Volkswagen Vanagon 4x4 Conversion.

Yup you are right it's all gear driven. After all the discussions I've had with friends on this t-case I don't know why I wrote chain up above. I also meant to say "straight through to the input" (not output, wrong word).

The only reversal I see is on the intermiediate/idler gear. The PTO and input appear to be one in the same part and spin the same direction as the output shafts. ??
 

vwhammer

Adventurer
Actually there is no reversal at the transmission or at the transfer case.
There is a counter-shaft in the trans but it runs the front diff which is not used in my case.

I originally planned on building a new gear and tail housing for the trans so I could move the output to the counter shaft.
This would have reversed the output while lowering it on the transmission a the same time.
Lowering is useful for the vanagon due to the height of the engine and trans and the location of the main firewall crossmember.

This proved to be too expensive at the time so I went with a plan B.

Pretty much everything spins clockwise all the way down to the diff in the transfer case.

This is all fine until you flip the whole drive-train around and put it in the back then try to run a some axles.

Now you have 4 reverse gears and one forward.

To fix this one simply (using the term loosely) needs to flip the axle differentials in their housings.

This is the route that I chose with careful selection of the axles and differentials so all the diff gears are being driven correctly.
 
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Great, makes sense! For your sake I was hoping that was the case. The transmission I was thinking of looks like this. I guess at some point Subaru must have gone to a conventional "clockwise" rotation rear driveline.

PICT6730.jpg
 

vwhammer

Adventurer
The last 4 weeks have been a bad time for me.
Well not me so much but a bad time for the van.
My wife and I have had a lot going on so garage time has been short.
Not trying to make excuses but I changed jobs and have been getting settled in there.
The holiday slowed things down some.
We busted out some junk in the house and now there is a new project growing there.
My wife is the president of the local roller derby team and they finally found a venue to have their first home bout in about 5 years.
I am pretty active with the team so I have been helping get some of that stuff set up.
The bout is tomorrow then derby is over for the season.
However, it is Ohio Brew Week in Athens starting tomorrow.
Besides all the breweries that come into town and all the events that they have planned,(that I will be attending) the Derby team and I volunteer to help with a couple of events so that will take up most of next week.
Then the 23rd we are off to Maine for a weeks worth of chillin'.

Pretty much all I have managed to do the last 4 weeks is order and receive my airbags from Australia.

And now Photobucket is shafting everyone with an account there so I can't even post a pic.
Well I could if I go to another hosting site (which I plan to do) but I am waiting to see if Photobucket makes things right so I can determine what to do with all of my dead pics.

I have a friend that has been chomping at the bit to do some welding and help out with the van but I have to keep telling him not this week.

I did do some design work with yet another set of radius arms after the discussion I had with Metcalf.
I still need to finalize that and send the parts off to the laser cutter.
I will likely have my friend weld them up while I work on some other things on the van.

I will get back at it soon enough but I am just kind of wingin' it at this point.
Still keeping a few soft deadlines in the hopes of actually driving this thing this year.

Oh and I may have decided on another engine and trans combo but I don't want to get into all of that until I know for sure.

Ok that's enough rambling for now.

More Next time...Hopefully with some functional pics.
 

vwhammer

Adventurer
Well since I told Photobucket to go (expletive deleted) themselves it seems appropriate to find a new image hosting site.
This is just a test to see if that works so don't get too excited.
Here's muh air bags.
3BXfcoz.jpg
 

vwhammer

Adventurer
Ok.
It appears on my end that that worked so now I need to work out the time to go back through and fix all the images in this thread.
It may take a little time but hopefully I can wrap all that up with a juicy update.
Stay tuned...
 

vwhammer

Adventurer
Hey kiddos!
Remember this build?
Well after nearly a year of not working on it while I did some home remodeling I have decided to get back at it.
Beyond just wanting to drive and use this thing I have other reasons for finishing it up soon.
Our plans are to put our house up for sale and we will be building the next house so I need to be able drive the van as there will not be anywhere to put it until I build a garage at the next place.
So now its go time.

I have only worked on it for a couple of hours recently but it made it painfully apparent that I had some choices to make.
I finally got my sub-frame located where it should be and decided to slap the control arms in there and see what it looks like.
TTv2sGx.jpg

I am not going to lie.
I don't really care for this layout.

There will be about 13 or 14 inches of clearance at the midpoint of the van but there sure does seem like a lot of stuff hanging down there.
If I could run 40 inch tires, clearance would not be an issue but since 31 or 32 inch tires are about the max without serious body mods then I need to think about this more.
It still has more clearance than a stock syncro and a couple more inches of belly pan clearance than a stock 4runner but the arms are just bumming me out.
There's just a lot of "stuff" hangin' out there to drag or get snagged on everything.
I should also mention that I am not happy with the design of the arms themselves (notice the two different versions)
They are also not fun to build.

So tonight I laid on the floor under the van and really started looking at the space I have available for this and that.

If you have been under any of the coil sprung Wranglers or Cherokees or even checked out the 4Runner rear suspension you will see that they are pretty compact.
You will have likely noticed that they also function pretty well, even in stock form.
The 4Runner rear is probably a better example of this as its longer arms allow for more travel before bushing bind.

With all this in mind, I decided to go lay under our 5th gen 4Runner for a minute and take a looky.

A few measurements later and It would seem that I totally have enough room for a 4 link front and rear on this van.
Hell it even seems that I should also be able to make the links a little longer than the stock 4Runner rear bits and way longer than any of the Jeep parts.

I have also been thinking real hard about making a small hump in the van floor so I can lift the transfer case up a bit more to help with breakover angles.
This could easily be hidden by a false floor that will also make space for some plumbing and wiring that I could run there.

To top it all off I think I can build all the link mounts and a new simpler transfer case mount with fewer parts and a lot less complexity.

It would be a relatively simple 4 link set up with a panhard bar.
I could also build in some adjustability in the 4 link arms more easily than I could the radius arms which would make lifting or upgrading the suspension simpler in the future.

As with anything built form an existing platform there are compromises.
Will this be a super flexy rock crawling rig?
No.
However, I think changing to a short (ish) arm 4 link would not only be easier to build and adjust than my radius arm set up but it would also be a lot tidier, more compact, easier to build and it would perform better than the radius arms would.

Since all of this is bolt on at this point it's not real difficult to bail on this design.
Of course I am also bailing on the 5 or 6 hundred bucks I have in the existing suspension parts at this point but that has long since been paid for so...Meh.

While the bike builder Jesse James might not be the best roll model or philosopher, I will always remember something he said on his chopper show a long time ago.
I am paraphrasing here because I do not actually remember the quote word for word.
-I don't care how much time or money I spend on something, if it sucks is sucks-
Or something like that.

Anyway I'm gonna hit the drawing software over the next couple days and see if I can get a 4 link with suitable geometry sorted out.
I will then make the choice on the bushings or joints I want to use and get some parts and material ordered.

Until next time....
 

mgmetalworks

Explorer
Iterative design... Not a bad thing at all.

I was just thinking about this build the other day and wondering if you ever got it going. Keep after it! (y)
 

Vandit

Observer
Yes! This was definitely one of my favorite builds....glad to hear that you're back at it. Looking forward to what's next.....
 

cj-10

Member
Glad you are back at it. I have always wanted to try something like this. Can't wait to see how this turns out
 

Metcalf

Expedition Leader
Good to see you back at it.

I agree the radius arms aren't really worth pursuing generally.

It will be interesting to see what you come up with. I would try not to over think it too much though. Lower arms as close to parallel to the ground as possible. Use about 8" of separation at the axle end for axle control. Try and build in some adjustable upper mounting points at the frame to help dial in the characteristics you want. Use the longest panhard possible with the least slope possible. Shocks and springs as close to the tire as practical.
 

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