Torsion Twist...Might be a dumb question but Ill ask anyway | Ford Explorer Forums - Serious Explorations

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Torsion Twist...Might be a dumb question but Ill ask anyway

plance1

Well-Known Member
Joined
September 12, 2008
Messages
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City, State
cincy ohio
Year, Model & Trim Level
2002 sport trac
I crawed under my truck tonight so as to lube the two bolts that I will need to twist. I watched a couple youtube videos but when I got under there I noticed what I thought were the correct bolts, there were two L shaped brackets that looked to be in the right spot but these L-shaped brackets, covers or whatever they are threw me off. I noticed they had a hole in them and I saw a bolt sticking down so I sprayed it with W-40. The bolt wasn't close to the end of the Torsion bar, it was a few inches away (again, that threw me off too) It was dark, I put a light under the truck so I could see and I only wanted to lube up the right bolts. Did I do good?
 



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Do you mean a few inches to the side? If so thats the torsion bars. The L brackets is the torsion bar brackets. Look at a picture of torsion bars not mounted on a car, that might help you see what you're looking at.
 






On the cross member right before your transfer case there is 2 openings in the cross member with one screw in each hole those are the torsion bolt
 






Ok...so I don't have to remove anything to get to the bolts, right? I didn't think so. These bolts are not directly underneath the torsion bars they're a few inches over. I assume there are some pictures posted of this somewhere.
 












thanks, the first post says "heres a pic of the bolt" and then the picture isn't there....but Im reading the rest of it now so as to find out how many turns to turn the bolt
 






The second picture has an arrow pointing to it. No magic number for how many turns, just until its where you want it.
 






I read the posts in the link provided along with a few other posts....I found reference to a "camber kit" but only one or two references to it. What is that all about? If I am going less than 2" would I need to do something special with the camber? I plan on having this truck aligned right after I do the lift myself and I don't want my mechanic to be scratching his head if he might need something to align it right. Thanks.
 












It's always a must to get an alignment done (or do one if you know how) after doing a torsion twist.

The number of turns won't always be the same between different trucks between the age and wear on the t-bars.
 







Well what the heck???? For years I have been trolling this board and reading about TT and Im just about ready to do it and now I see theres all this work involved when I thought it was a relatively simple matter of adjusting two bolts and getting an alignment... This camber kit looks like more work than I want to take on so Im dissapointed.
 






Well what the heck???? For years I have been trolling this board and reading about TT and Im just about ready to do it and now I see theres all this work involved when I thought it was a relatively simple matter of adjusting two bolts and getting an alignment... This camber kit looks like more work than I want to take on so Im dissapointed.

All I did when I did mine was crank the t-bars, install my newly balanced wheels and tires and drove to the shop to get an alignment. They were able to get the alignment spot-on and in 5k or so miles, I did not see any uneven wear in my KM2s.
 






ok here you go my experience in TT and add-a-leaf. i twisted the front up to 2" the cross member that all others described is correct there are 4 bottomed out bolts with a hole in the center. in that hole there is a bolt in a stock height truck the bolt has about 1-2 inches of threads between the bolt head and the torsion bar key. now before tightening these bolts measure from fender to the ground and measure through the center of the wheel. once you get your stock measure jack the truck and put the front on stands with plenty of room between wheel bottom and ground to accommodate the lift. crawl under and tighten the bolts i and the rest described. NOTE: don't raise a 4X4 more then 2". 2WD can go more many 2WD go 3" upon reading the red be sure not to exceed 2" on 4x4 thats critical if you dont want CV axles to break. so tighten the bolts and drop the truck often to check height. check height with weight on wheels.

p.s. you can twist the bolts with the truck off jacks but there will be more resistance.
 






Ok, had the truck at my mechanic's shop today (Performance Alignment in Blue Ash Ohio). I went ahead with the Rancho 5374's up front and the 5185's in the back, they did the Torsion Twist but could get it up to 1 1/2 before running out of thread on one of the bolts. They also installed the camber kit so that they could do a proper alignment after they installed Cooper ATP tires. I only drove it a short distance but it seems great.
 






Sounds pretty good, and glad you like it. If you take the running boards off it'll feel a lot taller.
 






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