[Guest]

I have an 87 sammi but it is real tired. The engine burns about a quart for every 100 miles. The u joint is shot. Carb is worn. steering gear box is all over the place. front and rear body bolts are rusted through and the body bangs like crazy. clutch is worn. the frame is rusted through in 4 big places. the fenders are falling off and I can see out of the truck without looking out the windows{floor, rear wheel wells etc} I wouldn't sell it until it finally dies. Then it will get the ceremonial GHOST ride over the edge. That is usually really cool. i just cant justify any more money for something i will spend all those perfect off road weekends in my garasge while everyone is out there tearing it up. What do you think of the sidekick? Whithout any mods what are the largest tires I can put on it? how is the ride? how is the 4 wheel drive? The sammi was incredible off-road but it seems as though it will be departing us soon so I must find something to replace it and for $600 i can have a 95 sidekick with 62000 miles.

 

[2868]

235's will fit stock. I've seen some do 31's, but you'll need to trim the fenders. Too much work for me.

1" coil spacers will let ya run 30's with no fender rubbing.

Being IFS, it'll definately ride better on the street.

 

[2479]

My $.02 is 30x9.5s with out mods and no rubbing. The ride is awesome on road and off is ok to. I've had no problems with the 4wd system on mine. Only thing that sux is the lack of ground clearance and ifs (as every body knows).As for a dd I prefer the sidekick but for off road a sammy would beat it hands down.Sorry for the short reply but I've just got thru 12 pages of

.

Shane

 

[RRich]

My '92 Tracker started out as a parts donor - I was going to build a crawler from it.
I was impressed with the way it handled off road stock.
Tried on some 31's I had - impressed more - minor touching.
Tried on some 33's - took a little cutting - wow!
Then went to 35 x12.5's - MTR's -- impressive - took cutting and a body lift. Then it needed gears.
4.39 T-case did the trick, and ARB's, external cage, rock rails, 100% skid plate etc.

Now when I go out with clubs they laugh -- "Ha Ha - a rice burner!" After wheeling with them a few minutes they stop laughing.

IFS -- love it - rides great -- never could understand why when a wheel goes over an obstacle the other wheel lays over on it's side - and that's good? The old horse drawn wagons used that solid axle, you'd think technology would have come up with a better idea -- Oh, wait, they did - IFS.

 

[933]

I bought my 90 Tracker at auction for cheap money as a DD and for my teen son to drive. Its presentable but not pretty but I continue to get very good service from this little truck. We have made it better that it was and even though there is a 2" water jacket crack that seeps coolant it just keeps going.

I don't think I've ever had a better rig than my Tracker. So if you Sammi's too far gone, retire it and enjoy the Tracker. I doubt that you will have any regrets.

 

[daxe]

I don't have anything too important to add to this thread (I know..shut the F up, right?) but it is interesting to me since I just went through some stuff that was related to this and it's still happening.

I had my tan haardtop sami and built it up some, YJs, GRS2, spool, winch, armor, etc. The body was rusting away to nothing so I imported a nice softtop from VA and swapped the body over to my hardtop chassis. The result was so nice I decided to make the sami a daily driver and go backwards a little bit in development. I was going to build a tube frame crawler out of my "extra" sami frame for wheelin.

Right in all that time I happened into an 89 sidekick with good drivetrain but beat body and interior. After poking at it a little I thought it would be fun to make that into the offroadmobile. My pal wildweasel has a pretty rad Tracker, so that helped inspire that thought. I started talking about building it up and found myself with a drivetrainless 95 Tracker with a nice body and interior for a *real* nice price. It was generally thought that if I was going to build track/kick I ought to start with something more solid.

As I thought bout this a little more, I realized that the combined 89 kick/95 track vehicle would make an even better DD rig (more room, better ride, etc.) and that the sami was already halfway to extreme, so why not just continue building.

The track/kick project is about 3/4 done and should be wrapped up this weekend. I just got some other goodies to work on the sami over the winter and go YJs M/L SPOA, locked in front, 4 wheel discs, etc.

But I'm not fooling myself. I already know the track/kick is going to ride on siped 30x9.5 MTs with probably a little coil spacer lift. I am leaning towards some nice rocker protection and custom bumperage, probably to house my cheapo winch when I buy a better one for the sami. So i can see it coming a mile away. in a year or two the TRacker is going to start getting bigger and bigger, especially if the trend towards aftermarket parts for track/kicks grows as its been lately.

I agree with the whole idea that the track/kicks are the next samis. Samis are slowly becoming "extinct" and track/kicks are filtering down into the near "throwaway" category where I think a lot of our samis probably started. You'll start to find them parked next to barns with beat up soft tops and flat tires or a dented quarter panel or something..all ripe to be grabbed up and massaged back to life as a fun toy.

I kinda like having an iron in both fires at the moment. options are good.

~daxe