6-8" Custom Suspension Lift

[warpath77]

As of now im running with Marks 2.5" lift which is great, definitely improved my offroad experience. But I really want my Envoy lifted between 6 and 8 inches, I realized it would have to be completely custom, Im just wondering what needs to be replaced

If you know what needs to be done and a rough price that would be great, if its possible I'd really like to give it a shot.

If this was discussed in another thread I apologize

[DmccartneyFF2TB]

HEHE I think that is deffently an odd question. As far as i am aware no one has even tryed to do any thing like this. The biggests problem i can see is the shafts???? there is my 2 cents.

[The Roadie]

Nobody's done it except one member who fabricated his own lift spindles to match the differential relocation. It's not a commercial product, and we don't know if he wheels it hard, but we doubt it. The usual lift companies have all said no or ignored our requests.

To do a custom diff drop solution would cost about as much as a SAS.

Are you talking about fabbing one yourself, or hoping to just throw $2000-3000 at a local fabricator to do one for you? I would recommend talking to local experienced offroad design/fabricators. Brainstorm it with them, get one of us who have been discussing it for years on the phone, and see if you want to invest in the first such kit. Then see if your fabricator wants to get into the commercial lift kit business.

[warpath77]

I would be getting someone to make it for me, I know of one offroad fab shop in my area. I'll have to give them a ring
$3000 is quite a bit for just the lift, I love the idea of having a tall envoy hehe

[navigator]

I think Mark's suspension lift would get you close to 3 inches, then a 3 inch body lift would get you about 6.

[warpath77]

I think Mark's suspension lift would get you close to 3 inches, then a 3 inch body lift would get you about 6.

Yes I have Marks lift, I might go with the body lift but suspension is more important to me
Thats probably the easiest choice haha

GM must not have liked us well enough to make it easy for us

[chevycrew]

Nah, GM couldn't care less about us wanting to lift it.

to do a 6-8" lift...


Drop everything in the front down, build mock oil pan to hold the diff and disco, lower all 4 a-arms, change t-case (driveline issues) etc...


Might as well solid axle it and run the $600 rear sump oil pan...

[fishsticks]

I've been working out the kinks in an idea to drop the diff out of the oil pan for a while now. Since I have an extra vehicle now and can afford to have the TB down for extended periods of time I may pull my front end apart and start mock ups soon.

I'm not really looking for anymore lift (I have 4" on the suspension side). I want more down travel.

[janesy86]

I'm not really looking for anymore lift (I have 4" on the suspension side). I want more down travel.

Exactly. This is what I need to keep going.

[bartonmd]

Nah, GM couldn't care less about us wanting to lift it.
.

Exactly... They were more concerned with making the first full frame midsized SUV without a rollover warning... They could care less about the 50 people wanting to lift old vehicles, when they sold how many hundreds of thousands of these to women who drive them like they're cars?

Mike

[Diacom]

Even if you don't go rear sump, it would be possible to lower the diff below the oil pan to gain the clearance you want. The issue you will run in to is having to work something out with the control arms, which if this was easy to do would already have been done by folks wanting to have better angle with current lifts, as well as a different spindle if you wanted to keep the upper in the stock form.

Beings the shaft through the oil pan does not move up and down, it would require alot of relocation brackets to drop it down, but you'd be close to the lift you want with out having to go SAS. There would be no need for a body lift either.

Just another expensive way to look at it.

[chevycrew]

The diff drop could be done with some plate on each side of the oil pan, with a tube between for the shaft.

Pretty simple for just the diff drop. The lower a-arms, steering, and front D-line would be harder. Upper a-arms, chop off the upper bracket and bring the a-arm tight to the top of the frame. But for clearance it may to need to be widened to clear.

[fishsticks]

The diff drop could be done with some plate on each side of the oil pan, with a tube between for the shaft.

Pretty simple for just the diff drop. The lower a-arms, steering, and front D-line would be harder. Upper a-arms, chop off the upper bracket and bring the a-arm tight to the top of the frame. But for clearance it may to need to be widened to clear.

Plate and tube is what I was looking at for a diff bracket. Doing a custom bracket would allow for reinforcement of the mounting location near the pinion. For S10 guys, pinion walk was really bad on the aluminum cases, which is why they failed a lot. I think ours actually holds up better because it's mounted to the oil pan.

The buckets are straight up and down enough that the upper arms will slide down nicely. Just need to reinforce the bucket where you want them.

For the lowers a piece needs to be made to relocate the two plates that have the knuckles on them. My thought was to build pieces out of plate with tube to reinforce the bolt holes, then just use longer bolts to go through it to the stock alignment bolt holes.

There apparently are two different sizes of front driveshafts. Code JRO is 23.625" long and HA1 is 26.75" long. I have HA1 and have lots of room to move the DS in and out on the CV. I've already had it down and it seems long enough to bring down 3-4" or so. Since we are making our own bracket, we can clock the diff to give a little better pinion angle. Also, since the diff NEVER moves, it actually makes the driveshaft issue pretty easy.

[Trail X]

While you're at it, change the LCA around so it can accept a more "standard" front strut design. One of the biggest limits is the strut itself.

[fishsticks]

I'm unsure of how much shearing force is on the lower strut mount. Obviously we all saw what Bill's Icons did.

It might be feasible to build an adapter to our yoke using a piece of tube welded to a plate. The tube could slide through the yoke and be notched to accommodate the bolt that goes through. Then weld a piece of plate on top and tabs onto that. Mount a standard (EB1 style) bottom mount shock at a 90* angle from the pivot point of the yoke bolt on the LCA. Add tabs to the outer edges to help locate the spring properly. Assuming the springs load fairly evenly during flex it might hold together...

[Trail X]

From what I followed, you'd keep the lower strut yolk and somehow mount to that?

If I were re-doing things, I'd do it more like this:



If you just offset the strut a bit, you could mount it in a similar method... U bracket and a bolt. I THINK that's a more standard method... if nothing else it looks more robust.

[fishsticks]

I think we'd need a new LCA for something like that. Not enough room to move over. I was sticking to the realm of stock control arms...

[Trail X]

I think we'd need a new LCA for something like that. Not enough room to move over. I was sticking to the realm of stock control arms...

If you're going through the trouble to lower the subframe, just go ahead and redo the control arm.

[fishsticks]

I think we'd need a new LCA for something like that. Not enough room to move over. I was sticking to the realm of stock control arms...

If you're going through the trouble to lower the subframe, just go ahead and redo the control arm.

I forgot. Engineers have no idea what the word "budget" means.

[The Roadie]

... Engineers have no idea what the word "budget" means.

hehe. We understand budgeting, but we're used to spending someone else's money.

Seriously, one of the best definitions of an engineer I read was: An Engineer is somebody who can do for a dollar what any damn fool can do for five.