Baja Yaris

[justjesus]

Originally Posted by Maritime

tires:


Lift Kit which will give me 1" front and 1.5" back:


Maritime

Originally Posted by Maritime

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Complete-li...~vgz:rk:3:pf:0

Looks simple enough, strut top bolt extender and spacer for strut, rear spring seat extender like for jeeps.

I have the General tires on my Jeep XJ. So far, I like 'em enough. For my Yaris, I'm running the prior gen of the BFG All Terrains in 195/70-14 (70, I think). They hold up well for daily driver duty.

Sure enough, when looking at my own Off Road Yaris project, I found some Jeep JK front spacers that may work in the rear of the Yaris. Some measurements were taken, and I *think* they could work. I bought them but never put them on to confirm. I'm pretty sure of it, though.

Originally Posted by Maritime

Ha, that would be rad but way out of budget. I'll be lucky of I can manage a 2ZR swap and afford an LSD when the original motor finally bites the bullet. the lift, tires and rack are all budget friendly.

Originally Posted by myfirstyota

Yea an LSD is about $1600 cad for a quaife. Plus install. Its not a budget friendly mod... But sometime you gotta say f-the budget lol

The LSD, plus the xB final drive ratio, is what I was considering for mine. But, unfortunately, I couldn't say "F- the budget" :( The cost of those two items, plus install, was high enough that I took that money and bought a 1996 Jeep Cherokee (XJ).

If you YouTube "off road yaris" mine should be the first hit. You can see where having an LSD would have helped. But in reality, that stuff I was attempting there IS a bit much for a FWD econobox :) I knew this going in! It did much better on regular dirt trails.

I really hope you get this project going!!!! I still go back and forth on mine.

Also, I'm still kind of tinkering with a way to get the rear lifted, without affecting the shocks, or the angle of the rear beam assembly.

[Maritime]

Originally Posted by justjesus

I have the General tires on my Jeep XJ. So far, I like 'em enough. For my Yaris, I'm running the prior gen of the BFG All Terrains in 195/70-14 (70, I think). They hold up well for daily driver duty.

Sure enough, when looking at my own Off Road Yaris project, I found some Jeep JK front spacers that may work in the rear of the Yaris. Some measurements were taken, and I *think* they could work. I bought them but never put them on to confirm. I'm pretty sure of it, though.






The LSD, plus the xB final drive ratio, is what I was considering for mine. But, unfortunately, I couldn't say "F- the budget" :( The cost of those two items, plus install, was high enough that I took that money and bought a 1996 Jeep Cherokee (XJ).

If you YouTube "off road yaris" mine should be the first hit. You can see where having an LSD would have helped. But in reality, that stuff I was attempting there IS a bit much for a FWD econobox :) I knew this going in! It did much better on regular dirt trails.

I really hope you get this project going!!!! I still go back and forth on mine.

Also, I'm still kind of tinkering with a way to get the rear lifted, without affecting the shocks, or the angle of the rear beam assembly.

Yep, the LSD will be if and when I do an engine swap if the body is still good. I saw your vids on Youtube. Found them after I decided I'd do the Baja and started searching to see if anyone had done it before me. I'm only planning to use it on some old logging roads etc so after seeing what you did, I'm comfortable with the project. I can't find any tires in the 195/75/14 anymore. They are all discontinued, that's why I need to go qith the 27x8.5 14. I hope the 1.5" lift front and back and some fender massage will be enough to fit them without rubbing.

I have just a little bit of fab left on one front lift and I'll be ready to install. If I can swing a couple hours in the evening this week I'll get them installed. The rear lifts came and look promising. If the centers end up to wide, I'll cut those out and the outer cup walls should still keep them in place. Then I will drive it a few times to make sure all is ok noise/vibration wise. If good I'll cover a current wheel tire in foam/cardboard to make it the sized of the new tires and see if it fits in the wells. I'll need to compress the shocks/struts and still turn the wheels to see if they rub. I think I have enough stands and jacks to manage that. I'll post up pics when I do it.

[justjesus]

Originally Posted by myfirstyota

I think you'll have to make rear axle drop brackets if you don't want the angle of the axle affected. I plan on a 3-4" lift and I'm just gonna push that axle down. It will be way too much fab work to make axle mount drop brackets. I took a quick look one day to see if some sort of bolt in drop brackets could be made. Didn't look remotely easy to me.

I had two ideas for that. (1) Where the beam ties into the body, one bolt on each side if I recall. There are actually two bolt holes on either side. Some guys use the upper one once they've lowered the car some. I was thinking using those two bolt holes to make a simple bracket to drop the beam a small amount. (2) was a plate system. One plate per wheel. Sort of like the penguin spacers, but made to "lift" the car by adding ground clearance. I drew it out once, but have moved a couple of times and not sure where that drawing is.

Originally Posted by Type-Y

This is a cool idea. I for one have always loved bugs, in all their various iterations, including the baja bug. I've often thought of the Yaris as the modern day VW bug due to it's simplicity, reliability, dependability and utility. Good luck and post your progress.

Yup. I like those Baja bugs as well. Saw a video or two with a group of them going through some trails near where I live. I watched those videos to see if I thought the Yaris would be able to make it. Haha.. havent tried those yet.

Originally Posted by Maritime

Yep, the LSD will be if and when I do an engine swap if the body is still good. I saw your vids on Youtube. Found them after I decided I'd do the Baja and started searching to see if anyone had done it before me. I'm only planning to use it on some old logging roads etc so after seeing what you did, I'm comfortable with the project. I can't find any tires in the 195/75/14 anymore. They are all discontinued, that's why I need to go qith the 27x8.5 14. I hope the 1.5" lift front and back and some fender massage will be enough to fit them without rubbing.

Thanks for watching! I noticed that size hasn't carried over to the new KO2s. Bummer, for sure. Other tires that I was looking at, and they have more Yaris friendly size options, are dirt rally tires. Not sure how long they'd last on a street driven Yaris, though. I was lucky enough to get the BFGs while they still had them. I believe the Grabbers in 27" size were the next smallest size (not including rally tires).

If you're just looking at some old logging roads, maybe a less aggressive "all terrain" may work.

But then again, the black Overlanding Yaris guy is running 215/75-15 which is about 27.6" tall. Not sure what his "lift" specs are, but it looks like he's having success with them.

Originally Posted by Maritime

I have just a little bit of fab left on one front lift and I'll be ready to install. If I can swing a couple hours in the evening this week I'll get them installed.

Looking forward to your update.

[myfirstyota]

Originally Posted by justjesus

I had two ideas for that. (1) Where the beam ties into the body, one bolt on each side if I recall. There are actually two bolt holes on either side. Some guys use the upper one once they've lowered the car some. I was thinking using those two bolt holes to make a simple bracket to drop the beam a small amount.

I also looked at the upper holes to use to mount some type of drop bracket. Now, I didn't spend an hour poking around down there but I didn't think the upper holes were threaded on the inboard side. And because of the way the "frame" is assembled, theres no access to the other side without cutting holes. Please tell me I'm wrong and that the upper holes are threaded on the inboard side (like the lower holes where the axle mounts from factory). If they are... drop brackets would be very feasable. But then I think, you axe some ground clearance by lowering the whole axle...

[Maritime]

I'm not looking to rock crawl and go mudding. logging roads and fields etc will be doable, especially because the Yaris is so light. I think when looking for tires I was considering DOT legal side by side tires in a 14" that were 25-26" but decided against those.

[myfirstyota]

Originally Posted by Maritime

I'm not looking to rock crawl and go mudding. logging roads and fields etc will be doable, especially because the Yaris is so light. I think when looking for tires I was considering DOT legal side by side tires in a 14" that were 25-26" but decided against those.

Serious offroading is better left to anything but a Yaris. But like most of us wanting to lift our cars, I'm sure your just looking for more ground cleaance. Personally the reason I want to lift my car is so I don't have to shovel he snow berm left by the plow at 4am to go to work and not having to worry about destroying the front number on said berm.

Also I'd imagine side by side tires would pretty loud rollin down those nifty 110km/h hiways got down home.

[Maritime]

Originally Posted by myfirstyota

Serious offroading is better left to anything but a Yaris. But like most of us wanting to lift our cars, I'm sure your just looking for more ground cleaance. Personally the reason I want to lift my car is so I don't have to shovel he snow berm left by the plow at 4am to go to work and not having to worry about destroying the front number on said berm.

Also I'd imagine side by side tires would pretty loud rollin down those nifty 110km/h hiways got down home.

Yep, exactly the reason, my drive is a hill and getting the car up to the house so I can then blow out the drive is not easy or impossible if there is more than 2-3" of snow, front plows in and lifts the tires and then you spin away. even an inch more would help. I have a fused ankle and can't walk well on hills when dry, add snow and ice and it's dangerous. I want it to still drive ok on the Highways but be better on the crap secondary roads I commute on and also get me to some good fishing and riding spots. I can get there now, but I drag the bumper and possibly the exhaust and don't want that.

[Maritime]

Oh and I found this too. I'm going to email and see if they'll ship to Canuckistan and how much it would be:



https://www.skid-plate.com/skid-plat...trol-2005-2011

[myfirstyota]

Originally Posted by Maritime

Oh and I found this too. I'm going to email and see if they'll ship to Canuckistan and how much it would be:



https://www.skid-plate.com/skid-plat...trol-2005-2011

I had one on my old slammed vw. Worth its weight in gold.

[Maritime]

Originally Posted by myfirstyota

I had one on my old slammed vw. Worth its weight in gold.

I could see it being good for both a lifted soft roader or a slammed hot hatch for sure.

[myfirstyota]

I've actually dropped some sketches off at a local metal supplier. They're gonna cut some pieces out of 1/4" plate with a waterjet for me. I'm essentially trying to fabricate spring spacers for the rear. But the kicker is I cut the rear OEM spring perches off of my donor xd axle. They will sit on top of my custom made spring spacers pushing the shock mount up as well. 3-4" of lift on stock springs and shocks is the plan. There won't be any extra suspension travel but like we said. . this isn't for serious off roading. The front will basically a copy of ctscotts crashy.

[Maritime]

Originally Posted by myfirstyota

I've actually dropped some sketches off at a local metal supplier. They're gonna cut some pieces out of 1/4" plate with a waterjet for me. I'm essentially trying to fabricate spring spacers for the rear. But the kicker is I cut the rear OEM spring perches off of my donor xd axle. They will sit on top of my custom made spring spacers pushing the shock mount up as well. 3-4" of lift on stock springs and shocks is the plan. There won't be any extra suspension travel but like we said. . this isn't for serious off roading. The front will basically a copy of ctscotts crashy.

Nice. that sounds great.

[Maritime]

And these are cheap enough 45 USD on amazon and would work to hide the sins after the BFH and cutting.

[myfirstyota]

Originally Posted by Maritime

And these are cheap enough 45 USD on amazon and would work to hide the sins after the BFH and cutting.

If you get these installed before I do keep us posted as to fitment

[Maritime]

Originally Posted by myfirstyota

If you get these installed before I do keep us posted as to fitment

Will do, there are 2-3 styles on there and I'm going to get the ones that will fit best after clearancing the wells.

[myfirstyota]

This thread is full of NB'rs lol

[Maritime]

Originally Posted by myfirstyota

This thread is full of NB'rs lol

So you are an X-pat maritimer too eh?

[myfirstyota]

Born in Moncton! Fam about 45 min outside of Bathurst