anyone ever see this?

[xsjado]

http://www.nthdegreemobility.com/zig-zag.htm

wondering if anyone knew anything about that, how well it works or whatever.

[psychobilly]

axle wrap and wheel hop would be nightmarish. You couldnt pay me to run that.

[bbaker80]

I sure wouldn't enjoy a downhill off-camber descent with that thing. Pros are running small ATV winches in the rear to prevent unloading at precisely the time this thing would separate and allow the body to move freely over the weight of the rear axle. Ask anyone that was in the Badlands with me last summer (Tom, Ralph, Dave) what would have happened if the body of my Jeep pitched forward even another inch or two when I was running the cliff face in Purgatory.

Maybe if you didn't wheel hard this thing would work:

" Q: Will the Zig Zag cause me to ‘endo’ over the front bumper on steep down hills?
A: No.
Please refer to the FAQ above about ‘heavy braking’ and remember again that the ZZ cannot open up until the load on the springs goes to ZERO. This means that – just like heavy braking – you can’t go to zero load on both rear springs unless you are already rolling over the front. So if this happens to you, the separation of the ZZ only happened after you were already going over! This also applies to any combination situations of downhill plus braking.

If the terrain is uneven enough, you might get one side of the ZZ to separate while going downhill – just like it would on any more roughly horizontal terrain. If it was thought that this might be a problem in some unusual situation, you could elect to install the lockout keys ahead of time, but usually keeping all of the tires in contact with the terrain is a good thing."
http://www.nthdegreemobility.com/assets/zz/zz_01_02.jpg
Let's look at this picture as if you were going downhill. How much further do you have to go before this goes overon a steep descent? Even if we assume this Jeep is going uphill here, is the RR tire really still in contact with the ground, or is the weight of the axle/tire/wheel resting on about half a tread block. You aren't locked front and rear? You aren't going anywhere.

If you have to get out and install some kind of pin to keep the wheels on the ground you probably should rethink what you're doing, or not use crap like this. You don't have to decide to conect your swaybar before you run something, why would you want to have to think about how your rear shackles will react to something, then get out and put pins in them that probably are even harder to do than reconect a swaybar, and then pull them again once your through that section.

"In case for some reason you didn’t believe in the laws of physics, you can take some comfort in the fact that even if the ZZ did open up during braking, the design includes a track bar (the gold link) that keeps the rear axle located laterally even if both sides were separated from the frame – so at least the back end would want to stay in the back " In case you believe this one, remember what happened when you lifted your Jeep and tried to use the stock trackbar? The axle shifted to the side? Really........well isn't the same thing happening when the axle droops out of the body on its own. Leaf springs inherently keep the axle located, assuming its mounting points are fixed to the frame/body. Remove the fixed locating point, and the leaf no longer posesses this quality.

I'm done, disagree if you wish, the soapbox is free for someone else's use now.

[OverkillZJ]

I can't get as technical about it as Brian did since really I hardly know crap about leaf springs, but I also think it's a bad concept. I don't see the need for it anyway seeing how much flex leaf's can get when properly setup without such a freaky device.

[bbaker80]

Maybe if you paint it to match instead of baby blue it might work better? :lol: