was really to far out of line....

Hey Bug.......I am about as far west as you can go with out hitting water....well 45 mins from the Pacific........but I am not sure there are more builders out here......it seems mid west there are alot.......I agree that alot of people forgot that 2+2=4 ,,,,,,,,,, not 6................ 20" of travel is alot...............14 is what I will be getting.........with the frame 3 inches off the ground.........that's front......not sure on reat yet........and YES Bug I will be ordering the front Fox shocks the end of next week, then build the rear trailing arms..........yee hee...........

**Bugpac** · 09-01-2006, 04:01 AM

are you getting them from my guy, he has proven to myself and kwiksand that he is a very standup guy, i say this because kent was in need of some stock spacers that come with the shocks, he did some cad work for me etc etc, he mentioned me making him some, but i didnt feel comfortable doing that yet, parting tool was a pain in the arse to figure out, anyway i called him to buy and he shipped them to kwiksand for free of charge, i told him they werent even for me, but he didnt care.... 8)

**2lcf** · 09-01-2006, 04:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bugpac

are you getting them from my guy, he has proven to myself and kwiksand that he is a very standup guy, i say this because kent was in need of some stock spacers that come with the shocks, he did some cad work for me etc etc, he mentioned me making him some, but i didnt feel comfortable doing that yet, parting tool was a pain in the arse to figure out, anyway i called him to buy and he shipped them to kwiksand for free of charge, i told him they werent even for me, but he didnt care.... 8)

Yes........Sonny.......he has been a great connection...........pass his name on to everyone you know.........he would love the business...........

**Bugpac** · 09-01-2006, 04:14 AM

yes, we have finally got a good link in the links section, as he now has a ebay store... 8)

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Wheel travel

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