This might sound stupid, or even crazy, but since my rear axle is now out of a 97, i was thinking, even my friend and his dad were thinking that I should get the whole frontend from a 97 or so and see if it would bolt up and make the front end wider. This might be costly and not really worth the effort, but would it be possible? I was thinking that the only thing necessary to change might be the upper and lower control arms, and the spindes (maybe, or just swap to newer balljoints). And throw in a set of newer CV axles up front. That might require the use of a newer axle upfront though, since the newer rodeos had equal length cvs. I suppose it would also need newer centerlinks, and tierods. The latter are things I didnt think of. But it might be possible to keep the old recirculating ball setup and get the extra travel that the rack and pinion guys cant. Im probably starting to sound like a mad man with this idea. Many would say just go to a solid axle. But I think it might be cool to get the wider stance of a newer rodeo on an older rodeo and keep the IFS, then get a longer travel suspension than what was possible with the newer ones. This is not something that is in my near future, atleast not that I know of. But might be something to kick around for a while and see what the braintrust can come up with. I would really love to put a solid axle under my rodeo, but is not quite possible and feasible, atleast not for a few years after I get a good paying job after college and have another vehicle to putt around in. If things are as relatively simple as I think they would be, this might, could be a weekend swap. Im not much of one for ditching something that works fairly well, like our IFS, especially since its fairly strong. I like to modify or think of ways to modify things to work even better. I know that we are limited by the length of our control arms, then the balljoints, then probably tierods and then the cvs. Im just shooting around ideas. I have tons of them now. I should probably start putting on paper and seeing what I can do with them. Anybody is welcome to post their oppinions and ideas. Even shoot my ideas down. Im more or less thinking out loud, and decided the talk section might be a better place instead of the tech section. Since we are talking about ideas and not actual tech, yet. Like I said feel free to post ideas, suggestions, hints or even point out its a worthless, dumb idea. Sorry this is so long. Just have lots of ideas in my head at the moment
Dan