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WICruiser, I was worried about that too when I was laying everything out but after getting it all set, I have 9 1/2" clear from the bottom of the cradle to the ground. With a wheelbase of only 112" I think I should be ok, but if I encounter a real severe crest, I have a plan to deal with that too, but I don't want to ruin the surprise.

Until this point I have been working with the cab setting on blocks, but it was time to build a frame under it. With doing a tilt cab on my last build I felt that it would be the best option for engine access this time too. I learned a lot with my last build (somethings the hard way) but with this cab being only 1/2 as long I knew it was going to have to tilt a lot steeper to get enough room for good engine access. Like I said I learned a lot with the last build, like I wanted a better rotation point and a better landing point. It had to not only set firmly but it had to center the cab accurately when lowering. I had been studying suspension designs and thought I could use something similar to that as a pivot point. And for the landing point I could a tapered cradle that the cab could land in and be forced to center. I left enough room in the cradle so I could line it with rubber pads to keep it from raddling or squeaking. I had used dual hydraulic cylinders for my last build, but I wanted to look at other options for this one. I knew that the single cab was 1/2 as long and 1/2 as heavy so I didn't need as much force to raise it. Also, with the only ridged connection from the cab to the chassis was the steering linkage and I wanted to be able to tilt the cab without having to disconnect anything, like the last one. So, I worked on where to spot the steering box so it wouldn't bind when tilting. Everything else is hoses, wires or cables, all soft connections. Wanting to keep the profile of the frame flat and because I had a lot of it in the shop, I used 2" X 2" X 1/4" tube steel to build the side rails of the sub frame and the pivot points. Across the rear of the frame, I used a piece of 1/2" X 4" plate that spans the rear of the cab between the rails and it connected to the same bolt holes as the factory used. For the front cab connections, I welded 1/2" plates that extended out from the side rails to align with where the front factory mounts are. Between the 1/2" plates and the bottom of the cab I ran a piece of 1" hard rubber at the mounts to help with noise and vibrations when driving down the highway. At the front of the frame side rails, I welded a 2" piece of 1 1/4" pipe to the end of each rail and made frame stand offs out of the same 2' X 2" tube steel with 1 1/4" pipe that welded to the outside of the chassis and ran a piece of 1" pipe thru them to create the front pivots. At the rear of the frame, I built boxed cradles that hooked over and welded to the side of the chassis. They are very solid and keep the cab centered. With them lined with thin rubber pads I feel that they will help with noise and vibrations also.

For now, I'm just using the overhead crane to tilt the cab until I decide what I want to use as a lifting device. It also allows me to just pull the front pins and lift the cab off and out of the way to work on other things.

Next up rear axle placement and suspension. COCOE