The top motor mounts have both been rewelded when my brother broke one and I saw the other had started cracking, the factory had only welded one side of the bracket to the frame.
I don't see how having the shock vertical would be any different then in a solid axle truck with a vertical shock.
I have looked from site to site trying to find info on the math to put together a suspension and have come up with nothing so far.
So I guess I will just need to get the ole compass out, and take some more pics of the suspension the way I want it to show what I mean.
I think you are trying to fix a slipping chain the wrong way. The engine and axle and fixed to the swing arm and have nothing to do with suspension geometry. You either have swing arm or axle flex or an engine mount is worn or broken. CKau added an additional axle carrier bearing and support next to his sprocket to prevent flex - Most likely you are seeing the same problem.
if you want to play with suspension angles, make a couple of shock brackets like I have in the pictures below and see how it changes your ride height and dampening. Be aware that the engine to frame harness connection and throttle cable have a finite distance you can extend the swing arm before damage. Also extreme angles will mess with your fuel level in your carburetor bowl and effect drivability.
A 4 link suspension is pretty close to a swing arm.
And my truck has one shock facing forward and one facing backward. So that doesn't really help for a guide, but they are a bit more vertical than 45 degrees off the axel.
And my orginal goal was not to move the shocks but to box in the motor using the dogleg mounting holes. And to do this the shock is in the way and needs to be moved.
On my buggy to get the engine out. There are two bolts on the back of the frame near the rear wheels and two bolts where the dog legs drop down. This piece comes off then you can pull the engine. So i don't want to weld that frame to the buggy.
On the boxed in arms, the engine slips in and out from the rear/bottom of the swing arm. On some you must remove the axle, but mine clears without further disassembly.
It does not look like the chain should have anything to do with the dog leg to me, Got any better pictures to look at, the motor is mounted to the swingarm right? _________________ Desert Trail And Sand Fabricators
If you take a look at these buggies, there are only 3-4 different swing arm arrangements.
None of these buggies that has ever had a chain slip issue was ever fixed with changing any of the things you're talking about changing.
ACBlind and I have both had chain slip issues and all of them were due to some other failure (swing arm cracked, chain adjuster in backward, etc..).
I'd look take a closer look at that before I started welding up anything new. Here's a hint: We didn't find one issue until we took the engine out of the swingarm.
Taking the engine out looks more daunting than it is. If it were mine I'd take the engine out and do a really good inspection. I just wish we would have had our welder when we did it... It's a perfect time reinforce some of those cheap welds.
If you've already done this... We can ask you more questions to assist you in solving the problem. _________________ Chris Dierkens
'04 Yerf-Dog 3206 10g Rollers, 1500# Spring, Reverse, SuperTrapp, Uni
'04 KPX Xterro: pumper carb, oil cooling, 10g rollers, Junkies pipe, Uni
'05 Blade 150 DX: 4 Valve head, 10g rollers, East Side pipe, Uni
www.northeastbuggy.com