It's been a hot minute since I posted on this forum, but I wanted to enlighten the users who are still on here and possibly follow my craftsmanship and journey with my Pathfinder.

Some time has passed since I did anything crazy to my front suspension, but after putting up with some drawbacks due to paying for cheap suspension components, its time to once again mess with and hopefully dial in my suspension again.

Most of the work being performed is on the front suspension. The Rear Suspension is where I want it.

In the front, I am replacing the Driver and Passenger Side:

LCA's - Detroit Axle Nissan Titan/Armada LCA's
Steering Knuckles - CJD Racing Steering Knuckles
Wheel Hubs - Mevotech TTX Wheel Hubs
Inner and Outer Tie Rods - CJD Racing Full Heim Steering Kit
Lower Camber Bolts - All Dogs Offroad Camber Lockout Kit

Here are some photos of my journey so far:

Pre-Installation Fitment Photos:

Issue #1

The ABS wire is blocked due to the lack of a slot for the wire to sit in.

I ended up Dremeling out a slot for them to sit in, and the issue was corrected.



Issue #2

The Factory pinch Bolt does not fit in the hole on the CJD Racing knuckles.



I ended up resorting to using an M12x1.75 Cap Socket Bolt and Nut. As you can also tell, there isn't a way to hold the nut while tightening the Bolt down, so the shop ended up tack-welding the nut in place, and it has held very well. All of the nut and bolt hardware is rated at Grade 12.9 for the highest strength possible





Issue #3

The Ball Joint Hole on the CJD Racing Knuckles is too small for the factory ball joints.

Our Factory Ball Joints for the lower control arms have a diameter of 22mm. The CJD Racing Lower Control Arm holes are around 19-20mm.

After carefully drilling out the holes with a 55/64 drillbit (Slightly smaller than a 22mm Drillbit), the factory ball joints fit tight and perfectly into the knuckles.



Wheel fitment pics:

The knuckle is supposedly designed to clear 16x7 stock wheels

I ended up having to use my 1.5-inch wheel spacers with my American Racing 16x8 Wheels that have 0mm offset and 4 1/2 inches of backspacing



Shouldn’t have any contact issues between the steering components and my wheel and tire.

Shop Day Photos:





Loosely put together on the drivers side:












Issues that we ran across at the shop:

The Heim steering kit was about 1-2 inches too long. We ended up cutting off 1 inch on the clevis side and 1 inch on the knuckle side.

The Passenger Side ABS connector broke on the engine harness side. We are going to attempt to resolder a new one in or try to repin the old one.

That looks like that is CJD's 2wd 4" spindle lift spindle? I've had their full heim tie rods sitting in my Pathy's trunk for almost a year now, was hoping they'd be a perfect fit when I get to it this fall. Looks like you've got some nice upgrades though.

Few questions:

Did CJD give you any heads up about the factory ball joint and pinch bolt?
Did their own nut and bolt come with the spindle?
I'm guessing their boxed LCA is meant to go with their spindle and not the factory?

For the price these parts cost though, I would have thought it would be a plug and play type deal instead of still having to spend more time modifying it to make it work. As always, appreciate you sharing your progress. Keep up the good work.

You guys are my heroes.

This stuff is taking it to the next level! Serious biz this.

Well done.

silverarrow27 wrote: ↑

Mon Aug 07, 2023 1:19 am

That looks like that is CJD's 2wd 4" spindle lift spindle? I've had their full heim tie rods sitting in my Pathy's trunk for almost a year now, was hoping they'd be a perfect fit when I get to it this fall. Looks like you've got some nice upgrades though.

Few questions:

Did CJD give you any heads up about the factory ball joint and pinch bolt?
Did their own nut and bolt come with the spindle?
I'm guessing their boxed LCA is meant to go with their spindle and not the factory?

For the price these parts cost though, I would have thought it would be a plug and play type deal instead of still having to spend more time modifying it to make it work. As always, appreciate you sharing your progress. Keep up the good work.

Answers to your questions:

1. That looks like that is CJD's 2wd 4" spindle lift spindle? - These are actually CJD Racing's 6 inch Drop Bracket Steering Knuckles that are designed to replace the weaker cast iron knuckles from other kits.

Link to the knuckles: https://cjdracing.com/collections/nissa ... ft-spindle

2. Did CJD give you any heads up about the factory ball joint and pinch bolt? - Unfortunately, CJD did not give me any heads up on there being issues with factory hardware or components. Most of the issues that were found/discussed was between myself and another member over on ClubFrontier who is also running this Knuckle on his Frontier with 38 Inch Tires.

3. Did their own nut and bolt come with the spindle? - The only hardware that comes with the kit is the Knuckles and the tie rods. Keep a notice - The tie rods in the kit are for factory width, not titan swap width. The titan swap kit they sell is too long. More on this later.

4. I'm guessing their boxed LCA is meant to go with their spindle and not the factory? - It is very likely that the knuckle was intended to be used with the CJD Lower Control Arms. That being said, this would be a poor implementation and feature of the knuckles IMO. Like I said however, these can be modified to work with the factory lower control arms as long as you drill out the ball joint hole to 55/64 to 22mm

5. For the price these parts cost though, I would have thought it would be a plug and play type deal instead of still having to spend more time modifying it to make it work. - In my case, these knuckles were aquired from a third party sale over on ClubFrontier. Nonetheless, there definitely needs to be clarification in the notes on the knuckles that modifications may be necessary to make them fit. Ive run across additional issues with these knuckles which I will cover in the next post.

TooMuchControl wrote: ↑

Tue Aug 08, 2023 5:38 am

You guys are my heroes.

This stuff is taking it to the next level! Serious biz this.

Well done.

Appreciate the kind words!

Day 2 of the install:

Everything is mostly back together, but we did run into additional snags that needed to be addressed:

First issue: Drivers Side CV Axle was torn and needed to be replaced.

Luckily, Autozone had my CV Axle in stock which is a 2011-2013 Infiniti QX56 2WD Axle - Titan Swapped with R180 Differential



Issue #2 - The Brake Caliper Mounting Ears were not positioned correctly and the holes were off.

The shop ended up having to reposition the mounting ears and slot the holes slighly to make the calipers fit properly.

The other piece was that the caliper mounting bracket was contacting my rotor. After repositioning the Mounting tabs, this issue no longer occurs.









Issue #3 - The Tie Rods are too long.

From CJD Racing, the tie rods they include for their titan swap kit are 12 inches long (Shaft Piece). Unfortunately this is too long and they either have to be replaced with different sized tie rods or you must shorten the tie rod shafts and retap the threads.

The tie rods they included with their drop bracket kit are 7 inches long (Shaft Piece) and those are too short.

In my case, we have shorteneed the tie rod shafts from 12 inches to 10.5 inches. In reality, the shaft needs to be slightly shorter. More like 9.0-9.5 inches. keep in mind that the inner and outer heims that screw into the tie rod shaft have a threaded length of 1.75 inches (3.5 inches total). Fully extended out (typically not recommended(I would say at least 30-40% thread engagement) you would have around 12-13 inches of total tie rod length.

Additional Photos showcasing lift kit installed:









A few notes:

The CV Axles and lower ball joints do contact at full droop but when its at ride height on the ground they do not contact each other.



The tie rod bolts were flipped so they dont contact the swaybar.

The knuckles do fit a 16x8 wheel (American Racing AR172 Baja) with the aid of a 1.5 inch wheel spacer. The wheel spacers are needed regardless for this wheel because the brake calipers dont clear the wheel without them.

Hoping to get the truck aligned soon and actually driving again later this week.

Stay tuned!

Update:

Pathfinder is back on the ground and driving again!

Some post-install photos, including alignment results:

Post Alignment Result:



Back Home:



Cruising through MPLS:



At the Convention Center:



Took home a trophy for the first time! Top 3 Import Truck!

Very nice, congrats on 3rd place!