NSSM tutorial

[AtEase]

This is a brief "how to" on how to make a No Screw Shock Mod (NSSM). It's a very simple and, if you already own a hot melt gun, very cheap mod.

The first step is to remove the screw in the shock. Second you need to fix the top shock housing to the chassis, not allowing it to move from side to side, just as you do with the LSSM, visible in pic 1. Then you need to fix the spring to the bottom housing. I, Mr Hawk's idea, used hot melt glue. An excellent choice since it does what it's supposed to, and is easy to remove, you can see the hot melt glue in the second pic. Then all you have to do is snap the bottom housing, with spring attached, back on, compress the spring and fit it to the top housing.

The main benefit is that the suspension will compress and decompress very smooth. But it will also be very easy to adjust the spring tension simply by adding or removing rubber o-rings. There will be no need to unscrew anything, just compress the spring and insert or remove desired number of o-rings.

On the downside there will be no more shock absorbing, but I'm thinking about a way to acheive this anyway, a shock mounted like the rear shock on the MR-02s.

[MrHawk]

Here are two more pics of mine and AtEases overlands in action with the new shocks.

They flex soo smooth now, way better than the lssm.

[easy]

I guess that will work for very low speed crawling but removing the shaft will definietly reduce the stability of the suspension. What will prevent unwanted side to side movement from steering loads at higher speeds and side hills ect?

As for not having to unscrew anything to adjust the ride height you don't have to unscrew anything with the LSSM mod either. Just pop the bottom of the shock off and slide out the shaft. The longer replacement shafts don't have a head on them so you can pull them right out of the upper body.

Davemud

[MrHawk]

Originally Posted by easy

I guess that will work for very low speed crawling but removing the shaft will definietly reduce the stability of the suspension. What will prevent unwanted side to side movement from steering loads at higher speeds and side hills ect?

Davemud

You mean leaning when turning? Well mine did that really bad with the lssm too, so it was just as bad. Might even be a bit better now after I tweaked it a bit.

Sadly you can't have mad flex and still make it corner like standard.

[AtEase]

Originally Posted by easy

I guess that will work for very low speed crawling but removing the shaft will definietly reduce the stability of the suspension. What will prevent unwanted side to side movement from steering loads at higher speeds and side hills ect?

As for not having to unscrew anything to adjust the ride height you don't have to unscrew anything with the LSSM mod either. Just pop the bottom of the shock off and slide out the shaft. The longer replacement shafts don't have a head on them so you can pull them right out of the upper body.

Davemud

Not even the hardest shocks will prevent leaning in side hills, shocks just dampen sudden movements in the suspension. And the purpose of the NSSM is to have an very smooth suspension, the ball joints provide dampening enough for rockcrawling with the OL.

The NSSM allows you to adjust ride height without pop anything off, only the spring. A lot easier if you ask me. I've had the LSSM for a long time, and I think the NSSM performs better, for my needs. Of course it sucks if you want to race, but that's not my primary use of my OL.

edit: bad speling

[USATorque55]

I'm with dave on this one mate.

What stops the rear of the car from moving side to side.

If your LSSM wasnt as smooth or as easy as just the springs, then you did something wrong building it. The entire design of the LSSM is to eliminate any friction in the shock apparatus.

I think a video will be the best evidence that this works. Otherwise it just seems like a good to loose stability for no reason.

Heres a pic of my OL. I run the softest springs commercially availible, these springs are for the Oil shocks of a MZM.



I have an RTI of 1395.35 on the truck. Which is double of what full scale crawlers get.

Suprisingly I dont have any video of the truck, but I will gaurentee you the shocks are the least of my worries when running it.

[MrHawk]

Originally Posted by USATorque55

What stops the rear of the car from moving side to side.

Don't really know what you mean with this, side stability is equal to the LSSM I had before

If your LSSM wasnt as smooth or as easy as just the springs, then you did something wrong building it. The entire design of the LSSM is to eliminate any friction in the shock apparatus.

My LSSM was smooth, but with the H1 body the pins had to be too short to not interfere with the body, and that made them kink in the shock bpdy at full drop making the the suspension lock up.

I have an RTI of 1395.35 on the truck. Which is double of what full scale crawlers get.

If that's a 20 degree score then your a bit mistaken, a 1:1 crawler will easily do 1200+



This mod was never intended to be the ultimate solution, we wanted to try something new and we did, and it works really good.

[MrHawk]

Ok so I made two short vids of it.

My DV-cam has a fried firewire port, so I had to use my digicam so sorry about the crappy quality and sucky quicktime format..

2 Vids

[pomme de terre]

i was taking my OL apart anyways, so i decided to try this mod out...
i had LSSM before, and it was working fairly well

the NSSM works fine for me, i dont plan to change back to LSSM (waay too lazy to do that )
i used stretched stock springs along with the NSSM and although there is a lot more roll than my car is with stock springs + orings + LSSM, it WAS better at crawling, but this could be due to the fact that i am now running stretched stock springs instead
its not that great at high speed, but still driveable for me

my friend dougboy uses stretched stock springs (i got to idea of stretching mine from him) on his OL along with XRM shocks and suspension is pretty free and soft on that
torque have you ever tried those? if not, give it a shot

[AtEase]

The springs are what stops your car from moving from side to side. And the purpose of the LSSM as I understand is to allow more travel, not to eliminate friction in the shocks.

[AtEase]

Originally Posted by pomme de terre

i used stretched stock springs along with the NSSM and although there is a lot more roll than my car is with stock springs + orings + LSSM, it WAS better at crawling, but this could be due to the fact that i am now running stretched stock springs instead
its not that great at high speed, but still driveable for me

my friend dougboy uses stretched stock springs (i got to idea of stretching mine from him) on his OL along with XRM shocks and suspension is pretty free and soft on that
torque have you ever tried those? if not, give it a shot

The NSSM doesn't stop you from adding o-rings, it shouldn't allow more roll than LSSM, just less dampening, and smoother suspension movements.

No, I haven't tried stretched springs, and I don't see the point for me either. With the wheelbase in the Pajero, the shortest, I can't get the car higher or flex more than now without rebuilding it quite a lot.

[pomme de terre]

i wasnt refering to you but ok....

the thing i noticed about the NSSM, is that the springs dont really compress anymore
its more like the springs themselves bend, and bend back into place

but it still works.... and im liking the softness....

[easy]

When I mentioned side hills I wasn't refering to the springs compressing on the low side and causing body lean. I was refering to deflection in the shock because there is no shaft to stabilize the shock. You would get deflection from steering loads at higher speeds too.

I suppose this works due to the light weight of the truck but I personally wouldn't give up the stability at higher speeds. If you want a smooth stroke get a set of Iwaver or GPM oil shocks and put a little grease in them.

Davemud

[AtEase]

Originally Posted by pomme de terre

i wasnt refering to you but ok....

the thing i noticed about the NSSM, is that the springs dont really compress anymore
its more like the springs themselves bend, and bend back into place

but it still works.... and im liking the softness....

We noticed that too, maybe I forgot to mention that in the first post. You can adjust that by angeling the bottom and top shock housings. With my Pajero I only needed to adjust the top ones a bit to make the spring compress as it's supposed to. But it also depends on how you fixed the spring to the bottom housing, if it isn't fixed straight you might have to you hot melt glue to fix the bottom housing in an angle.

Originally Posted by easy

When I mentioned side hills I wasn't refering to the springs compressing on the low side and causing body lean. I was refering to deflection in the shock because there is no shaft to stabilize the shock. You would get deflection from steering loads at higher speeds too.

I suppose this works due to the light weight of the truck but I personally wouldn't give up the stability at higher speeds. If you want a smooth stroke get a set of Iwaver or GPM oil shocks and put a little grease in them.

Davemud

No, that is not supposed to happen at all. The shaft is not there primarily to stabilize the shock, the friction between the top housing and the shaft is what provides the dampening, both in OL original shock and oil/grease shocks. With the NSSM you have to fix the top housing so it can't move from side to side, just like 1:1 cars. Stability in the suspension is what the A-arm and the two links on top of the engine and servo housings are for.

[easy]

atease, I'm talking about deflection, side to side movement in the suspension not body lean. As the OL is a 3 point design with the single ball head screw in the middle on the bottom I can see how there is no side to side movement or "deflection" in the suspension with this mod.

However, now it seems you are telling us the springs don't compress straight up and down it sounds like they bow out instead. If that's the case the reason you get softer movement is because the whole spring isn't working only the few coils in the area of the spring that bends are working. Fewer working coils = a lower spring rate and softer suspension.

The shaft in the stock shocks is not there to provide damping via friction as the shaft slides through the hole in the upper shock body. The friction is there by default. The shaft is there to stabilize the spring and cause it to compress in a straight line along its axis.

The O ring in the bottom of the top shock body on the Iwaver, stock Kyosho MZM and GPM oils is the main source of damping. None of those shocks is sealed well enough to keep the oil in and even if they were normal weeping during use would deplete the fluid fairly quickly due to the small size of the resevoir.

If you were to try a set of the oils with oil or grease to lube the O ring you would see how much smoother they are. Its due mostly to the lubed O ring but also due to the O ring being able to distort slightly to accomodate side loads on the shock shafts.

For the record I rebuilt about 800 shocks when I worked as a warranty and tech representative for company that distributes different brands of shocks in Canada. If the mod works well for you and you're happy with it you should use it and share it with others. Thanks for doing so.

Davemud