New Rear LIft Option

[MountaineerGreen]

So the other day I was sitting in traffic and a Z84 or whatever(EDIT: ZR2) it is S-10 was sitting a few cars up in front of me. You know the kind I am talking about, the somewhat lifted factory 4x4 truck made in the late 90's and early 2000's. What caught my eye was the leaves had quite a bit of arch, and the truck was pretty high with the factory SUA.

That got me to thinking could I use this instead of F150 leaves to get some lift without a stiff ride? Obviously, the top leaf would have to remain in my factory pack, but what if I got most of the leaves from the S10 pack. I would think that with all that arch, I could get quite a bit of lift without a bunch of leaves.

The question remains, how wide are those leaves and can I find some in a salvage yard?


Anybody have one of these trucks that can measure the leaf width?

This may make a cheaper alternative to the superlift leaf setup.

 

[IZwack]

There are oh so many options as far as leaves go A few people on the forum have swapped in a few F-150/Bronco leaves. A few have also gone with the Chevy springs... there are so many possiblities. But in general, the "thinner" the individual leaves are, the better it flexes.

 

[MountaineerGreen]

Right, I saw those and was amazed at how much arch they had for a stock truck. I am looking to get some more flex and a better ride before Moab.

Right now I am running everything but the main leaf of an F150 and all the leaves of my factory pack except for the overload.

I looked into Bronco leaves, but they are all 3" wide- our factorys are 2.5"

 

[IZwack]

Have you looked at using the stock leaf pack and shackles and going SOA? The stock leaf pack flexes pretty well once weight is on it. And I'm only suggesting using the stock shackles to counter the 5-6" lift acheived by the SOA conversion.

On the back of my Explorer are the stock leaf packs with an AAL (probably useless now) and the bottom thick overload spring removed:

 

[MountaineerGreen]

Yeah, but Im afraid 5.5 - 6 " is too much lift right now- Ive got 4" up front and I'm running 32's

Plus, I don't know if the navi d shaft will be long enough with a SOA, and I don't really want to buy a custom shaft.

 

[IZwack]

Yeah, but Im afraid 5.5 - 6 " is too much lift right now- Ive got 4" up front and I'm running 32's

Plus, I don't know if the navi d shaft will be long enough with a SOA, and I don't really want to buy a custom shaft.

Arent you running the Warrior Shackles? If so, IMO, I think using a stock set of Explorer 4-dr leaves with the thick bottom overload spring removed will be fine for an SOA. The overload spring itself is over half an inch thick.

Driveshafts cost ~$120 to retube -- well worth it.

 

[MountaineerGreen]

That brings another problem, for the time being, the monty still has some pretty serious towing duty, so removing the overloads is out until I can get a different tow rig.

 

[IZwack]

Ah gotcha.

I guess the issue is that you're trying to put a lot of rear flex on a vehicle that must be used for towing. The two are at opposite extremes as towing requires a stiff set of springs while flex requires a very soft pair of springs. Without going to fancy components and designs like air-ride or air-bags, you're going to have to settle for something between the two extremes.

 

[MountaineerGreen]

Right- thats why I was thinking about using as few of the S10 leaves as necessary to get the lift I want and still be able to run SUA with overloads. I guess I am going to have to get a balance of both, or a tow rig

 

[james t]

You would have to find a ZR2 truck/Blazer in a wrecking yard. The ZR2 is alot different than the typical S10 truck/Blazer. The springs are different and may even be a different length from the regular S10. You can run 32's on a bone stock ZR2 and even 33's with trimming and no lift.

 

[MountaineerGreen]

You would have to find a ZR2 truck/Blazer in a wrecking yard. The ZR2 is alot different than the typical S10 truck/Blazer. The springs are different and may even be a different length from the regular S10. You can run 32's on a bone stock ZR2 and even 33's with trimming and no lift.

They may be kind of hard to find in a salvage yard and or expensive!

I really need to find a truck to do some measuring on-


Now I am going to go edit my first post with the proper name, thanks James!

 

[BigDave!!!]

Sorry to hijack the thread but I just have to say that those two pics by IZwack are two of the coolest looking pictures of an explorer i have ever seen

 

[IZwack]

I love you too BigDave -- we're getting married.