Flipping Tie Rod End's. (Polaris Sportsman)

[PolarisRich]

Flipping Tie Rod End's. (Polaris Sportsman)

So I broke down today and bought a new set of tires for my ATV and when I put them on my bike the front tie rod ends were rubbing. So I decided to post a "How-to" with a few pictures on " Flipping Tie Rod Ends".

My machine is a 2005 Polaris Sportsman 500 H.O. and I put ITP Mud Lites XL's 26x9.00-12 on the stock rims.

Here's a few pictures of how tight the tie rod ends were rubbing...

First thing I did was to remove the front tire to gain access to the tie rod.

I removed the cotter pin and unbolted the tie rod and pulled the bolt out of the steering knuckle. I then placed the bolt back into the steering nuckle and lowered the tie rod end to the underneath side of the steering knuckle and placed it back onto the bolt using a washer on each side of the tie rod end.

Bolt the entire thing back together and finnish it all off with replacing the cotter pin.

Now you can see how much clearance this gave me!

I hope this post helps if your going to flip your Tie Rod Ends!

Thanks

PolarisRich

[DirtDemon]

I don't want to be one to critisize your plan here, but it looks to me like the ball joint is sitting at the end of it's movement there. It looks like any decompression of the suspension would put alot of pressure on the joint causing it to eventually fail or maybe even hit the spindle at full extension. It seems like it would be better to use a wheel with more offset or even a wheel spacer to make the clearance. I could be wrong, is this a common thing that people do to these machines?

[PolarisRich]

Thanks DirtDemon,

That last picture is a little deceiving. I have the tire on a slight angle outwords so I could fit my camera between the tire and wheel well. This makes the tie rod end alot closer to the strut than it would be on normal riding. Plus the ATV is on jack stands. I also have spring spacers in to preload the front springs so in the last picture in question the strut is at it's lowest point of travel and cannot travel any further to bind up the tie rod end. If you look even closer at that picture you will notice that I even used a file to smooth out the edge of the knuckle so the rubber on the ball joint would not bind.

You are right the ball joint is sitting close to but not completely at the end of its movement. Now not by all means am I saying that this is the best way to make room to put larger tires on your machines, but this is a very common mod for Sportsmans that riders have been using for years without problems.

If I had the money my choices would be in this order..

1) Offset Rims

2) Wheel Spacers

3) Stud spacers

4) Flipping the tie rod end.

5) Stick with stock sizes.

I thought I would make this tutorial just to give some other riders a visual and or options to a very common problem.

Here's a picture of the machine sitting on the ground at ride height with the spring spacer.

[DirtDemon]

I see, so in the picture, the suspension was hanging as low as it will ever go. I did notice the shiny spot on the front of the spindle where you filed it down. That being said, this process does seem like a good, cheap way to fix, what I assume is a common problem with adding larger tires to these machines. Nice of you to post this tutorial.