King and link, or ball joint?

[PSG]

Somebody told me today that you can go narrower with king and link setups than you can with ball joint. Is this correct?
Which one is better?

PSG

 

[K@rlos]

Pretty sure you can get 4" beams in both. Which is better question however has opened that wonderful tin of worms :lol:

 

[paul_q]

I beleave ball joints use to bottom out so people switched to king and link to go low but that was before dropped ball joint spindles.

 

[r73]

Bottom tube on king and link beam sits a bit higher and the link pin set up can in theory run at lower angles. Balljoints shouldn't really be lowered too much more than about 3" as they run out travel in the socket. Dropped or welded spindles take care of this by giving you an extra 2-4" of drop.
Best thing is to drive both setups and see what you prefer neither are cheap!
If you speak to Graham at Midland Early Bay he'll set you straight and you can test drive his bus.
VW obviously felt that ballpoint was an improvement - I personally prefer the ride.
You'll always be limited by tyres hitting tubs and track rods hitting chassis on extreme lowering.
Don't forget that tyre load rating should be a limiting factor on how low you can go - but hardly anyone with a lowered bus runs the correct tyres and I'm yet to hear of a problem ( thankfully)

 

[Graham L]

As above the limiting factor on going narrow is the chassis rails and fouling your wheels on them when on full lock, thats why 'most' people go to a max of 4" as thats the max you can go without making major alterations.

You are more than welcome to come and drive my bus

 

[PSG]

Thanks Graham

 

[K@rlos]

As above the limiting factor on going narrow is the chassis rails and fouling your wheels on them when on full lock, thats why 'most' people go to a max of 4" as thats the max you can go without making major alterations.

You are more than welcome to come and drive my bus

Graham is right, I made a 6" narrowed K&L beam for mine, it doesn't rub on the chassis because I made some steering stops but the lock isn't brilliant tbh :?

Looks the nuts though :mrgreen:

 

[davecrook1]

When people mention 4"narrowed bj beam and 4" narrowed k&l beam.. wont the k&l be narrower as i thought k&l is narrower than a bj beam stock??

 

[K@rlos]

When people mention 4"narrowed bj beam and 4" narrowed k&l beam.. wont the k&l be narrower as i thought k&l is narrower than a bj beam stock??

Yes a K&L beam is 1" narrower than a BJ beam

 

[Graham L]

When people mention 4"narrowed bj beam and 4" narrowed k&l beam.. wont the k&l be narrower as i thought k&l is narrower than a bj beam stock??

It's not the beam that's narrower as the limiting factor is the chassis rails it's more about the design of the arms on KnL and how far they 'angle out from the beam if you see what I mean.

The French slammer ball joint beams are 11cm just over 4" narrowed and the arms are as close to the end plates as they can be and very similar to the Slamwerks KnL I removed.

On a 4" KnL you are likely to scruff the chassis rails on full lock, we used to when we had. KnL fitted.

 

[audix]

Narrow is always better