G's Raptor

[Squatting Dog]

I am glad the pics and write up will help. Hope you have a friend to help, ambitious project to do on your own.

It is not too bad... Especially with corey's excellent directions, and having him only a phone call away.

-Greg

 

[RPG]

Can you give a comparison of travel for the stock leaves vs Std Natl vs HD Natl?

Rear wheel travel is limited by the shock no matter the spring. The difference between the standard and the HD is the payload ability, but performance is the same. The HD's just like to have some weight on them.

 

[KaiserM715]

Rear wheel travel is limited by the shock no matter the spring. The difference between the standard and the HD is the payload ability, but performance is the same. The HD's just like to have some weight on them.

Agreed. I am wondering if that changes if the shock is no longer the limiting factor.

 

[imdubious]

Rear wheel travel is limited by the shock no matter the spring. The difference between the standard and the HD is the payload ability, but performance is the same. The HD's just like to have some weight on them.

With all of his mods to date what is his front & rear travel compared to stock?

 

[vanilla_gorilla]

Rear wheel travel is limited by the shock no matter the spring. The difference between the standard and the HD is the payload ability, but performance is the same. The HD's just like to have some weight on them.

Standard springs:


HD Springs:

 

[E63]

With all of his mods to date what is his front & rear travel compared to stock?

I believe I am the same as stock in the rear and 5/8" greater in the front. Now what does this mean in terms of performance - Real World?

Not much imo. The performance is really how fast can you go thru the whoops? How big of a jump can you do and stay in control? How long can you go thru rough terrain before your shocks overheat?

Keep in mind what shocks do is convert the energy of compression and rebound to Heat. Thats why shocks get hot after they get worked. Also why you don't want to cover them, again imo.

So what I have done is upsized the shocks F and R giving a huge increase in damping ability easily 50% more. Increased Reservoir capacity - added front aux reservoir.

Other suspension mods have increased performance and handling.

I am able to handle rough terrain at least 50% faster than I could with stock. Where is the limit?, I haven't pushed beyond that yet.

 

[vanilla_gorilla]

I am able to handle rough terrain at least 50% faster than I could with stock. Where is the limit?, I haven't pushed beyond that yet.

I know you have said you are new to the off-roading thing, so do you think that 50% in crease is partially due to your skill level increasing as well or just because of the mods you have done?

 

[E63]

Tpms

Going to a different tire setup often means you will be running with a different tire pressure than what FORD has programmed into the stock Tire Pressure Monitoring System (TPMS). The stock TPMS is set for 44 PSI and has about 3 PSI drop threshold before a series of warnings appear in the center display. There is no user accessible means to recalibrate to a new pressure. Common problem, many different ways folks have managed to deal with them. It is really 2 problems; first you really do need to know what your current tire pressure is for safety and good tire wear, second the error messages are annoying and might cause you to miss something really important.

Aftermarket TPMS
Used and recommended by several forum members, I bought off Amazon. Discount Tire put on and I had them re-balance all the tires. They originally told me that since the tire was not completely dismounted that rebalancing was not necessary, I said "well then just check it", sure enough the difference in weight required them to be rebalanced.

The nice thing about the aftermarket unit is that it displays the pressure in each tire, the temperature and for some reason the voltage coming thru.

Installation:
Several folks have removed the trailer brake controller and fashioned a mount to fit in this spot in the dash. Not a bad way to go. I wanted to try something a little different. I rationalized that even though I do not plan on towing anything with the Raptor, I know at some point I will sell her. The new owner may wish to tow and keep the aftermarket tires and TPMS so having another location would be a plus.

There is a perfect sized spot below the main display to the left of the trailer brake controller. Not easily seen while the wheel is pointed straight, but how often do you need to look at tire pressure? Besides it has an audible warning if one tire’s pressure should fall.



The problem with this location is the USB style connector (It is not real USB) sticks out an inch to far.

TPMS power tap
I opened up the unit to see if I could wire straight to the board. No luck, its all surface mount tech and has a step down transformer from 12V to 5V. This is the reason the unit gets hot when left on.




I carefully shaved off the rubber surrounding the point that I wished to bend the connector.



Once satisfied with its integrity in the new shape I coated in “Plumber’s GOOP” (basically clear silicone), wrapped in waxed paper and secured with a twist tie into the right angle shape and let dry overnight.

That end was easy and worked great. Wiring up the other end was a 3 hour nightmare. I hate automotive electrical wiring, its cramped, its tricky and I never seem to have the right parts, tools or knowledge. I have gotten better over time, but I still dislike it.

Gbrown simply soldered wires to the outside of the 12v power adapter, after much wasted time and redoing connections 3 and 4 times, I see why he did it that way. Here is the inside of the adapter:


As you can see there are 4 wires. The small micro sized Red and Green are wired together to the +, the wire shielding they use for ground, the small black wire that runs on the outside of the main wire is not used at all. Soldering the small wires to the 10 gauge in line fuse wire was very difficult. Just the weight of the wires can cause it to pull apart, plus my feet in the tight confines caused me to rip apart a few connections as well.

A combination of soldering, crimping, shrink tubing, electrical tape, wire ties, and additional wire wrap reinforcements allowed me to end this nightmare hopefully for good.




I wanted it to only turn on while truck was on, and since my knowledge is thin in this area I decided to hook up to Aux 4 up fitter switch. This in theory should be easy since my Lowrance Nav (GPS) was already connected to this and since I wished to move the Lowrance power source to stay on all the time.

My Icon Radio had a direct thick gauged wires running direct to the battery and ground, both the Nav and Icon had heavy duty inline fuses so I simply taped the power of the Icon for the Nav and left the ground alone. I installed an additional in-line push fuse for the TPMS (2A).

Funny thing is that now the Nav only works with the truck on yet the Icon works anytime. I can’t figure out why, but not worth tearing everything apart just for that.

Reflections:
While I had stuff apart, I painted the Nav support wires and clips flat black, no more reflections of this in the windshield.



Dash Squeaks
I also installed some rubber cushions behind the Plastic housing that surround the dash cluster and steering wheel to replace some folded up business cards that I used to stop an annoying squeak.



Look Ma, no spit wads in the dash

 

[E63]

I know you have said you are new to the off-roading thing, so do you think that 50% in crease is partially due to your skill level increasing as well or just because of the mods you have done?

Thats a fair question and I am not sure I am in the best position to answer this objectively. Its like asking a frog in a pot of water that is slowly coming to a boil "how much hotter is the water?.

There is absolutely a learning curve, how much can the Raptor take? Last week I took one section fast enough that Jarrett thought I would bust the front Knuckle, did it three times and we both learned, yeah it can handle it.

Now Jarrett from RPG has seen my driving skills as we went out together just a few weeks after getting truck, and several times since. A lot of what I have been learning is where to be looking ahead, lines thru undulating sections, what part of the whoop to hit first, how to use the ruts, speed management, to relax more, and yes how fast can I go.

Jarrett - feel free to tell the honest truth, I can handle it! How much improvement in speed thru whoops is due to modifications and how much have I improved by pure seat time?

 

[vanilla_gorilla]

Thats a fair question and I am not sure I am in the best position to answer this objectively. Its like asking a frog in a pot of water that is slowly coming to a boil "how much hotter is the water?.

There is absolutely a learning curve, how much can the Raptor take? Last week I took one section fast enough that Jarrett thought I would bust the front Knuckle, did it three times and we both learned, yeah it can handle it.

Now Jarrett from RPG has seen my driving skills as we went out together just a few weeks after getting truck, and several times since. A lot of what I have been learning is where to be looking ahead, lines thru undulating sections, what part of the whoop to hit first, how to use the ruts, speed management, to relax more, and yes how fast can I go.

Jarrett - feel free to tell the honest truth, I can handle it! How much improvement in speed thru whoops is due to modifications and how much have I improved by pure seat time?

Still great stuff E63, been loving your thread!

HA! You are in for it now Jarrett, if you are coming to Reno, might need to ride shotgun with you to get a couple tips.