VerMonsterRV
Gotta Be Nuts
Hi all, anyone know of a USA source for the springs for a rail-on-rail subframe? This is for our 1120 and the subframe is 16'x8' (roughly).
Diplostrat. I totally agree with your findings. The corrugated roads destroy vehicles. They are hard to imagine until you have spent 8 hours on one and have another 8 tomorrow.Always dangerous to offer free advice, but, after a lifetime in the third world, I would offer this:
The real killer is washboard roads. First world Jeepers obsess over twisting and torsion, but this is not a real issue for extended overland travel where you are mostly on roads, just bad ones. Most people have never really seen washboard (corrugations, tile nodule, etc.) as it takes a combination of dirt and a lot of heavy traffic, not a combination often found in the first world. And, as noted by a few posts here, it is that vibration that REALLY damages your truck. (Australia has washboard due to the road trains. The Sahara used to have it. Cameroon certainly did. The CAR, ironically did not - simply not enough road traffic to cause them.)
Torsion can be an issue, but the common "cure" a three point suspension can also be a truck frame killer as it will concentrate all of the weight on three small points on the frame. Dig around and you will find examples of this. For washboard you want all of the weight spread as evenly as possible over as much of the frame as possible.
One way to do this is with a "pull out" mount (used AFAIK) by Unicat and Bimobil. The camper sits on the frame but when there is extreme torsion, the mounting bolts are spring loaded and will pull out.
Observations offered with NO guarantees. Obviously, any approach well executed is better than any other poorly executed.
All the best.