Hartman
Explorer Addict
- Joined
- October 16, 2001
- Messages
- 8,315
- Reaction score
- 13
- City, State
- Indianapolis, IN
- Year, Model & Trim Level
- 1996 5.0
Finally, today was the day that I was to lower my truck. My plan was 2 inches all around, I didn't want to go more than that because of my 4WD. I first tackled the rear (taking the advice of the others that have done it). The universal 2 inch lowering blocks where set in, and the u-bolts were made to fit (like it's that easy!). By far, the hardest part of the day was getting the u-bolts to sqeeze into the shock plate. This was very frustrating for me, but I was persisant and I got the suckers in (somehow). Lowering the axle down onto the blocks and getting everything lined up was no problem for me, surprisingly. When I first jacked up the axle, I made SURE that it was being jacked up at the very center so that when I let it down, it would be pretty close to even with the blocks. Keep in mind that everything mentioned in this post was done by myself, with no outside help. All I had to guide me were my Craftsman tools!
The front was easy. I first measured the stock height of the front. The passenger side was 1/2 of an inch lower than the drivers side. I made note of that. I did not jack up the front of the truck when I cranked the torsion bars, I saw no need to. I ended up getting about 2 inches on the passenger side, and about 1 3/4 inches on the drivers side. I was happy with that.
After the truck was lowered, I went inside and waited for the Big Brown Truck to arrive at my house with 4 KYB MonoMax shocks that were to be installed as soon as I got them. UPS had delievered the shocks at the perfect time, they gave me about 1 hour to relax after the lowering before I was back out to the garage to do more work. The rear shocks were easy. Of course, if you are doing this, LOWER THE SPARE or else you'll never get the rear done. The front shocks were not so easy. The top shock bolt was a BEAR (to directly quote aldive's write-up on lowering his truck). It took me a good half an hour to get the bolt off on the drivers side! But again, the persisance thing comes into play.
FINALLY, after almost 6 hours of suspension work, I was done and in bad need of a shower. I tested the truck on some very curvy roads by my house and it performed VERY well. I had already installed the EE rear sway bar a few days before, that helped tons as well.
Unfortunately, last night, my u-joints started acting up before I had even lowered the truck, so it looks like I'm going to have to have those replaced (the famous "thud" of the driveshaft is evident on acceleration from a dead stop). None-the-less, I was happy I had did it all in one day, and the satisfaction of knowing you did it all yourself is great. Now onto the pics.
Side shot:
Dead Link Removed
Taking care of those tail lights with a bit of tail light tint tomorrow:
Dead Link Removed
You can see the 2 inch lowering block in this pic, along with the KYB MonoMax shock:
Dead Link Removed
Here's another pic of the MonoMax shock with the EE sway bar:
Dead Link Removed
Questions, comments, critisism welcome!
The front was easy. I first measured the stock height of the front. The passenger side was 1/2 of an inch lower than the drivers side. I made note of that. I did not jack up the front of the truck when I cranked the torsion bars, I saw no need to. I ended up getting about 2 inches on the passenger side, and about 1 3/4 inches on the drivers side. I was happy with that.
After the truck was lowered, I went inside and waited for the Big Brown Truck to arrive at my house with 4 KYB MonoMax shocks that were to be installed as soon as I got them. UPS had delievered the shocks at the perfect time, they gave me about 1 hour to relax after the lowering before I was back out to the garage to do more work. The rear shocks were easy. Of course, if you are doing this, LOWER THE SPARE or else you'll never get the rear done. The front shocks were not so easy. The top shock bolt was a BEAR (to directly quote aldive's write-up on lowering his truck). It took me a good half an hour to get the bolt off on the drivers side! But again, the persisance thing comes into play.
FINALLY, after almost 6 hours of suspension work, I was done and in bad need of a shower. I tested the truck on some very curvy roads by my house and it performed VERY well. I had already installed the EE rear sway bar a few days before, that helped tons as well.
Unfortunately, last night, my u-joints started acting up before I had even lowered the truck, so it looks like I'm going to have to have those replaced (the famous "thud" of the driveshaft is evident on acceleration from a dead stop). None-the-less, I was happy I had did it all in one day, and the satisfaction of knowing you did it all yourself is great. Now onto the pics.
Side shot:
Dead Link Removed
Taking care of those tail lights with a bit of tail light tint tomorrow:
Dead Link Removed
You can see the 2 inch lowering block in this pic, along with the KYB MonoMax shock:
Dead Link Removed
Here's another pic of the MonoMax shock with the EE sway bar:
Dead Link Removed
Questions, comments, critisism welcome!