Can we play "what lift does our '93 X have?"

[ryboj]

First post. Great board! And yes, I've read for hours and hours on here the last few days and last month getting better acquainted with this breed of truck to see if this is the path we wanted to take, so I do know a couple things, but far from a guru.

My friend and I picked this up yesterday as a joint venture 4x4 project but we're not exactly sure what we have, lift wise. Also, this is after we just picked it up, so it hasn't been cleaned yet or gone through whatsoever, but so far, everything is functional and in tact.

Just glancing at it, one of the local 4x4 fab shops thinks it's a Rough Country 4" lift with Pro Comp coils but wasn't sure on the shackles.

I apologize that I don't have every angle available via the pics, but hopefully it's enough to make some judgment on what we might have.

From what I do know, if this is a Rough Country kit, I understand most people on this board believe the axle pivot drop brackets suck and can cause damage to the diffs under certain circumstances, so if this is true, we'll 100% ready to get feedback on how we can tackle upgrading what we have.

Here we go:

 

[little x]

I can't tell you which brand drop brackets those are, but on the back you have 2 aal's and warrior shackles, for a total of about 5" lift. You should soa the rear, take out both aal's, and find/make a set of stock length shackles. That will net you the same height you have now with way more clearance around the rear end and more flexibility.
On the front you have a short arm kit, meaning that the stock radius arms are used with drop brackets. You can extent the stock arms to custom brackets further back, or purchase long arm kits from companies like skyjacker and james duff, either of which will net you more travel up front when paired with appropriate shocks and springs.
As important as the lift are the gears and lockers. If those haven't been done I would do those before messing with the suspension.

Welcome to the board!

 

[ryboj]

Thx LittleX for the feedback and welcome…

Question, just to clarify. Are you saying we have 2 stacked AALs on each side or 1 AAL on each spring pack? If we have two per spring pack, what a terrible way to add lift.

Are the warrior shackles considered higher quality or just run of the mill around here?

I don’t mean to question your knowledge here, but I’ve also read on numerous posts that having the SOA setup doesn’t improve drivability, stability or suspension travel clearance, other than ground clearance. This not true? How about a custom set of Atlas, Deavers or Nationals for the rear (I live around these guys’ area) and keep the shackles? Or would it still be best to dump the shackles and do a custom spring with stock shackles?

In some respects, it seems we need to scratch the lift the truck has and start over, or piece it together from different companies, like a lot of what you guys do here.

We’ll start another thread on how we need to proceed with the drivetrain since I didn’t want to litter this particular sub-forum with other topics…  But yes, we're building a list of things we’ll be needing, incl lockers, etc.

As a side note, the truck will be a mild trail runner, however with most miles being racked up at Pismo Dunes, Mojave and Ocotillo Wells deserts.

Thanks again…… still looking to find out what drop brackets and coils we have….

 

[ryboj]

From appearances sake, do you think there is a 4 or 5" lift on the front, since the truck currently sits level.

 

[little x]

You have 2 aal's per side, for a total of 4. That's why going back to a stock spring pack for the soa would help flexibility: It's not the soa that adds the flexibility, it's removing the 4 aal's that are currently giving you a very hard spring pack.
The warrior shackles are top notch. But if you did a soa they would probably give you more lift then you wanted out back.
A set of nice springs (sua) out back and the warrior shackles would give a very good ride and loads of travel. But it would also cost around $750 more then just doing a soa. That's enough cash for a set of gears and master install kits right there. Plus you would have much less clearance around the rear axle. But, if your going to be using this truck mostly in the sand, it will give the better ride at speed.
You can tell if you have a bad set of drop brackets by removing the springs and shocks and cycling the suspension. If the pumpkin hits the drop bracket before the axle hits the bump stop then you need new drop brackets, or short term solution is to lower your bump stops.
It looks to me like the truck has a slight forward lean to it, making me think that it has a 4" kit up front. Plus, several 4" kits come with 2 aal's per side to lift the rear, so it makes sense that it's a 4" kit with shackles added in the rear.

 

[corkey]

it's not 2 aal's it's a aftermarket spring pack,,
look at the binding strap that goes around the spring, it is not stock,,

 

[corkey]

this is not stock,

 

[ryboj]

Great info guys! I understand 100% of what you're saying and agree.

It would be awesome if there already is a aftermarket spring pack....but not sure on it's flexibility, since a set of Superlifts' wouldn't be anything noteworthy. I'll see the truck for the first time tonight, as it's up in Clovis, CA, but towing it down this Sat to start performing all the basic needs/servicing.

Good idea on cycling of the front suspension.

Keep the goodness coming! Thanks guys.....

 

[little x]

this is not stock,

You may be right, but it could be added after sliding in the 2 aal's.
ryboj, measure the length of the 2nd from top spring and the middle spring. If those are the same length as stock it's probably aal's, if they are different then you have an after market spring pack.

 

[ryboj]

Hi Little... when we looked tonight, inspecting everything closer, we noticed the 5 leaf spring pack was completely riveted together with no seperate leaves or AALs, but there is an overload spring that you see at the bottom. So, if this is not a stock spring pack from corkey's point of view, and there are no AALs, then it's just basically trying to figure out who makes them.

To me, the springs feel somewhat tight. When comparing his other truck, a Long Travel Tundra, it uses a 10 pack deaver setup with no overload that moves brilliantly, but I think there is some room for improvement with this spring pack. I'd venture to say it's nothing outside a standard lift company's spring pack.

On a different note, the back (passenger side axle) axle drop bracket on it's backside had a sticker that said "R402" on it. Does that ring a bell anyone? We looked at Rough Country's site, but they don't mention the part number on the drop brackets unfortuntely, but they do look quite similar.

 

[SuRrEaLNJ]

im gonna agree that those arent stock packs in the rear

unfortuneately i cant be much more usefull then that

 

[ryboj]

Thanks guys for the contd help. We're going to run the truck through his folks acreage that has a nice creek with boulders up and down the embankments to feel out the articulation with the current setup.

 

[ryboj]

Ok, we just completed some more scrubbing and pressure washing and discovered what the springs are, see here.

Only thing is, we don't know if they're any good and we don't know if the overload spring was something that came with it or was added to. Rough Country isn't picking up their phones right now for us to ask.

Also, did RC only make 4" over springs? If so, that combined with the warrior shackles puts us around 5.5-6" lift in rear, yes?

If that's the case, is it still possible that we liklely have the 4" drop axle brackets from RC, but with a different coil spring, i.e Pro Comp because of the color and overall height of truck?

Also, for now until we replace this bracket with something better or cut and turned beams, can and should we clearance out the known binding area that you see in the pic for when the passenger side diff compresses against the drop bracket? Or will this ruin the rigidity and intergrity of the bracket strength?

Rear view of passenger side axle drop bracket... :thumbdwn:

Rear spring number:

Rear spring RC brand:

Still lots of q's, but we're getting closer......

 

[ryboj]

Didn't go out and violate his parents property, but we did hit an open dirt lot down the street and tested some basic capabilities in suspension.

Interesting thing is, the rear suspension outperformed the front, which we didn't expect, by a decent margin.

My fellow off-road friends are of the mindset that the front is lacking because of the sway bar is interfering with the level of articulation it will allow for. Additionally, there is some binding with the lower sway bar links up against the base of the spring coils, which pop in and out of the spring coil rings. Seems like a bad design.

So, right out of the gate, we need to explore (no pun intended) quick sway bar disconnects, which I'm sure are available for this setup, no? Any real contenders we should look into?

The second big thing we encountered was that when we were on a incline in 4x4 low or high, it would go into neutral, but we believe the transfer case is actually going into neutral. Bringing the RPMs up slightly and rolling back down the incline would re-engage the drivetrain with no mechanical clunking or popping. This neutral effect we have not experienced in 2wd whatsoever or even 4x4 on a flat service. I'll post that particular issue in the drivetrain section.

Pls see the pics below, and hopefully you can agree the rear is doing a nice job of flexing, but the front is holding the truck back, again believing it's the front sway bar causing all of the issues.

Below you'll notice the rear doing it's job but the front is barely stuffing in:

Nice example that the rear is flexing:

And again:

 

[ragajungle]

I have the exact same rough country lift - mine came with those same springs on the front. They are like a pitted - metallic finish. nice truck btw!

 

[ryboj]

Thanks Raga for chimming in/compliment!

Raga, when you bought your RC lift, what was the advertied lift amount for the front and rear?

We're confused since we have the RC rear springs and we have 1.5-1.75" over shackles, so we're trying to figure out exactly what we have here, being the rear should be up a lot higher but it isn't, so not sure what's up. There doesn't seem to be substantial arc to our springs, so maybe we have a 2" over RC spring pack? Confused.

Does your sway bar end links rub too on the lower base of the coil springs like ours does? Basically popping sometimes in and out of the coil springs....

 

[ryboj]

Found this from the past... looks like there was a 3" offering from RC years ago with a rear spring pack available. This would explain the rear, but it also means we have front coil that are more than 4", when taking sag into consideration. Need to call RC to confirm the spring number and lift just for the heck of it.

http://www.explorerforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=13722

 

[4x4junkie]

Your front lift brackets look like those from Tuff Country (the camber adjuster pivot bolt setup gives it away).

TC brackets won't harm your front diff housing like RC would, but like RC, they are not the sturdiest. I would suggest adding some reinforcement to them if you want to use it hard.

Yes, ditch the swaybar, and even those stiff front coils too. Those are what's holding up the front from flexing.

 

[Slowlyvverot]

I agree, make front discos for the sway bar with parts from your local hardware store or just toss it. ive been running mine like that for a while now. get rid of the rear one too since it is too small to really do anything.

The aftermarket TTB coils are on the stiff side. A lot of people have switched to EB or Fullsize coils to help the front end move around better. The Ranger Station has lots of good info on those coils.

 

[ryboj]

Nice Junkie! Thanks Slowly!

You're right about the TC lift brackets! I went on their site and found this:

http://www.tuffcountry.com/NewFiles/24860.pdf

It mentions R402 as the passenger side drop axle bracket in their install pdf. Right on. Wow, this thing has all kinds of parts on it. Now, I wonder if the coils are TC's too, it sure looked like it in the picture with the coloring, here:

http://www.tuffcountry.com/images/stories/ford/24860_lg.gif

Still don't understand how we have the current stance on the truck though, still should be a little off, maybe it does make sense.

Either way, we need to address those parts like you guys mentioned, incl the sway bars. Maybe we can ditch the rear and obviously get some disconnect action on the front. We will be doing a lot more desert driving with this than trail, so it needs to be able to handle higher speed situations, so I'm not 100% sure we want to be fully disconnected yet.

I'll research then what coil we can swap into for now. I believe eventually we'd like to do it all right and go with cut and turned beams, autofab or camburg front end and a custom rear, but for this year, what's left of it, and likely 2011, we want to correct and make fully functional what we have without a lot of dough for the time being so we don't do it 2x. We can strengthen the TC brackets too. We'll need to use cash on hand to correct all mechanical outstanding issues, like an oil leak, any brakes or maintenance items, freshen up the trans, etc etc.

But in the meantime, I believe we can switch coils out without a lot of money, but if possible, maybe get a set of autofab or camburg coils to hold us over for now and into the future? Maybe not. If the EB or FS is the way to go at the moment, financially speaking, that might be the best route then.

Great stuff guys.... making a lot of traction here.