Anyone find a cab mount dampner?

[NiftyFifty]

Hey guys,

Well the truck is back in a 100 pieces again and one thing I would like to address is the roughness in the cab with all the extra spring pressure I have from my 1 ton springs. I removed about 4-5 when I swapped the jeep rear end in, but its not enough. I'm just curious if anyone has tried any kind of thicker rubber mou to between the cab and fame mounts? I seen some repos listed, but they just looked like thing prices of rubber mat, and I'm thinking something thicker, but softer.

I'm hoping to do a lot to change how it rides and sounds inside... No more yelling to have a conversation on the highway

[ggdad1951]

Cab mounts? Roberts has them. But you need a more solid one for drivers front. ... hockey puck works well there.

Edited May 22, 2014 by ggdad1951

[NiftyFifty]

Any reason why you need a solid one? A real hockey puck is harder then plain rubber strips IMO. I had those mounting my flat deck to the frame, but they did zero for less shock.

[MBF]

 The cab needs to be solidly mounted because the pedals come up through the floor, and the steering column housing is clamped directly to the dash requiring a fairly solid mounting of the cab.  The left front corner mount is slightly different than the others and is basically used as a locating point to keep the cab from sliding around.  The cab can't do a lot of floating or moving around on the chassis (like a modern air ride cab on a big rig) with the original column and pedal design.  Mike

[ggdad1951]

queue Hank with his copy of the cab mounts from the manual...

[Jeff Balazs]

For what it is worth I think you need to come at this from another angle. There really isn't anything wrong or noisy about the standard cab mounts. The noise comes from the cab itself...... and to a lesser extent how it reacts to wind, ride and engine related noises. Ride noise and harshness needs to be addressed at the source. I don't have any experience with a 1 ton but I can say that my 3/4 ton responded well to what I did. Getting the springs to regain the full range of movement helped a lot. I did several applications of PB Blaster Corrosion Stop and this stuff really helped. My 3/4 ton also responded well to having 300# of weight added to the rear. I did not remove any springs and this simple fix made a huge difference to the overall ride quality.

 

There is quite a lot that you can do to quiet the cab down. This is one of the areas that seems to ignored or glossed over on a lot of builds. To me since I am building a daily driver and the last truck I intend to own I got real serious about it. I kind of doubt anyone else has gotten quit as crazy as I have about this.....but I tell you what it was worth it. It is really quiet and cool in this cab compared to most older vehicles I have ridden in. I will warn you that it is not a one step or one product job. There are many things which need to be addressed.

 

Here is what I did.

I started with several applications of brush on rubberized bed liner. I put this pretty much everywhere I could reach. The roof and cab back...the floors and even inside the doors. On the larger expanses of sheet metal I cemented strips of rubber made from conveyor belt to help deaden sound transmission. I put several coats on the underside of the cab before I mounted it. This stuff while very messy worked well to eliminate squeeks etc.... It stays fairly flexible after drying and is a good rust preventitive. This probably accounted for about 25% of noise reduction.

 

I then went over everything with at least one layer of Hushmat Ultra. Again everywhere I could reach...the roof..the floor....the entire back of the cab....even some inside the doors. The firewall got 3 layers and I even did quite a bit of the underside of the dash. This stuff works really well and probably accounts for around 50% of the noise reduction I was able to achieve.

 

I didn't stop here. I decided that if I was going to do this I would go after everything I could. I had John Nida of Pilothouse Interiors do my upholstery. He did a great job. First class and very heavily constructed. I then made up insulating panels of foiled bubble wrap and/or rubberized carpeting to go between the upholstery and the hushmat. Little things like doing the area under the seat made a difference. It may sound a bit over the top.....but attention to all of hese things make a huge difference. When you can slap the metal pretty much anywhere on the cab and it sounds like you are slapping a heavy slab of concrete you know you got it right.

 

Riding around in an old truck doesn't have to be like riding in a tin can. That get's old in a hurry.

 

Hope this helps.

Jeff

[HanksB3B]

queue Hank with his copy of the cab mounts from the manual...

 

Here you go 

 

 

If you are going to use a hockey puck make it a   Chicago Blackhawks puck. They could stand a little more crushing. I think Corey Crawford has 6 extra ones left over from last night...

 

Go Kings, (but truly a Rangers fan they lived in my hometown)

 

Hank 

Edited May 22, 2014 by HanksB3B

[NiftyFifty]

Thanks for the replies, I plan to go crazy with the sound deadening products and a heavier interior, but you feel every bump in that cab, so I was just hoping to attempt taking that out of the equation as well. I have some softer rubber mounts that look close to original, I may see if they make any difference

[ggdad1951]

Thanks for the replies, I plan to go crazy with the sound deadening products and a heavier interior, but you feel every bump in that cab, so I was just hoping to attempt taking that out of the equation as well. I have some softer rubber mounts that look close to original, I may see if they make any difference

 

remember you end up cinching those cab bolts down pretty good so you don't get much dampening from them. As someone stated, the cab in not like a modern semi cab, but a pretty tight fit down to the frame.

[Jeff Balazs]

Thanks for the replies, I plan to go crazy with the sound deadening products and a heavier interior, but you feel every bump in that cab, so I was just hoping to attempt taking that out of the equation as well. I have some softer rubber mounts that look close to original, I may see if they make any difference

I think you will have to address the ride quality issues you have at the source. In other words the suspension. The cab mounts if they are done up properly are probably not the problem and can't be too soft. The front suspension on my 3/4 ton worked pretty nicely for a solid axle arrangement. I was able to zero in on the rear suspension pretty quickly by adding some sand bags until I could feel it smooth out. To get a 1 ton to ride nicely you may have to have some spring work done? At least you already have the longer wheelbase so if you get the suspension right it should smooth out. In my opinion the longer the wheelbase the better you should be able to get it to feel.

 

Jeff

[NiftyFifty]

I don't want anything in my box like that for weight, I will likely take a few more springs out of the rear anyway. These rubber mounts aren't that soft, I wouldn't make anything that allowed movement, only lessen vibration. As for the front end, it already a 1/2 ton set up. Any 1/2 ton owners know how many leafs they have in the rear?

[Jeff Balazs]

I wasn't suggesting you leave the weight in the bed.......just use it as a tool to determine what works. The thing is I think when you start removing spring leaves sometimes it messes with the rebound action more than it actually helps the ride. This is just my opinion but I think it may be better to either try and work with what the manufacturer put on the truck or have new springs made rather than just pull leaves.

 

If you have swapped out the front from a 1/2 ton into this truck you may well have inadvertently created a situation that could have actually added to the ride harshness. Again this is just my opinion but it seems possible to me that the lighter and softer 1/2 ton front end could be a bit "overwhelmed" by the heavier frame and rear suspension of a 1 ton.

 

Jeff

Edited May 22, 2014 by Jeff Balazs

[NiftyFifty]

I dont think there is a frame difference in 1 ton ton 1/2, at least not on any trucks I've seen? The rear shackles, springs and diff are of course all different, but even the front springs I believe we're exactly the same, just a heavier front spindle. There are so many short springs, I don't think it can possibly hurt to remove, other then hitting the magic point that it can still handle the weight of the box and frame to the rear.

[HanksB3B]

Pictures couldn't hurt...

 

Hank 

[55 Fargo]

Just got back from taking my Fargo to town. My gravel road, 3 miles to the pavement. A the moment this road is as hard as rock, full of small holes, ripples and ridges, it feels very rough even with a modern vehicle.

I only drive 30 mph or so on this awful road, my 108 inch truck feels like a shopping cart. i do not think much could change this fact on this road. I find on pavement not much issue, even going over railway tacks speed bumps etc. I have 300 lbs or so in the back.

Here is the good part, I knew I was low on gas, so had a jerry can with a couple of gallons of gas, guess what, ran out of gas right in an intersection, not a real busy one though. I pushed truck to side, put in some gas, primed carb and away we went.

My truck is quite noisy, no interior insulation etc,.

I want to know from others, how smooth and/or quiet are your 108 inch wheel base Pilothouse trucks?

[NiftyFifty]

I can grab some tomorrow, I've got my parts 1 ton sitting in the back to compare front ends, but I recall they were identical when I installed because I just replaced the whole axle/springs because it was easier then pulling the u-bolt nuts

[Jeff Balazs]

They are all different.....heavier section on the frame channels for one. It changes from 1/2 to 3/4 to 1 ton. Also the axles themselves have a different weight rating as well as the springs. Sure they may look similar but they are not the same.

Take a look at the frame drawings when you get a chance.

 

Jeff

[NiftyFifty]

I don't think the springs or axles are different in the front, only different spindles... I measured and both 1 ton and 1/2 are 1 3/4", both have 7 leafs all the same length and the shackle eyes both measure the same. These trucks were built heavier then they needed to be from the start... I can't see them running that many different frames etc in the same basic chassis. Now the larger trucks of course...

I don't have a 1/2 ton close to compare frame rails, but last one I looked at (where I got my front axle) sure looks identical in all ways.

[HanksB3B]

Wait, isn't the frame and the chassis the same thing? I'll send if the parts book lists the same number. 

 

Hank 

[NiftyFifty]

I looked in the CDN parts book at the springs, but its not exactly written real clear

[Jeff Balazs]

I can't say what was done on the models produced in Canada but the all 3 of the light truck models produced in the US had the difference I referred to. For example the 1/2 ton front axle rating is 2200# and the 3/4 is rated at 2500# and they do not share the same part #. They look similar and share many of the same dimensions but there are slight differences. This is the case on several chassis related parts of these trucks. The 3/4 ton frame rails really are thicker in cross section than they are in a 1/2 ton frame. Not a lot .....something like a 1/32" or so......but they are different.

 

I was a bit surprised to discover just how much was different between these models myself when I started working on my truck.

They really took the Job Rated thing quite seriously. This is especially true when it came to the springs and spring ratings. The various spring sets may share mounting dimensions and look similar but the spring rates are very different.

 

Jeff