Quote:
Originally Posted by Merlyn2220
Ah, ok I see the new design now. I had looked at your thread last summer, but you hadn't built the diamond plate version yet. It looks to me like your center section (axle-to-axle area) is fixed, and the rear articulation all happens from the fixed hinge points about 12-18" forward of the rear axle. Is that correct? Because you are working on rubber spring tension holding the pan up, and a sliding interface (rubber pad under the shock perches) you don't have to worry about the axle going down too far and ripping off the front hinges. My thought was to fix the axle pan in place tight to the axle (probably with big u-bolts), and then figure out some flexible flapper sheet to go from the front fixed part to the mobile axle part. That might be more complicated than what you have, or more prone to squeaks. I'll have to think about that before building.
Per Isoldmysaturn's comments, did you find poor FE while you were rebuilding the pan? I'm hesitant to spend $300 on aluminum sheet to build the passenger side (muffler side) bellypan with questionable ROI.
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Yes, the center (main) belly pan is fixed in between the crossbeams. There wasn't a requirement fer it to move.
The front hinges are about 3' in front of the rear axle just because that's where the attachment points fer the rear crossbeam ended up. The rear belly pan (rear crossbeam to rear axle) is about 4' in length and just extends past the rear of rear axle. This allowed me to attach the straps to the rear belly pan without any interference from the rear axle. My original design had the belly pan attached directly to the rear axle but my observations showed that the attachment angle was changing due to the flexing and articulation of the leaf springs. Since the belly pan isn't on the same plane as the leaf springs pivot, my original attachment point was gitting beat up. Even with the next version, the straps were breaking due to the stress as they were wrapped abound the axle housing. This is why I went with the current version so the attachment points won't git beat up since they are not tied directly to the rear axle and the belly pan is allowed to slide depending on the position of the rear axle. My current design is my best one yet to address all the various issues I had with the previous versions. The current version also allows fer easy removal of all components fer access and maintenance.
If you have access to free or really low cost Coroplast sheets, that would be a good medium to work with as long as you used some good bracing. Luan sheets are also low cost but has a tendency to delaminate after about a year depending on how much weather you expose it to. FRP sheets are definitely out of the question because of the cost, durability, and weight factors.