Body lift question?

[AllBlackBimmer]

I posted this on another forum, but I am trying to get as many and varied answers as I can... so..

Today (after owning my truck for 3 weeks) a guy I work with told me I have a body lift, and not a suspension lift... In all honesty I didn't really know when I bought the truck since the suspension looked like it was changed out as well (blue shocks were the giveaway).. I obviously knew the truck was lifted up somehow, just not exactly how.

My question is this now... there are some "issues" when lifting the body such as the steering linkage and transmission link so I hear.
Everything seems to be OK now, and the truck looks like it was well taken care of and has other aftermarket mods that are not half-assed, but what do I need to look for to make sure my body lift “was done correctly” and won’t cause me problems down the road? It’s an ’04 with 67k on it.

How do I know what “kind” of body lift I have?
What other things should I check on?

I’m actually going to be taking my truck to a local garage in the next week or two for them to drop the transmission pan and change the filter… I want to ask them to look at the rest of the truck to, and I want to mention the body lift and have them look over it, but I don’t want to sound like a complete idiot.

New to the truck world, am more of a car guy, so please don’t flame me too much.
Thanks guys,


Picture for reference.

[/url]image by AllBlackBimmer, on Flickr[/IMG]

 

[87 broncasorus]

from looks of front bumper small body lift. look on top of the frame mouts and see if you have one body bushing or if you have a bushing and spacer. next check tightness and that's about it stearing hoses and wiring they would have had to deal with or it wouldn't stear bad grounds and gas would leak all over when filling.

 

[AllBlackBimmer]

from looks of front bumper small body lift. look on top of the frame mouts and see if you have one body bushing or if you have a bushing and spacer. next check tightness and that's about it stearing hoses and wiring they would have had to deal with or it wouldn't stear bad grounds and gas would leak all over when filling.

I'll check the mounts... I think its a 3" lift. Cab seems to sit good and feel solid. No excessive bouncing or anything like that.
Seems to steer just fine, and no gas leaking.

I guess the 2 most things I'm "concerned" about is the steering, since you have to lengthen the steering shaft... I don't want to be driving down the road and all of a sudden have no steering

and I've also heard about the transmission linkage and wiring, since that also needs to be stretched out. I don't want to be slowly killing my transmissions.

 

[Bronco638]

The Edge comes with a 2" body lift from the factory. I put a 3" body lift on my old '96 Explorer. IIRC, the lift kit came with a steering shaft extender. There were other things, on the Ex, that were capable of being 'stressed' by the body lift (and I don't recall them now) but the steering shaft is not necessarily the biggest worry. As long as your steering shaft is secure, you should be OK. However, it doesn't hurt to double check that the fasteners are tight. There are 'lift' brackets for the bumpers (I made my own for the Ex). So, even though you seem to have a 1" gap between the body and front bumper, the only way to really know what lift you have is to measure the spacer blocks between the cab/bed and frame.

 

[AllBlackBimmer]

The Edge comes with a 2" body lift from the factory. I put a 3" body lift on my old '96 Explorer. IIRC, the lift kit came with a steering shaft extender. There were other things, on the Ex, that were capable of being 'stressed' by the body lift (and I don't recall them now) but the steering shaft is not necessarily the biggest worry. As long as your steering shaft is secure, you should be OK. However, it doesn't hurt to double check that the fasteners are tight. There are 'lift' brackets for the bumpers (I made my own for the Ex). So, even though you seem to have a 1" gap between the body and front bumper, the only way to really know what lift you have is to measure the spacer blocks between the cab/bed and frame.

thanks.

Yea, I don't care as much "what" liftkit I have anymore, I am just worried about any "safety" or "mechanical" issues I may be facing with the liftkit.

I like it, other than getting into the truck I know one of these days I'm going to rip my pants in the groin area

Other than that, truck feels solid, but you say, better to just double check to make sure.

My car is at the shop now, and once I get that back, I'm taking my truck to a local garage to have them do a transmission pan drop/filter change and have them look over it.

 

[Bronco638]

I have similar (Westin) nerf bars on my Edge (the painted ones). Get into the habit of using those to enter/exit the cab. It'll be less stress on the ol' groin and easier on the side bolsters of the seat, to boot.

 

[AllBlackBimmer]

I have similar (Westin) nerf bars on my Edge (the painted ones). Get into the habit of using those to enter/exit the cab. It'll be less stress on the ol' groin and easier on the side bolsters of the seat, to boot.

I find them rather useless to be honest...
They are still up high, and don't stick out far enough to actually use them as intended.

I find using them is about 10x more awkward as I usually put my right foot directly into the cab.

Placing my right or left foot on the nerf bar makes for an extremely awkward entry. as I am not sure which way to "step" into the cab them... I usually go "forward" into the cab, and not "back in"
I am a bigger guy... 6'1", 245 lbs which I am sure doesn't help either.