SpecE450 - Red Cross ERV turned Racecar Tow Rig

[19Spec3]

The front-end refresh helped somewhat with handling but the sag was still there. On to the rear. I installed new heavy duty rear springs (purchased from Beattie Spring, Part No.: 43-1339HD, rated at 7200lbs, up from 5100lbs), new U-Bolts, new shackles, and matching Bilstein dampers. Though it's a relatively straight-forward job, holy moly these springs are heavy. An extra set of hands sure would have helped but it can be done by one guy and a floor jack. The ERV now sits nice and level and drives much better. It's getting an alignment right now and I suspect handling will be very much improved.



Red Cross / Wheeled Coach did not make it easy on the passenger side. I had to drill holes in the storage compartment to get access to the shackle bolts.

 

[Bikersmurf]

The front-end refresh helped somewhat with handling but the sag was still there. On to the rear. I installed new heavy duty rear springs (purchased from Beattie Spring, Part No.: 43-1339HD, rated at 7200lbs, up from 5100lbs), new U-Bolts, new shackles, and matching Bilstein dampers. Though it's a relatively straight-forward job, holy moly these springs are heavy. An extra set of hands sure would have helped but it can be done by one guy and a floor jack. The ERV now sits nice and level and drives much better. It's getting an alignment right now and I suspect handling will be very much improved.

View attachment 838060

Red Cross / Wheeled Coach did not make it easy on the passenger side. I had to drill holes in the storage compartment to get access to the shackle bolts.

View attachment 838062

View attachment 838061

Before you take your rig in for a wheel alignment I'd pickup a two 0-4* adjustable camber bushings. When I brought my Ambo in for a wheel alignment my $70 alignment turned into a $400 alignment. I took it up with the shop manager and got it reduced to $270 since they hadn't said it would cost an extra $330 to supply and install a 2.5 degree bushing and I told them it would likely need changes to the bushings when they quoted me the $70 price, and I supplied them with a couple spare bushings of different angles.


The biggest kicker was that the 2.5* bushing that they could get that day wasn't enough on the drivers side. I ended up replacing it myself with a 3.5* bushing in my driveway because they wanted another $270+ to install it. Instead I used an angle cube to ensure that I was able to set the camber to the same as it was before and that the extra degree would go to castor.


The new bushing improved the tracking a lot, but in the end I used an adjustable bushing on the passenger side to finally get it right. I ended up using the cube to set the camber and adjusted the castor by some care full estimations and a couple test drives. Now I can let go of the wheel at 60 mph and it doesn't pull or wander. It has also been long enough to know that the tires are wearing dead even.

Were I to have a do over, I'd have installed two adjustable bushings and aligned reasonably well, and then brought it in the the shop for the final adjustments. However, this worked out and it's great to drive.

One last thought, I didn't mention that I used the pushpin method with a tape measure to do a final adjustment of the tow in.