Watts Link Questions:

I think this is what you mean by the bars being longer. This will eliminate the curve at the top of the travel like in the diagram above.





And this with a good bit of lift and not even close to extended.

Originally posted by BioMax



The gif that DroptSdime posted is neat-o... but wrong. The link never goes past perpendicular at any point, but the pics that SHIFTBOY linked to is perfect!

The gif isn't wrong. It probably wasn't drawn for a suspension application. That is what a Watt's would do if it reached either extreme of it's vertical travel.

there's a good java animation of a watt's linkage here:

http://www.brockeng.com/mechanism/Watt.htm


if you go to the this page: http://www.brockeng.com/mechanism/index.htm they have a few other straight line generators that are pretty interesting. the java animations are nice because you can click on them and stop them at any point in motion.

Max, what I'm curious about is the relationship between the length of the parallel bars and the length of the center crank bar. is there some sort of equation to figure out how long one needs to be in realtion to the other? would it be possible for you to give us a really quick, really general step-by-step primer in setting up a generic watt's link?

Ox

Most air ride setups use a bag on a bar setup that allows the suspension a great deal more travel than a stock setup. For this reason the watts with the bars crossing the center is a good application. The bars get pretty off angle looking at raised and lowered but are parallel at ride height and overall theres no binding and with heim joints. And with the cone washers you dont get any binding in the bars either. I also like to make the poly bushing watts with short sleeves to allow more travel. I dont use the hard plastic bushings like a Pete and Jakes 4 link uses. I use ES graphite impregnated poly bushings that never need grease.

I hope that more people use the watts link in custom applications. They are neat as hell and work just as neat as they look. There are more pics on my site about watts links. www.dallashotrodparts.com/watts.html

Many stock vehicles use Watts links as well.