Unibody durability off road

Status
Not open for further replies.
A 3/4 or 1-ton is a bad off-roader regardless. Weight and length are not your friends. My WJ in 2WD will run circles around my Rams in 4WD hi or lo in pretty much anything serious.

The stiffer load carrying suspensions do no favors either. Not that my Rams are incompetent. My WJ just does pretty much anything they can do with greater ease.
 
I have no personal experience with the new ones but I punished the subarus I had decades ago and didn't experience unibody issues with them. The GLs were nothing I'd feel confident with in aggressive rough driving but the 97 legacy I had was absolutely stout. The only damage it sustained was from bottoming out on soft parts like the fuel tank. I was young, drove a lot of trails, and didn't dodge potholes during tight corners and it never, ever, had any alignment or chassis-softening problems. As long as ground clearance wasn't an issue, i'd feel more confident in that at speed than a wrangler. In addition, that one was an AWD with limited slip center diff, Not FWD with rear wheel assist. It was by far the most sure-footed vehicle for that kind of driving I've owned, though with limited power and all wheels pulling, it was not one for easy hooning on-road. It was a blast off road until moving past its clearance limits. I had a mild spacer lift on mine.

Due to the continual washing out and repaving of a certain part of back road on my commute, I also jumped it twice per day. After years of continual washout and repaving, it became a woop-dee-doo with a big pit in the middle. You either took it at 2mph or 45. you'd be airborn over the washout so each way. I'm not kidding. Obviously, I had this down to an exact science with the precise speed and line to achieve a landing on the ramped back side for the smoothest approach, but I still did it. Both ways, M-F. The previous honda civic I did this with landed with much more grace, so while I eventually got it right with the subie, it took me a few commutes before dialing it in, so we had a couple of hard landings. At 36,000 it had a recall for the front a-arms. The originals were tack welded while the replacements were fully welded. They replaced mine. I asked about the old units and the alignment. They told me the old units looked fine and the original alignment was still spot-on and none was required.

That said something to me. I know what I'd put that thing through.
 
Last edited:
on the flip side, I went from a jeep ZJ to a WK a few years ago when the WKs were new. Its chassis (WK) did not impress me at all in terms of rigidity. In fact, it flexed or regular roads more than any other car I noticed. Hopping the curb to my driveway at crawl resulted in door and dash creaking. Door creaked on gently rolling pavement. I finally stuck my fingers between the door and roof one day with the window down and could feel the door moving up and down relative to the roof as a matter of driving a 25mph residential road. It was really disappointing and I never really got over it, realizing just how much body flex that JEEP had. And they'd advertised a 50% increase in torsional rigidity when going from WJ to WK. I really wanted to love that WK - it did a lot of things well despite cost cutting. But that was a massive chink in its armor to me.

So maybe it varies by vehicle.

For a lesson in body rigidity trying putting a volvo s60 on 4 jack stands. All cars will flex a little, as the jack stands themselves probably aren't on glass-level concrete, but they'll give a little and settle in. The S60 was less cooperative, usually with one of the four stands not contacting the car. I'd have to shuffle them around for a bit or keep the jack in play above the loose jack stand for stability. Those vehicles are .stiff.
 
Last edited:
Same on a hoist (lift), but not often. But everytime on the old BMC 1100/1300 - there was always an arm free when lifting those, zero flex.
 
Originally Posted by meep
In fact, it flexed or regular roads more than any other car I noticed. Hopping the curb to my driveway at crawl resulted in door and dash creaking. Door creaked on gently rolling pavement. I finally stuck my fingers between the door and roof one day with the window down and could feel the door moving up and down relative to the roof as a matter of driving a 25mph residential road.

For a lesson in body rigidity trying putting a volvo s60 on 4 jack stands. All cars will flex a little, as the jack stands themselves probably aren't on glass-level concrete, but they'll give a little and settle in. The S60 was less cooperative, usually with one of the four stands not contacting the car. I'd have to shuffle them around for a bit or keep the jack in play above the loose jack stand for stability. Those vehicles are .stiff.



Thats interesting, as what Shannow said, I faced a smiliar issue with my previous car. I was speeding on the highway once and sudddenly a truck stopped and i had to brake hard, the whole car chattered and after that I heard a tick tick tick sound coming from the dash/windshield at 80kmh and above, i thought it was the speedometer cable, so i slowed down and the sound went away , i sped up it came back, I stopped the car to check in the engine bay thinking perhaps my gearbox is giving trouble, but I dont see anything wrong. So i continued my journey, then a few minutes later, all of a sudden a loud pop, and immediately the windscreen started cracking and the cracks slowly spread all throughout the glass. I know there was no stone hitting the glass, so I surmised it must have been chassis flex. You see, at hard corners or going up inclines with either front wheels, the door ajar warning would come on, indicating that the doors have somehow twisted away from the switches, it must have been chassis flex, That car also had lots of squeaks and rattles over bad roads, but it was a econobox after all.
Now my current car is a luxury car ,though its old it seems to be in better condition than my previous car. But lately I have been getting some vibrations on bad roads and some creaks on braking, that seems to be coming from the pillar trims. It didnt have this sound before so maybe I have put back the trims wrongly after the reverse camera install.
Granted the left door is sagging on the hinges, in this case is the chassis flexing ?The door ajar warning is not coming on and when I take hard smooth pavement high speed corners I dont hear any pops or creaks. This car is much better built than my previous car and the creaks is like only 1/10th of it, but I am still worried. Is my chassis flexing ? Its a 89 toyota soarer, which is basically a Mk3 supra with no targa top.So is it possible my braking creaks are coming from suspension mounts and or the inner trims or sagging doors instead of chassis flex ?
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top