98 frontier build

[TiTRD]

Looking good Mike.

[mike_belben]

thanks rich, ive lost a little weight. you're looking pretty good yourself.

[mike_belben]

last time on IFS


after years of being packed with remodelling shit, i got my garage situated well enough to work out of, brought over all my tools, got torches, bought a new hobart 187, built benches, brought over shelving, etc. working in your own garage, not giving a damn about the rain, not having to lay in the dirt, finding everything exactly as you left it.. what a wonderful feeling. this is what makes that fucking mortgage tolerable.













up on some pine logs i slabbed.



rear end is out, guess this explains the crazy wheelhop backing it into the garage

[mike_belben]

started to set it up on castor stilts at ride height.. about 24" to frame. my garage is a little too narrow to work around it.






lobbed off the back bumper and a good chunk of frame, most of the bedmounts are undone and im gonna bob a chunk for now, though the bed is about shot.

about half of the IFS off

[mike_belben]

anyone need parts off this?

ive got the CA46 rear with 4:62 factory gears and a welded diff (abs shit removed)





a set of decent condition spare oem CV axles


brake parts, spindles, hubs, etc. as well as warn (i think) locking hubs.

all located in springfield MA

[mike_belben]

its hard to say no to cheap 42s for sale, especially when they're already on rims you can bolt on. damn you craigslist.



the frontier frame has a huge front arch, and the oilpan is practically molded around the axle. tons of room for uptravel as long as the axle doesnt hit the pitman arm.

im trying to keep it low but with 42s i have a feeling this might be close to the bumps. this is 24" to frame and flatbelly should be easy.

[mitchg]

looking good

[mike_belben]

thanks mitch.

made a little progress today. brought the 60 housing from my fathers house, scraped for a few hours, gave it a good bath, primed and painted.



then set up some ghetto plumb bobs out of sewing thread and 1/4-20 nuts that worked mint. put it all in place to find out my oil pain was not having it. the whole sump is offset to the passenger side of the block rails to make room for the driver side factory diff. nissans are much happier with ford 60s i guess.





im gonna slice the pan up most likely but i still couldnt keep it as low as i wanted. so the frame went up to 26" to ground height but i dont think thats terrible for 42s really. got it all situated and mocked up the springs, hangers and slider boxes to see what im working with.













i went with the sliders because of how abrupt the frame rail width changes on these trucks, and what looked like the likelyhood of a shackle having interence with the cab mount. still have to cut out the bottom center section on the boxes.

[mike_belben]

[toyota trucks]

looks like its coming along good mike

[TiTRD]

Looks awesome Mike keep up the good work.

[sasfrontier]

This is mine with some 11.00-16's (they measure 38" exactly) Right befor the frame curves up front i'm sitting at 27" but will be lowering the front one inch when i change coils. I am going to have to limit my uptravel to about 5-5.5" but thats fine in florida. I also have a 2" bodylift.

It doesn't have quite as much squat as the pic shows (junk in the bed)



Atleast you have a king cab long bed... I'm going to be cutting the back of my cab for tire clearance in the near future.

[mike_belben]

thanks guys

if you're at 27 to frame on 38s then im really quite low for 42s. right now im a hair under 26" to frame and think i can maybe even come down a tad. im willing to cut quite a bit to accomodate uptravel.


i used slightly undersized drillrods at each end to square up my springs








got the front hanger in permanently tonight but havent taken pics yet.

getting used to the hobart 187. im not in love with it, but its definitely able to build a rig if you dont mind double passes. for $600, its not bad at all, but you arent gonna open a welding shop with this machine alone.

[sasfrontier]

Yeah i'm really not willing to do any major cutting yet. Curious to see how much you have to modify the oil pan. Looks good so far can't wait to see how low you can get it.

[nissannut]

Nice work!

[mike_belben]

yeah me too.

i have a 240SX motor and a FWD altima motor here (KA24DE's) and neither pan will work. the 240sx might bolt on, but its got a deep sump at the front edge that is still offset to the passenger side.. it would likely hit worse.

the altima is an entirely different animal, the bottom half of the block is a girdled rail and its hardly got any pan at all. im surprised they even call it the same motor.

[mike_belben]

boogered a little but they arent going anywhere. think im just gonna cap the rails. i was gonna put a front "crossmember" but it cost clearance, approach angle and steel, figured screw it.

[sasfrontier]

How is the room for steering looking? Also are you going to hack up the body mount and move the box forward to get better draglink angles.

[mike_belben]

absolutely not. full hydro or crooked draglink.

it may work fine since im running my tie rod behind the diff. hard to say without knuckles

[frontier2k1]

good looking build!

[98ZJ]

Looking good so far man! That is a hell of a deal you got on those tons too, damn. Alot of people would kill for a deal like that. Good job man, can't wait to see more and to see some action shots of that bitch

[mike_belben]

i didnt have to kill anyone, but i did have to get them out of the chassis in the middle of nowhere. and then make a whole lotta chips to convert the front to single wheel. if i was factoring in my time, buying a $600 going rate single wheel front would have been the way to go, especially if it had good brakes. ive got over $400 into these just in brakes and rear hubs.

[98ZJ]

yeah true, looking at it that way it would have been nice to get some already pulled and ready to go. Especially with brakes..

[nissancrawler]

you might want to look into a 2wd pan. I swapped to that on my hardbody. Gained 2" of clearance and another quart or so capacity to boot.

[mike_belben]

yeah but that would take time and money. i own a fab shop so it'll only cost time and i'll get exactly the pan i want.

i built the front spring packs and put weight on the truck.. depending on uptravel, its looking like i may be able to just hammer it in a little or perhaps not even hit at all. it can wait for now. hopefully will have the slider boxes in today if i can finish my buddies driveshaft. then i gotta make degree shims and likely get longer Ubolts