Thursday, Aug 22, 2019 at 12:23
There's no issue with the difference in wheel track - until you load the Landcruisers up with high centre of gravity loads, maximum loads, and loads centred totally on the rear axle, or slightly behind it.
In those cases, your Landcruiser becomes the vehicle from Hell as regards rapid switch from understeer to oversteer - the problem that VW Beetles have, that saw many thousands of VeeDubs rolled - much to the shock of their owners, who never saw the sudden switch coming.
A mate told me how he was riding in a 78 series Troopy, fully loaded with 5 blokes and all their camping gear - and they went arse-up within 5 minutes of running into rain on a stretch of unsealed road, which turned the road surface greasy.
They righted the Cruiser, and continued on - slowly - up the road, and came across another 78 series Troopy on its roof! - caused by the exact same circumstances.
There's a story on one of the forums, where a
young bloke relates carrying an 800 litre spray tank on the back of a traytop V8 79 series, and he reckoned it was the 4WD from Hell, as regards handling. It was all over the road. It was his bosses, and he ended up not wanting to drive it.
But the 800L tank was located with about 20 cms of clearance to the headboard of the tray, probably making the load centred behind the rear axle.
His boss changed the tank setup, for other reasons, and moved the tank forward until it was hard up against the headboard, and the handling problems disappeared.
My nephew is running 7 x 79 series V8 traytops as heavy fitters vehicles. They are all running on the Toyota alloy rims.
They are loaded to the max with lockers, tools, parts, etc - and he's lost one, a complete write-off, via an "unexplained" rollover on a wet road - and two more have lost back wheels, when wheel studs sheared off at speed.
The rollover was an expensive one for the insurance company, these rigs cost him $109,000 each on the road, with all the barwork, lights, toolboxes and extras galore - and the rollover vehicle was under 12 mths old, and the nephew called in the insurance company on their "total replacement for a write-off under 12 mths old" - and they had to pay up the full $109,000 for a complete new vehicle as specced.
You have to ask yourself why numerous companies are making a "nice lil' earner" out of regularly producing 95mm wider rear axles or spindle extensions, for these vehicles, which can become unstable very rapidly, under the right conditions.
Cheers, Ron.
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