Leveling springs, F250 shock towers, & Extended radius arms

[Desert Jim]

I have been a guest on TRS for years, and I'm finally going to start modifying my truck. I don't 'wheel like I used to, so I'm looking for function more than anything.
RC seems to have a good spring by their description, I figure a 4.0 Supercab spring would do the trick for my 2.9 regular cab.
The f250 shock towers would make it possible to get some good droop, but here is my problem... radius arms... The stockers bind up on a stock setup, and the store bought items I feel would give me too much caster. Not to mention the drop brackets.
In the 80's we used to weld some tubing and gusset up the stockers on the old f100-150's 2wd's cast arms, could I do something like that on my "new" stamped arms? How long would I need to make them? My "old" ranger 2wd had them back to the transmission cross-member, but it had hella wheel travel (combine that with the bent I beams, hella tire rub against said arms). I was thinking of splitting the difference. Has anyone built a set, or have a good idea of how to do it? I have some ideas in my head using thick wall DOM tubing, some square stock angle iron and plate. But proven is always better than an educated guess!

 

[alwaysFlOoReD]

There are a bunch of people that have built there own arms. Here is a recent one;
http://www.therangerstation.com/forums/showthread.php?t=132114

 

[Desert Jim]

Those look like the ticket. If I went with square stock I imagine I could mill some plugs and run some grade eight hardware and sleeves to use the donuts.
Thanks for the link. I searched for them, but I think I used DOM in my query...

 

[ronclark]

With no lift would the F250 shock towers really add that much to travel?

 

[brinker88]

With no lift would the F250 shock towers really add that much to travel?

With the proper length shocks, arms, and coils, yes. I'm only running 3-4" lift and look how much travel I've achieved.

 

[4x4junkie]

This thread has a few examples of arms shown in it:

http://www.therangerstation.com/forums/showthread.php?t=29814


I think a minimum of 3" lift is required before you can start pulling any real travel numbers. Otherwise the axle being so close to your frame severely limits your uptravel.

I got around 3.5" susp. lift on mine and am getting a hair over 20". My bumpstops are stock (not lowered) and I use every bit of that space available.


(specs and a bunch more pics if you click on my BII sig link).

 

[Desert Jim]

Thank you guys. ordered the shock towers today.

 

[crawlin91]

Ruffstuff specialties now offers threaded tube bungs for 2x2x.025" square tube, which is about half the price of DOM tube.

 

[brinker88]

And go with Currie Johnny Joints NOT Ballistic Fab Joints.

 

[maniak]

And go with Currie Johnny Joints NOT Ballistic Fab Joints.

Can you point me to a thread with discussion about this? I'm running Ballistic joints on our extended Radius arms.

I've tightened them a few times over that last 30k miles but other than that there have been no issues with them..

One of the reasons I first went with Ballistic is that they are local to me and I never found any reason to choose one over the other.

~Mark