RXFORD

Anything thicker than 3mm to 1.3 is a bit silly in my opinion. Kinda like hanging a brick off paper. The heat affected zone from blazing 4mm+ to the thinner material would counter any benefits of having a thicker load plate imo. I would use 3mm but make the plate fairly big/long to spread the load. It will need to span the full height of the oem rail or xmember to meet requirements. I probably wouldn't fully weld it to a chassis that thin either. Just stitch weld to keep the haz to a minimum. Radius corners and 'Fish mouth' or 'diamond' the ends where the plate crosses perpendicular to the rail instead of just having a square cut. Adding a few plug welds here and there is sensible too. I would definitely speak to the certifier you plan to use about it. There may be additional things he would like to see being that its basically sheetmetal.

Yeh ya probably right to be fair. I've been around f/c alot so I'm used to them. I run knurled in my machines with solid wire. Saves having slippage issues with single roller drive and a 15kg spool.

Generally the guide rolls have a tiny knurling on the radius/groove to help grip the wire. Not sure how easy that would be to replicate if they were machined. They almost look crimped. You can use 0.8 tips with 0.6 wire, but you may get a little 'arc wander'.

If you have 3ph you may be able to pick up an older Miller Syncrowave or Lincoln Squarewave for around that kinda money. They are bigger transformer type machines but pretty solid/reliable bits of gear. If you are after a single phase invertor style I'd probably look into a Cigweld Weldskill 205. Can get them new for under $3k.

Earlier hilux stuff is hard to get and alot of the Rn era housings are bent from farm use. Easier just to get a later one and narrow to suit. I have a jig setup for narrowing G-series housings if you end up going down the hilux route.

Or Murray at Weber Specialties in Akl.

Fyi, the 2000 era 2wd Hilux draglink is same geometry but has a dip in the centre. Bolts up to the earlier shapes and gives a bit more clearance.

You must have fluked it, or have limited travel? Generally just winging it and attaching the pickup points anywhere leads to excessive pinion angle change and dshaft plunge which is never ideal come cert time. Parallel upper & lower bars give an infinite instant centre which isn't ideal. It gives pretty much no anti-squat% so not alot of added load on rear wheels under acceleration other than the unsprung weights. This can lead to axle tramping when breaking traction, and poor traction when accelrating out of corners amongst other issues. Vertical separation on axle pickup points should be greater to give a known i/c forward of axle. An i/c around the front bumper is usually considered pretty good for street cars as it gives enough traction for the general use, but not so much that its going to hook up like a drag car.

Typically panhards have never been a great option in the minitruck world due to the larger range of travel that bags give compared to coilovers etc. The added travel makes the panhard push/pull more which wouldn't be an issue if you had skinny rims, but people are usually trying to stuff the biggest diam & widest rims they can under the tray. With limited room between the outer skin and chassis the sideways movement can be an issue. To be honest the only bagged ute I can ever remember having a panhard in Nz was @cletus navara, and he might have a story about axle shift vs wheels haha. If running a parallel 4-bar, a watts would be the better option, but due the extra cost/engineering of a watts the common choice is a triangulated 4-bar.

Holy shit that sucks heavy. Crazy how quick things can turn pear shaped. On another note, an easy way to fill bigger spot weld holes, even with a half drilled lower flange is to chuck a heat sink under it. Copper or Ali block will stock you blowing through but can still get a nice plug weld. Sometimes saves having to replace flanges. Nice work though!

Bulbs mint, It'l still get a wof haha. If its not raining tomorrow I'l open up the container and have a rummage. May have a black grill. I remember rage-binning heaps of shit so I'l have to refresh my memory. Where are you in Nz?

Hey mate, yeh might have a few bits. I'd have to check on the prefacelift corner light housings, but I know I have some new clear lenses. Same with the bumper lenses. I need some good drivers side door hinges. Mine are a bit sloppy. It was noted when I got the pink sticker wof, so would like to swap them before I get next wof.

Heims are used fairly often in the minitruck world. As are polybushes. You'll generally get more articulation with heims, but also more 'road noise'. Heims need to be teflon lined to meet lvv requirements. Polybushes dont flex as much and can wear out quick if you overstress them, but are a bit more comfortable if you use the right ones. Some of the cheap chassistech ones are shitty hard urethane and don't last. A combo of heims/polys is common too. I generally do this. Just make sure you use the chart in the car construction manual to get the size vs weight correct for cert.

Its possible to get them legal, just have to be prepared to the extra mile to get the necessary proof. My b2000 does actually have CT spindles, but it has been certed on them for a long time so luckily I didn't have to go through all thay drama. I can't remember if Belltech are doing Maz spindles, but if they are it may be better option. All the Belltechs I've ever dealt with have been branded/logo'd however wpuld pay to double check before purchase as they are a fair bit dearer from memory.

The quality is hit and miss. Some of the castings can be a bit rough. And by rough I mean have porosity holes etc. In saying that, I havn't heard of anyone in the NZ minitruck scene having one break on them. The biggest issue with CT spindles these days is there is no brand/manufacturer logo cast or stamped into the spindles. They only have 'mazL' for example. Lvvta require proof that the spindle is said brand, a receipt is not good enough proof and the pictures on thier website are terrible. I recently had to email pictures to ChassisTech of some Mitsi L200 spindles my customer has in his ute to confirm they are thiers. They confirmed so now I have proof from the company which hopefully Lvvta will accept.

Cliff Bond Reconditioners did the machine work on a couple engines for me many years ago. I lived down the road from Andrew the owner when I was down that way. Hes a GC.

Sweet, came out nice.

The Repco at Botany has a waste oil bin in the Alleyway behind the store. I took some there a couple weeks back.

My 2c on the matter having done a fair few of them. I highly recommened spending a bit of extra money and having him run a test panel in the form of a strip. To be honest I would be surprosed if he doesn't already have some made for this purpose. That way you can sit it over you bonnet and make sure you are 100% happy with the layout/spacing before turning a bonnet into a cheese grater. Just marking out the punch lines isn't enough. Its really hard to visualise. Yeh it can get expensive with the extra time, but so can buying more bonnets.

Pm me.

Just from a reputable manufacturer really. Aliexpress parts may lead to Cert man leaving a note on cert fail sheet saying "remove china parts" otherwise. Joints and link bars need to meet the criteria for weights in the CCM. Air line should be labelled with pressure rating. True story... theres a guy out south Auckland who builds trailers from pallet racking, who also uses Irigation hose for airlines in his 'builds'. Don't do this... Pm me with what you are looking at using if you want.

Likely to be a case by case thing that will have to go through Design Approval process.

Download the Car Construction manual and check your truck against the requirements. You might be ok if its not super low.

Yarns here. https://oldschool.co.nz/index.php?/topic/80170-matt-rxfords-junk-shit-talk-here/#comment-2514333

Back to doing its duties collecting broken commo's.