Custom Explorer Chassis Build.

Here is a chassis I'm building right now and what has been keeping me away from progress on my trucks, so I'll post this up for you all to take a look at and check out my work. Let me know what you think. No its not getting body dropped and yes the body kit is allready moulded in. So on with the show.

Well I have been working on this project for some time now for a customer things have been changed around and whatnot but I'm finally able to get going on the build. Here are the beginning of the build pics.





















Motor specs: 351W stroked out to a 432 with around 500+WHP.

Here are some pics of starting to put the Heidts rearend together, threadlocking the studs into the housing.







Here are some more pics.








I got a bit more if the IRS together the other day. I need to get a couple specialty sockets and whatnot so I can torque some of the bolts on the brakes and bubs before I can go any farther.

Got the rearend all together along with the new smaller tires mounted on the rims. I also have the height set, fully layed out so the u joints don't bind up and where the bags will be installed fully collapsed.





Well after some design, layout, cutting box tube, beveling all the tube edges for welding, tacking rails together, keeping up with parts orders and some other things. I finally have the main rails together I thought I would have the whole frame tacked together today but I ran into a couple issues with the Heidts rearend. Mainly I need to shorten the crossmember some so the rails fit where I want them to go and the axles clear the frame rails without having to be notched, and then I can build the rest of the rails behind the rearend. But anyways on with the pics.





The rear rails are built and tacked in place now.







All of the main frame rails are tacked together now and everything is squared up and set. I had to narrow the Heidts IRS crossmember due to the fact they had allready sent me the smallest one they make. The next step will be building a rear crossmember that goes in front of the 3rd member as well as making some brackets to connect the upper pinion adjustment crossmember to the frame rails.







The pinion crossmember is in place, I capped off the inside of the back of the frame and welded it up for the rear frame rail air tank. I also have most of the rear frame rails all welded up.

since I didnt like how the Heidts crossmember brackets looked I decide to cut some new ones that looked better out on teh cnc. I'm still debating on if I want to plate them or not. I also pulled the frame off the jig and brought it out side for some current full pics. I still need to adjust the rear control arms to get some rear camber. Right now its way positive.

























so far half of the welds on the frame are ground down and I got the shear load gussets ready to go.







I got almost all the grinding done on the butt welds and metal finnished other than a couple on the bottom.





I have all of the shear load gussets tig welded to the outside of the frame. Only a couple pics right before I cleaned up.





I have also had some people on forums ask about my CNC and here it is. It's a Dynatorch CNC plasma system with a Hypertherm 1250 plasma. It's an industrial system with servo motors. Heres the pics I have from my old shop of it.
Heres a couple vids of it as well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dERUwvZaiX4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=naKW4FOfAM4



This is when I first got it and before I put the cutting slats on it.


Some bag brackets I was making for my truck.

wow!!! very nice! and nice plasma/setup

Now That's Nice!

badass man

thats hot great job

Thanks for the comments everybody! With all the work into it I wish it was going under one of my trucks lol, but it will only lead to bigger and better things in the future!

hell yeah dude that shits looking good!

diggin the irs, alot... very nice

Sweet very badass been watchin on ssm

Thanks everybody!

dayum, thats is nice, going to be soo sick when ur finished

I only snapped 1 pic tonight but all of the inside shear load gussets are formed and welded up now.

Todays update, I trimmed both sides of the m2 crossmember then formed and tig welded a filler panel on the one side. I would have got more done but I had parts to build as well. I need to quit takin pics at night with my blackberry lol.

Here is the spec sheet on the motor and pics of it as well.

http://illusivefabrications.com/html/modules/coppermine/albums/installations/Johns%20Explorer/enginespecs.pdf

guy still having issues with the motor shop??

that guy has some dumb plans for the build of that explorer i tell you... hope everything works out for it though!

He just hasn't received any updated pics, I guess he snapped those when he was out there before. There suppost to be doing some other work to the truck while I'm building the frame like stripping and coating the underbody but I'm not 100% on those details I just know what I have to do, and thats build a kick ass chassis, deal with the air ride, and get it back to them to mount the body, motor, tranny, and get it powdercoated along with some parts of the engine. And then its going to paint and the owners audio video shop.

you say it like its gonna be easy.. im looking forward to seeing the amount of sheemetal work to get that frame under the body.. tuck the wheels, ect... even though it will still be 6" off the ground i forsee a lot of work still need to fit a body thats in NY on a frame built here in Ohio.. im mind boggled about that.. shoulda sent u a doner body/cab to at least plan it all from.. your just building a frame/chassis that they have to modify to fit that body right?

I did jig up the stock frame that they sent me CJ The only sheetmetal that may need modded will be in the cargo area and under the hood. And technically the rockers should be around 3 inches off the ground and laying the body kit and the body is in Indy lol. There are alot of companys out there that do mail order chassis. And most of them don't even start with the stock frame to go off of.

good luck... just a mess of where all this truck is being put together.. hope it all works out fine.

excellant thread! keep us posted

Todays update: I formed and welded up the other sides boxing plate on the front crossmember and then metal finnished both sides. I also took the flap disk to some of the frame rails as well and wiped them down with wd40 to keep them from rusting.

Very nice, very nice

Spent a few hours tonight grinding the rest of the chassis to bare metal, then I wipped the whole chassis down with wd40 to prevent rust. I also bolted the rearend and front control arms back on. And started playing around with the bag placement.