suspension refresh without going much taller

[BlackBII]

Does your truck currently have blocks in the rear? Are you doing anything on the front? You can get 1.5-2" of lift before needing drop brackets. You'll need fully adjustable camber/caster bushings as well though

 

[vagabond80]

Does your truck currently have blocks in the rear? Are you doing anything on the front? You can get 1.5-2" of lift before needing drop brackets. You'll need fully adjustable camber/caster bushings as well though

Yes it currently has the stock blocks. I plan to put probably the 132X springs in front, and new shocks. Just placed the order for the skyjacker fr32s (x2) $430 shipped, not terrible when used rusty explorer packs in need of bushings and retrofit would have cost me a little over 200. Trying to avoid getting too crazy(read: expensive) into this. I have a supercharged 3rd gen 4runner mad-max/truggie [project] for anything serious offroad.
I'll grab the bushings. Gaz was mentioning taking the bushings to alignment twice and getting away with not using them either time, but surely one of those "better to have it and not need it..." situations.

 

[vagabond80]

While working on a few other things I came upon what I feel is an interesting development. The rear blocks, which I thought were factory 4x4, are a little over 3"

Was hoping to swap the springs and temporarily reuse the stock bolts(been waiting 2 weeks on bolts and shocks from duff, still "processing", they say "don't ask us how long it will be)
But doesn't look like these bolts would thread down far enough to use without blocks anyway, and I don't think 7" of lift is going to work even temporarily

 

[vagabond80]

Finally got some parts in and did some work. James Duff has a note on their site that "some items will be delayed" and such due to covid and they say "don't ask us, it will only slow things down" but it took about a month to get 4 shocks, ubolts, and a drop pitman arm.
I began with the rear, pretty quickly realized my bolts didn't want to come out, even with a nitrocat 1200k impact. Began soaking everything in pb blaster and 50/50 atf/acetone. Got a 4' black iron pipe from the homeless despot that fit nicely over my breaker bar, and 13/16ths 6 side socket.
Went ahead and removed the bed, because I wanted to clean things up any and not mess around given how seized up the suspension bolts were. My truck doesn't have much rust, but it seemed tougher to get these out than I had seen from other people's posts. I knew the shackles would be difficult, but I ended up actually breaking a bolt and having to cutoff the rest. I replaced all 6 with new bolts about 5 bucks a pop from the local ace hardware, m14x2.0 course, about 110-120mm long iirc. I think 130 would just hit the frame on the top of the shackle. I reused the nuts with their tabs except for one I was unable to salvage.

Thankfully I had just ordered the beltech shackles, so they would be replaced anyway. Ditching the blocks(some sort of factory 3" I haven't found a reference to elsewhere)(my truck is not a high rider), skyjacker fr34s and the bottom hole of the beltech shackles should net around 4" lift, but I haven't measured the results yet. It looks pretty decent.

I moved on to the front figuring nothing up there could be as bad as the rear. I suppose it wasn't, or didn't have to be, but after disconnecting the sway bar I took a cut off grinder to get the springs out and access the keeper more easily.

Had to go to a more comprehensive hardware store for the 34mm(pitman) and 1-1/8"(spring keeper) sockets. The tech page lists the keeper nut as 26mm. This is incorrect on my application.

Shocks were standard rusty but nothing unexpected. Found that spring compressors didnt help much, had to manuver them too much and mine didn't fit the skyjackers too well either. A ratchet strap was moderately useful. The angle of the perch on the axle when lowered makes it interesting to get the top into it's retaining tabs. A combination of grunting and brute force with hammer and jack manipulation and got them in.
I then found that the ~2" lift provided by the skyjacker 132x coils was the absolute minimum length for the only eye-to-stud shocks offered by duff tuff(~13.5").

So, skyjacker m95s are currently on order. Unsprung weight upgrade, I suppose.

 

[BlackBII]

Looks like fun and what you'd expect from a 30 year old truck; rusty hardware, especially in the leaf spring eye sleeves. Make sure you use some anti-seize or something on the new ones so you aren't fighting it the next time around.

I have the Skyjacker M95's on my truck and like them.

Looking good