Well hot damn theres progress!
Alright, todays first project was to get the steering ram mounted. The ram I want is out of stock at the moment so I'm reusing my old one that has no problems.
Essentially I took a piece of 1/4" plate and it welds to the diff side mount and then bolts to the other side mount with two 1/2" bolts and the two 7/16" bolts that hold the ram on. So to access the differential I have to remove the ram then remove the two 1/2" bolts and then remove the bolts in the diff then the whole assembly comes off.
The ram is backwards from how it's supposed to mount so I made some spacers out of 3/4" .120" wall DOM which spaces the ram body 1/8" away from the 1/4" plate.
I also mitered the bottom of the diff. side mount to make it more purty like. The hole is obviously for the diff fill plug:
Next was to start on the combination bump stop/shock mounts. Here is the pass. side mount getting started:
I had to bend the back of the rear mount plate to follow the line of the upper link mount. The link mount will be plated in as well:
I used 1/2" shaft collars to space the shock out a bit. Previously I had made mounts that went right against the shocks misalignment spacers which caused the steel to dig into the eye of the shock. This time I learned my lesson:
Then I plated the top with 1/4" for the bump pad then finished with 1/8" up the shock mount bent to fit and luke all fancy like:
Drivers side was essentially the same thing, just didn't have a link mount to tie into so it dies into the tube:
More crappy welds. I do appolagize for the mount to axle tube welds, I had a kink in my hose that I didn't notice which was causing some sporatic wire feeding... Oh well, can't all be perfect:
Here she is in all her glory!
Anyway, tomorrow I shall finish welding everything up front and finish all the little gussets and plating I need to do. Then hopefully get the steering arms on and finished so I can start making some tie rods. My tubing for my links won't be here till Monday now so still waiting on that, checked today but they had nothing in yet.
Also need to make a small guard for the ram still.
Then it's on to the rear!