"Control Freak" rockwell buggy by Tucker's Offroad *pic heavy*

Finally getting around to doing an official build thread on the new buggy. When it came time to name the project, it came very easy, as "Control Freak" came from an attempted insult that I decided to wear as a badge of honor!
I sold my old chassis and planned on building the next one myself with my powertrain, but the pipeline called so I decided to hire master fabricator/machinist and one of my closest friends Nate Tucker of Tucker's Off-road to take the reins.
A shorter wheelbase than the last buggy with more wheel speed for the occasional bouncer hills were my only requirements, then I gave Nate creative freedom to design as he wanted. He told me of an Ultra4/trail rig/bouncer hybrid he'd had in his head for some time, which sounded great to me, and got both of our imaginations going.
We communicated every day during the build process, and with our combined fab and wheeling experience this should turn out to be a great all-around buggy. It's at powder coat at the time of this post with plans to be complete by RBD. There are a bunch of pictures on the post so be patient as I get them added. The parts list and specs are as follows:

• LS376/525 GM crate engine with GM ECM and harness
• Hooker Blackheart headers
• Griffin 3" dual core radiator with Flex-a-Lite Black Magic Xtreme fan
• Tank's Inc. 400 liter/per hour in-tank fuel pump, custom fuel cell
• TH400 transmission with Bombshell's old B&M 2400 stall
• Offroad Designs NP205 with all new internals, 32 spline inputs/outputs, 1410 yokes and Northwest Fab billet bearing supports
• WOD carrier bearing and aluminum link bars with 1-1/4" heims and 1" bolts
• EOR/BK 1410 driveshaft yokes, driveshafts built by Nate
• Rockwell 2.5 ton front-rear steer axles with 47 spline Ouverson axles and spools, Stazworks return to center setup, Wilwood brakes
• Ruff Stuff 48" trailing arms
• Raceline Rocker 17" double beadlock wheels with 42" sticky Treps
• ORI STX non-reservoir 16" struts on all four corners, with Fox bump stops and Currie anti-rock bar added in case a swap to coilovers happens in the future (doubtful)
• Custom stainless exhaust built by Tyler Foster at SikPipes into a 4" Magnaflow straight-through diesel muffler with 4" outlet
• Tucker's Offroad one-off chassis made with 0.188" and 0.120" DOM tubing with aluminum skins, dash and skid plates. 119" wheelbase
• Dakota Digital 4-in-1 gauge
• PRP GT SE seats and PRP harnesses
• Heavy equipment rear camera and monitor
• Vision X 3" headlights



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Re: "Control Freak" rockwell buggy by Tucker's Offroad

AyyyyeeeO.

Re: "Control Freak" rockwell buggy by Tucker's Offroad

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Re: "Control Freak" rockwell buggy by Tucker's Offroad

Re: "Control Freak" rockwell buggy by Tucker's Offroad

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There are steel plates that bolt in between the seats and rear shocks in case of a failure.

Re: "Control Freak" rockwell buggy by Tucker's Offroad

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And that's where we're at so far. Should be back from powder this week and final assembly will begin!

Re: "Control Freak" rockwell buggy by Tucker's Offroad

Lookin good! Congratulations !

Drooling

Man that thing looks good. Glad to see you got a pro-fesh-anel doing it for you!

WOW, this is awesome. Glad to see you and Nate are building your dream rig, it is turning out perfect. Love the interior detail.




ADMINISTRATOR

Wow..... I am pretty jealous the attention to detail it on point. I would like to see some pic/info on your hanger bearing I want to redo mine and go to a two piece shaft like you got

I'm no expert on trailing arms but those look awfully long to me.

jccarter1 said:

Wow..... I am pretty jealous the attention to detail it on point. I would like to see some pic/info on your hanger bearing I want to redo mine and go to a two piece shaft like you got

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It's the bearing Wide Open design sells. This is the only pic I have installed:
carrier installed by unclejrod74, on Flickr
WOD ad by unclejrod74, on Flickr

redneckengineered said:

I'm no expert on trailing arms but those look awfully long to me.

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We were unsure ourselves so we called Ruff Stuff and told them what we wanted to do with the buggy and this is the length they suggested. Called a few other guys running them and they corroborated Ruff Stuff so we'll see. We also checked several build threads of other buggies with trailing arms and copied their mounting locations.

So why the bumps and swaybars with the ORI'S? Their selling point is that they are not needed with the ORI'S.
That is low for a rockwell rig. How much up travel are you shooting for?

Looking GOOD...........

bjeep said:

So why the bumps and swaybars with the ORI'S? Their selling point is that they are not needed with the ORI'S.
That is low for a rockwell rig. How much up travel are you shooting for?

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I'm a big ORI supporter so I will never change them out, and you are correct you don't need that stuff. But years down the road if someone else ends up with it they'll have the option to run coilovers. Plus if a ORI does fail on the trail it'll beat the **** out of itself with no oil or gas in it.
We set it up with half the shaft showing all the way around. Nate knows what the wheel travel ended up being but I can't remember. Something in the 20s on the rear.
Someone we talked to said ORIs on trailing arms are easier to tune with a sway bar.

Nice front link mounts

BUG-E J said:

Nice front link mounts

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Yeah...Those are getting covered as we speak...