i screwed up a bit putting together my front 60 and the pinion is too high if i bring it back down i will end up with 14 degrees of caster i really dont run the jeep on the road that much but i was wondering if that affect how hard it is to steer the thing in the rocks and i dont really want to cut the knuckles back off :mad3:

going slow you will probably be ok... but have you ever seen the shopping cart with the busted front wheel? That'll be your front end at any speed.

It' s not going to drive right. When you turn the wheels right or left from center, the front of the vehicle is going to raise way up. Cut the ends back off and fix it.

even with hydro assist you think it will shake like a shopping cart?

Just had a friend do a spring over, set the castor to about the same. Then he asks why he can't drive over 30mph. I told him before he drove it that it wouldn't drive right. He is now in process of cutting the nuckles and rotating them

It would go straight just fine, but as said earlier, it would not want to turn, you would be raising the inboard side when turning...

Make torque at low rpm, and forget about gears.

cut em and do it right... id rather go thru the pain of fixing it than having it fawked up for a long time

I screwed up on my math (dont ask) on my Bar Stool racer and it had way to much caster and i'm telling you rite now dont take out you'll be sory it's danjours as hell and can you say "no steer"

I think you should cut the knuckles off and reweld them on in the proper location.

I say try it. 14 degrees is not out of line with what some heavy equiptment runs. The jacking and camber change effects from the caster are counter acted by the kingpin inclination angle which I think is 10 degrees. also if you have a flexy leaf spring frontend you might want to leave the pinion a couple degrees high because the front pinion wraps down when you are going forward.

Is there a replacement option for the upper balljoint that uses a cam style that will help jeepmonmad? I remember seeing somewhere one that would allow some caster / camber adjustment.

WHAT !!??!!...... I have 12 deg. of caster and the thing handles-drives like a Corvette with 38's !!! Caster helps you drive straight and centers the wheels. Hell, I can hit a hell of a bump or pot hole at 60-70 mph and let go of the stearing wheel (bump stear has alot to do with that also). Caster also helps the edge of the tire "dig in" on muddy trails to help keep the front end from pushing. Look at a Sniper, i bet they have 14-18 deg. of caster. If I build another front axle ill prob. try 14.

Richard

As near as I can tell with my primitive angle finder I have about 12 degrees of caster on my truck and it handles ok. I changed my transfer case so now I need to rotate the pinion to get maybe 6 or 7 degrees caster. I don't think it will make a huge difference because it drives fine as fast as I wanna go now. Run it and see I say!

'Just to add some perspective: my '86 Vette has 7.5 degrees (factory) caster. That's almost double of what a regular car has. Even Cheverolet reduced this figure for latter year C4 corvettes (back to 4 degrees). And yes, if I crank the steering while stopped you can see the front end lean. :D

leave it I am at 12+ also and it drives straight as a arrow and turns fine, with 35's !! and the front does raise and lower when I turn just like a ford pu does, this was done by them to increase decrease the turning radius, which is a good thing for a 4x4 right???,,anyway 12 + works for me!!

i have a r/c 44 and the caster is pretty high in it....
but it handles well....no tire wobble at any speed...any air pressure.....no steering damper...works a hell of alot better than the stock did aimed down.

Spec caster on a G.M. (Solid-axle) is asking for 8.0 degs. Much-longer wheel-base than a Jeep, so I would think the jeep could use more (????). *Does anyone have caster specs for a stock jeep?*

14 degs is high, very-high. But it might be O.K.. I think I'd go with it, If it turns out O.K. than don't worry about it.

I'm not positive. But I would think there should be some way to "dial" in the caster for alignment purposes (By adj the upper ball-joint location ?). If there is a way, it could be as much as 2.5 degrees or-so, and with that, it should bring the caster into a more liveable relm. It's another possible option to explore before cutting the knuckles off again.

It worked well off road for me but created a real nasty death woble. Now that the jeep gets trailered I still would not put it back to that much caster because even going to the trail from camp can get hairy.