hydroxy
I like to fiddle...
- Joined
- April 23, 2002
- Messages
- 2,275
- Reaction score
- 2
- City, State
- Fairfax, VA
- Year, Model & Trim Level
- 1995 Limited v6
ok I needed a garage to lower my ex, so boominXplorer was kind enough to offer up his place. I dont think there has ever been a writeup on lowering w/ lotsa pics about installing the blocks (Billions of TT threads, so I'll leave that part out). Here are pics. Ignore the crappy paint job of the sway bar.
Whole thing took chris (boomin) and I ~3 hours. I have a limited explorer, so I have the Air Ride Control (ARC) shocks. I'll post a thread soon about controlling the ARC system... but anyways... Here is how you install the blocks. I used 2" blocks from BlackBox's explorer.
1. take wheels off (not necessary, but highly recommended).
2. jack up the rear end by the diff and put some stands on the FRAME as shown here. Then let down the jack to let the suspension have full sag.
3. Take off the nuts on the U-Bolts. Then take the U-Bolts off, and move the shock mounts away from the leaf springs... IMPORTANT!!!!! on the passenger side, there is a metal bracket attached to the shock mount that holds the brake line. YOU NEED TO TAKE THIS OFF.
4. Now you should be looking at this.
5. Now that the rear axle is free, you need to jack the rear diff back up and put a stand HERE to make sure that the rear diff doesn't move.
6. Put the blocks on. The hard part is lining up the little bump. but make sure that it is lined up. Then lower the axle back onto the blocks.
Here I am reaching for the light in the middle of the photo op... whoops.
7. I took a wire brush to the bottom shock mounts, and then I put a coat of rustoleum on them where it hits the leaf springs... not necessary but I figured I had 'em off so I might as well do it.
8. Put the new U-Bolts on... put them right on the marks left by the old u-bolts. Getting them to line up w/ the shock mounts will take a little hammering and some elbow grease... a 2nd person is usually helpful at this point.
9. Tighten it up as far as you can. We even used a pipe for some more torque. There are a billion and one threads, so each turn moves it up only like 1/16 an inch (think about when you're tightening) you NEED DEEP SOCKETED tools to do this... otherwise it wont work.
Check the u-bolts in 100 miles to make sure everything is tight. There are tons of threads on lowering/raising the front via TT. Only suggestion I have for this, is to make a mark on the bolt and line it up w/ something so that you can lower each side the exact same number of turns. Once you have twisted it down a bit, push down on the front end to lower it down.
Here is the final product (had to put these in )
Before (look at gap in front wheel well):
After:
Whole thing took chris (boomin) and I ~3 hours. I have a limited explorer, so I have the Air Ride Control (ARC) shocks. I'll post a thread soon about controlling the ARC system... but anyways... Here is how you install the blocks. I used 2" blocks from BlackBox's explorer.
1. take wheels off (not necessary, but highly recommended).
2. jack up the rear end by the diff and put some stands on the FRAME as shown here. Then let down the jack to let the suspension have full sag.
3. Take off the nuts on the U-Bolts. Then take the U-Bolts off, and move the shock mounts away from the leaf springs... IMPORTANT!!!!! on the passenger side, there is a metal bracket attached to the shock mount that holds the brake line. YOU NEED TO TAKE THIS OFF.
4. Now you should be looking at this.
5. Now that the rear axle is free, you need to jack the rear diff back up and put a stand HERE to make sure that the rear diff doesn't move.
6. Put the blocks on. The hard part is lining up the little bump. but make sure that it is lined up. Then lower the axle back onto the blocks.
Here I am reaching for the light in the middle of the photo op... whoops.
7. I took a wire brush to the bottom shock mounts, and then I put a coat of rustoleum on them where it hits the leaf springs... not necessary but I figured I had 'em off so I might as well do it.
8. Put the new U-Bolts on... put them right on the marks left by the old u-bolts. Getting them to line up w/ the shock mounts will take a little hammering and some elbow grease... a 2nd person is usually helpful at this point.
9. Tighten it up as far as you can. We even used a pipe for some more torque. There are a billion and one threads, so each turn moves it up only like 1/16 an inch (think about when you're tightening) you NEED DEEP SOCKETED tools to do this... otherwise it wont work.
Check the u-bolts in 100 miles to make sure everything is tight. There are tons of threads on lowering/raising the front via TT. Only suggestion I have for this, is to make a mark on the bolt and line it up w/ something so that you can lower each side the exact same number of turns. Once you have twisted it down a bit, push down on the front end to lower it down.
Here is the final product (had to put these in )
Before (look at gap in front wheel well):
After: