New to the forums here, but not new to Toyota's. This truck has been in the family since it was pruchased new in 1980. I recently bobbed the bed 15", cleaned up all the rust and am almost finished with the paint. New paint in bedliner in bed and cab also. This truck has a 3" body lift and a 4" suspension lift. The issue I am having is that it does not flex nearly enough for what I want to do. What do you all think my best options are? It still has the rear overload spring which will be removed today. I was looking at maybe longer shackles in the rear? Would I be be better off starting over with something completely new?

I will be ordering some bead lock wheels and some 35"s in the near future. Currenly it is running the 33"s that were on it before the body lift. The only other factor I can think of is that this truck is way over powered running a 5.0L from a 93 Mustang.

Looking forward to your input and being part of these forums.

 

63" chevy's for the back or deaver springs http://www.nwtoys.com/content/135-ch...-swap-faq.html
up front you can do the RUF (rear up front mod) or a set of lift springs.
http://www.trailslesstraveled.com/viewarticle.php?id=37

BTW thats gonna be a real nice 1st gen...

 

look up trail gear, marlin crawler, ors- off road solutions (out of business) website is still up with some link suspension for the front. lots of stuff out there

 

what about some cantilever shackles for the back idk if they make them for the trucks though but they do for land cruisers

 

i've heard cantilevers are scary/dangerous on the back on downhills. i guess on the front they would be ok.

 

ive never seen them used on the front I don't think I feel like they would be sketchy on the front because the turn

 

ive seen them for sale in the old downey catalogs on the front of fj40's, before they went out of business.
more recently i read that they are extremely sketchie on the back in a steep downhill situation. i don't have any experince with them, i'm just passing along what i have read from people that have.
i thought about steep downhills i have been down and the thought of the back end of the truck rolling along fine and then it just about passes up the front over the top is enough for me to not want that experience, i've had that happen enough times on a motorcycle to know how that turns out lol...

 

That is a good article on the 63" Chevy Springs. I think I am leaning towards that idea.

 

Take some weight off of the rear suspension (or remove 1 leaf pack) and measure the eye to eye distance. It looks like your shackle angle is near vertical. If so I bet that 57" fords would be just a hair longer and keep the same lift that you have currently (just as easy as chevys) I did this on my 85 and had to move my rear hangers back a bit to get a good shackle angle. Or you can move the rear hanger forward a bit and go with longer shackles - should help a bit with the rear flex.

As for the front - RUF (again what I did on my 85) Rim to fender I gained 5 1/2" in the front and 6 1/4" in the rear over stock (rim to fender no body lift) mine is able to clear 36" tires.

What are you sitting at rim to fender minus the body lift?

Hope this helps!

 

do chevys and ruf cheap and you cant go wrong..... oh and ditch the 3in body lift

 

Normally I would agree. I do not care for the way a body lift looks. The only reason I have it on the truck is to solve one issue. Without it, my engine is forced to sit to low and when you bind the front end up the axle smashes the oil pan, soon as it gets hit a couple time it will either crack or break the pickup for the pump.

 

i do not understand how a body lift changes the clearance between the oil pan and the axle when the suspension bottoms out.
am i missing something? the engine is not mounted to the body.
i can only guess you mounted the engine higher in the frame for clearance with the body lift?

 

With the body in the stock position it does not allow enough room against the firewall for the transmission/engine to be out of the way for full travel of the axle. This in turn causes you to have to either mount the engine lower on the frame or use a body lift to get the clearances to mount the engine higher on the frame.

 

The body and frame don't move under flex at least they shouldn't . The suspension doesn't move the frame at all. Unless something is broken