Holy structural integrity, batman! ... wish I had pics

C

clutchdust

Millionaire Playboy
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Stopped at a convenience store today and this dude pulls in driving a jacked up Dodge Durango. It looked weird, like a lift kit that went wrong. It looked like the guy had just raised the body 8-10 on the frame and left everything else stock, just had a very odd look to it. So as I go back out to my truck I take a peek at what dude did. I almost shit myself when I see he cut the front frame rails just behind the a-arm pick up points, welded in a single vertical chunk of steel plate (looked like 1/4", maybe 3/8") and then welded the frame back up to it. Freaking crazy to me. There was no gusseting or anything. Just a single lateral plane and the way he did it the top of the front part of the frame rail just barely intersected the bottom of the back part of the frame rail. Talk about cutting out your structural integrity. What made it look even shittier is the engine and trans were still in the stock position relative to the front frame rails.
You can bet if I see this guy on the road, I will keep a close eye on him.
 
Morons like this are why some countries are so strict about chassis and suspension modifications.

How does something like that pass a safety inspection, anyway?
 
Scary thing about out here, no safety inspection. In Clark County (Las Vegas), you have to pass a smog check, but you could roll up in a car with only three wheels, no doors, a shattered windshield, no taillights and a single flashlight taped to the front fender and they don't care so long as it passes smog.
Just stupid.
 
About those trucks that are really jacked up into the air. I suspect that these vehicles off road performance is not that good. They have an extremely high center of gravity. Drive them on a dirt road that's sloped sideways and they'll tip over sideways. Drive them down a very step incline, stomp on the brakes, and the rear end will lift up and flip over the front of the vehicle.

Also, no matter how high you jack up the truck, the determining feature for road clearance is the height of the bottom of the differential above the ground. If the bottom of the diff is 2 1/2 feet above the ground, you can jack the vehicle 20 feet in the air and the ground clearance is still 2 1/2 feet.

I used to work with a guy who had one of the old Land Rovers...the early model that was small, very simple, and had a not too powerful 4 cylinder engine ( low engine was offset by a 50:1 low gear). It was stock..and stock meant it had an aluminum body . He made a lot of trips to Baja California (when it was safe to travel there) he told of passing these cosmetic "off road" vehicles that were stuck, broke down, etc.
 
Yeh, my son has a Jeep Cherokee, and so did his share of mudding and mountains in the NW region, sent a few of his Jeep adventures.....He has met some chick now, and so settling down a bit, and that meant removing the lift kit....:rofl::smash:
 
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