The UAZ 469 is in demand among motorists due to its high cross-country performance and low cost of spare parts. Some owners perform a body and suspension lift on the UAZ 469. This allows you to increase the distance from components and assemblies to the road surface. You can lift the UAZ 469 in two ways - increase the distance between the body and frame or make changes to the suspension design.
Body bodice and suspension of UAZ 469
Photo 1: Lifted UAZ 469 (source: Yandex.Pictures)
Do-it-yourself UAZ body lift
It’s hard to look at such a car with indifference. When meeting her, bikers honk their horns in greeting, police officers begin to smile broadly, and jeepers click their tongues knowingly.
Ulyanovsk SUVs have long had a reputation for not being very reliable cars, but this is to some extent compensated for by the cheapness of spare parts. The design, allegedly copied at one time from the Land Rover Series III, is morally outdated, but simple and repairable. And most importantly, in capable hands, a UAZ is capable of competing off-road with most of its foreign classmates. And this despite the fact that they put him on absolutely “oak” and not too big tires, and the tread pattern leaves much to be desired. Meanwhile, the vehicle's cross-country ability is half dependent on the wheels. This, as Ostap Bender used to say, is a medical fact. It turns out that if a car drives well in mud on mediocre tires, then on good tires it should work wonders. So there is a reason to put the domestic rogue on the “correct” imported wheels. True, in order for them to fit into the arches, you need to work hard and raise the body above the frame - in special terminology, perform a body lift, “lift”. The option that one of our good friends used is interesting for its downright extreme cheapness.
HOW IT WAS
To install wheels with a diameter of 35 inches on his UAZ 31512-32 (modification with military axles), its owner had to install spacers between the frame and the body. Their function was successfully performed by hockey pucks, two for each of the 12 mounting bolts. Before drilling the holes, the washers didn’t even have to be marked - their surface is slightly convex, and on the way from the factory to the store, a small abrasion forms right in the middle. The process of supplementing standard cushions with “homemade” spacers was very simple. First, the radiator mounting rods were unscrewed. Then came the nuts and bolts that secure the body to the frame. And then, with the help of two hydraulic jacks, the body was alternately lifted from the rear, front and sides, inserting washers. Of course, the standard mounting bolts had to be replaced with longer ones.
Another small modification is the installation of longer spring earrings from the Gazelle. The only difficulty that arises is that the standard “Gazelle” bolt for fastening the earring is smaller in diameter than the holes in the rubber bushings of the UAZ. Therefore, we had to put pieces of water pipe on the bolts. Once the body was bolted back to the frame and the new earrings were in place, all that remained was to adjust the angle of the radiator. Now the 35 wheels simply asked to fit into the widened arches. Note that all the work was completed by one person within 2 days.
HOW IT ENDED
On the new tires the car began to look very impressive. The ground clearance, which is 30 centimeters for a UAZ with military bridges, has increased by another 8-9 centimeters.
After starting the car, it became clear that the gas thrust was too high, and the engine growled at high speeds without outside intervention. However, there was no need to drill an additional hole; there was already a hole in the right place!
During test maneuvering, it turned out that the reverse gear did not engage - the body rose and the groove of the gear shift lever shifted. The problem was solved with a little work with a file. And that's all, no more side effects. But one of the advantages of the “lift” is the fact that the gas tanks have risen to the level of the frame and have become more protected.
As a final touch, the owner of the UAZ decorated it properly. For example, I attached a shovel to the hood of a car. The fasteners for machine guns, borrowed from the military Ural, were perfect for this purpose. The spartan-designed dashboard was enlivened with a sign with a built-in red light and the caption “No oil pressure.” For those interested, let us explain that similar signs can be found on border patrol boats. Further in approximately the same spirit.
High-profile off-road tires on chrome wheels transformed not only the appearance of the car. The UAZ began to behave differently even on the asphalt, silently swallowing potholes. Of course, because BF Goodrich Mud-Terrain tires are famous for their softness. And on off-road, if you lower it, it spreads out and gives a wide contact patch.
A LITTLE BIT OF ACCOUNTING
So, we were talking about the unprecedented low cost of the project. Let's do some simple calculations:
- Hockey pucks, 24 pieces, 6.50 rubles. Only 156 rubles.
- Bolts, 12 pieces for 19 rubles. Only 228 rubles.
- Earrings from “Gazelle”, 4 pieces for 35 rubles. Only 140 rubles.
- The total is 524 rubles (about 25-30 dollars).
- The UAZ of 1992, even with low mileage, is unlikely to cost more than $1,000.
- BF Goodrich Mud-Terrain 35x12.5 R15 tires can be found for $220 if you really want to. Four pieces and a spare wheel will therefore cost $1,100. Add to this 5 15x7 wheels for a total cost of $750, and it turns out that you need to shell out $1850 for the wheels.
If you add together a hockey gazelle body lift kit, a used car, and new wheels, it comes out to about $2,880. If you are mentally prepared for breakdowns of your iron pet, then the picture that emerges is quite acceptable.
PAY
It is clear that it is possible to lift the body above the frame using washers not only on UAZ. And in general, the idea itself is not new. There are imported branded body lift kits that cost about 200 dollars. Why do the imperialists spend that kind of money? The fact is that factory kits are made of special plastic that is resistant to vibration, shock, and heat. Such spacers undergo testing and mandatory certification. But nothing concrete can be said about the washers. It is unknown how they will behave upon impact, how much hard braking they will withstand, and in general how long they will last. The author knows of cars that have been in operation for several years with a raised, “little loss” body. But a few cases are not statistics. So be careful with free gingerbread cookies.
High-quality modernization
The car owner initially needs to establish the size of the future device and the distance at which the frame will be located from the body. This parameter should be within 50 - 100 millimeters.
After this, you need to make a spacer, taking into account the selected height of the elevator, for which a special profile with a square cross-section is used. The dimensions of its sides should be one hundred millimeters.
When making a UAZ Hunter lift with your own hands, you will need to cut twelve blanks from the profile. The height of each of them is 120 millimeters. Twenty-four squares measuring one hundred by one hundred millimeters are cut out of a steel sheet two to three millimeters thick. Subsequently, they are welded onto profile sections. As a result, cubes are produced with the wrong configuration. All spacers have holes at the ends of ten millimeters in diameter. The SUV frame is the main component of the device that is being manufactured. To secure the parts, washers, nuts and bolts are used.
To prepare the body base for future work, you will need to turn off the battery and place special supports under the wheels. The fixing radiator bolts are also unscrewed. To raise the SUV, you will need a jack and stands made of wood.
Thus, the car body is raised to a specific height. To do this, it is necessary to uniformly and alternately lift the parts of the UAZ Hunter located at the rear and front.
The most important thing here is that the body base does not shift relative to the frame. Otherwise, it will become difficult to align the fixing holes of the SUV to the frame.
Each spacer is placed with your own hands, for which you will need to remove the manufacturer's cushions by attaching the body base directly to the frame using bolts and spacers. Fastener components are not fully tightened. After this, the SUV is lowered directly onto the frame. During the next stage of work, you will need to finally tighten the bolts and screw in the locknuts. All components are installed in the opposite order. If this is necessary, then the required hoses are extended, as well as the wires of the SUV.
Using a grinder, the fastening of the steering column to the body base of the UAZ Hunter is cut into two parts. The electrical wiring running along the steering column is protected from sparks. Then the fixation of the steering column is moved to another place, after which it is welded to the dashboard. Such a UAZ lift can be done with your own hands not only on Hunter, but also on all other car models.
UAZ suspension lift
And now I’ll talk a little about the UAZ suspension lift. It has both pros and cons, like any off-road tuning. I would say that the main advantages of lifting the suspension on the UAZ are the improvement of the geometric cross-country ability of the UAZ, due to the fact that the wheels remain in place, and everything else rises up, except for the axles, of course. Frame, body, components - after the suspension lift, all this will come into contact with the surface of the earth, or even with a stump innocently sticking out in the woods, much later than in an unlifted state. And this is quite logical.
I consider the second important advantage to be the possibility of installing wheels of larger diameter, which did not fit into the arches of the UAZ before the suspension lift. I would not recommend limiting yourself to the suspension lift alone, since the suspension lift also has a minus, which is an inevitable increase in the angles of the universal joints. The cardan shafts begin to work out of whack, and if you step over the fine line between bad and not very good, then the cardan will let you down, rest assured.
How the car was created
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In the early 1970s, the country still used the GAZ-69, produced at the Ulyanovsk Automobile Plant, as a civilian military vehicle. Its platform borrowed a lot from the post-war Pobeda, and many of the design details and elements of the vehicle were clearly outdated in the 1970s.
The introduction of the UAZ 469 into production immediately solved the problem of updating without affecting the basic qualities of the 69th. Incredible bottom capacity, relatively light weight, excellent load capacity, similarity of components and mechanisms with other models of the domestic automobile industry - all this remains the same.
UAZ suspension lift: Bridge-spring spacer
It is also possible, without disturbing the design of the springs, to slightly raise the UAZ suspension using a spacer between the axle and the spring. In this case, there is no need to wait for a large elevator, because... I also don’t recommend going crazy with this. Well, of course, when making such a spacer, I recommend thinking about fixing it in its installation location, and also making sure that the length of the spring ladders is sufficient.
In addition, it is possible to forge old springs or buy new ones. There are tuning products, but they are all very expensive.
Repair of frames of American SUVs: Escalade, Tahoe, Ranger, Wrangler
For a number of reasons, full-size American pickup trucks are not officially supplied to Russia. But dealers freely sell huge Cadillac Escalade/Chevrolet Tahoe built on their basis. The cost of frames for SUVs produced on the other side of the Atlantic is approximately 430,000 rubles. Large SUVs from Ford are also not available to Russians. Until recently, the only exception was the Thai Ranger pickup. The key power element of the track costs 172,930 rubles. By the way, it fits the related Japanese Mazda BT-50 and is close in design to the outlandish Ford Everest for its compatriots.
The American Jeep Wrangler all-terrain vehicle has one of the most reliable and strongest frames in the world among civilian vehicles. That is why it is able to participate even in the most extreme off-road competitions. Moreover, the frame itself for an SUV costs only 245,000 rubles.
UAZ suspension lift: Spring springing
Springing springs is actually not very tricky, although people act smart after doing this operation. Many people do this not for the sake of a suspension lift, but so that the suspension on the UAZ finally starts working, absorbs irregularities, and becomes relatively soft. Many have experimented with this for a long time and tediously, but everyone has the same opinion - little has changed. I say this based not on the opinions of virtual theorists from forums, but based on communication with real people who did all this in their UAZ. Yes, better. Not much
