Buggy measurments? Wb, belly height.

87_bigbadzuk · Nov 9, 2016

In the process of figuring out what I want to set my wb at and ride height. Specs are zuk with 5.3 th350 dual yota cases and dana 60 front gmh072 rear and 38.5 swampers. Right now it's like 88 inch wb and 21 inch belly. What should I stretch it too and do you think 21 inch is too tall. The frame is built down adout 4 inches under stock frame for flat belly to clear tcase.

CHASMAN9 · Nov 9, 2016

It depends on what you want to do with it. Sounds like a fairly mild type of build so far, no hot built motor or running gear, so I would say probably 108" wb, 18-20" belly pan with around 62-65" height. Just randomly speaking. :dunno:

stano · Nov 9, 2016

CHASMAN9 said:
It depends on what you want to do with it. Sounds like a fairly mild type of build so far, no hot built motor or running gear, so I would say probably 108" wb, 18-20" belly pan with around 62-65" height. Just randomly speaking.

Second that, my last two rigs have been 108"~ wb and 19"~ belly. Worked good for what we do. Lots of tight creek bed crawling, not much hill killing. Depends on driver also, I love the low belly for the stability, but some drivers don't like to pick lines to keep from dragging. Just my .02

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zukimaster · Nov 9, 2016

Them Toyota cases will live a very short life behind a 5.3 and the weight of that rig, I had a dual set up behind a 4.3 with Toyota axles and 37'' tires, broke input and output shafts and 4.7 gears, and that was just taking a couple of hops on a rock.

87_bigbadzuk · Nov 9, 2016

Yes so far I haven't broke one. I had a 195hp 4.3 in front of them for 4 years and they still going. I have plans for a 203/205 or atlas later but have to work with what I got for now. I was thinking around 105-110 wb

87_bigbadzuk · Nov 9, 2016

I did have 4.7 gears in the back case but sold them and put stock 2.28 to help a lil

zukimaster · Nov 9, 2016

The first one was at 107 and about 17" belly, worked pretty good but hung up on the belly more than I liked, the one I'm building now is 112" and 20" belly

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87_bigbadzuk · Nov 9, 2016

I should have built a new chassis. I'm going from radius arm to 4 link front. Right now I'm looking at adding 10-12 inches just on the front. I was at 93" wb so I will be 103-105. Rear axle is only moved 2 inches back. When this is done so I can get back to wheeling and not riding shotgun in the wifes rzr then I will start on a full frame like yours or might even just do full chassis with nothing zuk

sleepsontoilet · Nov 9, 2016

108" wb, 17" belly

It drags, but I prefer the stability when going vertical.

stano · Nov 10, 2016

sleepsontoilet said:
108" wb, 17" belly

It drags, but I prefer the stability when going vertical.

Favorite zuk evah right there!! Carry on..........

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ftoy516 · Nov 10, 2016

my Ftoy is 22R, toy 5speed, 108 WB, 37 Treps, Dual toyota cases with Front Range Offroads skid plate mount and it has 18 1/2 roughly. There are times when i wish it was more, however, it doesn't hang up as bad as i thought it would. and alot of the time i wish i had a longer WB for some of the steeper hills and ledge stuff.

But if i had a linked rig on bigger tires i would personal go for 115-118 WB on 40ish tires.

drkelly · Nov 10, 2016

There was a thread somewhere a while back where I saved what seemed to be the most popular setup. It was 20" belly, 114" wheelbase, 14" shocks up front, 14-16" shocks in rear figuring the typical 39-42" tire sizes. I just started building a Samurai based buggy. I'm scaling those numbers down based on my smaller (36-37") tire size so am planning for 102-108" wheelbase with an 18" belly.

sleepsontoilet · Nov 10, 2016

stano said:
Favorite zuk evah right there!! Carry on..........

I'm humbled, I honestly don't know what to say beyond thank you. I'm still not satisfied with it, but probably never will. Something with the rear lines is just a touch off, but don't want to sacrifice my current storage.

drkelly said:
There was a thread somewhere a while back where I saved what seemed to be the most popular setup. It was 20" belly, 114" wheelbase, 14" shocks up front, 14-16" shocks in rear figuring the typical 39-42" tire sizes. I just started building a Samurai based buggy. I'm scaling those numbers down based on my smaller (36-37") tire size so am planning for 102-108" wheelbase with an 18" belly.

This was 108" wb with 20ish belly on 37s and scout 44s. It seemed to do pretty well, but I wanted a touch more side hill and vertical stability.

slravenel · Nov 11, 2016

Another thing to remember is the belly height based on link mounts.

Ideally, you want your lower links to be flat, so that is where the basic 18-20" figure comes from when talking about buggies since most of them are ~40" tire. The bigger the tire, the more belly you should have...but that is because of tire, not because of chassis design. Of course this also opens up the can of worms of getting the right amounts of uptravel / downtravel / shock length / etc...but you will have a bad time (or not the most ideal time) if you try and build a buggy based off of a few measurements.

Honestly...your best bet is to lay it all out and build around what you have. Set the wheelbase and belly height like you are doing...and then fit the drivetrain...and then build the buggy around it. Will save you TONS of time and headache later on trying to squeeze **** in places. Flipside to that which I see alot of guys do, is they just build a big ass chassis and put everything in there. That works great for some and makes for a comfortable trail buggy...but in my opinion there is a happy spot when it comes to size vs capability and I think that lies more on the small side than the big side.

For what it is worth, my buggy is:

~110" wheelbase
19" - 20" belly (depending on how much air in the ORIs)
6 foot to the highest point on the cage at 20" belly
7" uptravel in the front
9" uptravel in the rear

Lower links are flat, uppers are angled slightly downward towards the chassis

these are at full bump: