I hope this is the right forum to post. This is a project me and my 17 yr old is starting on. Truck came from Ohio with a built 5.9 swapped in and ran strong. To strong for my kids first car...so off to the ranch for ranch truck duties for several years. We drug it back home Sunday and the tear down has commenced. Our plans are a low budget mud truck. Not street legal and hopefully run 35" if I can relocate the front cab mounts. Anyone seen this done or have link to it? We plan on flatbedding, new cooling setup. New brake and fuel lines. Frame repair due to rust. Once its all done it will be flatblack and flatbed with a spool or welded in the rear.
Open for ideas as I am sure there plenty on the forum that has been there and done that. Thanks guys

 

Definitely lives up to it's name . I have heard of people relocating the front cab mounts to fit 35s, but i have also been told by someone before that the front diffs don't hold up too well with anything bigger than 33s.

I don't have much experience with these trucks though. haha. Just got mine 6 months ago, and all i've done is 5 inches of lift. (3 suspension and 2 body)

 

35's will snap the puny tiny Geo front diff like it butter, if its a mall rate you be fine for a while but for mudding, wont last long..

I ran 33X14R15 TSL Mud Boggers (street legal john Deere tractor tires LOL) on my 92 5.2L 4x4 and hell I did some damage to front and never was anything harsh..
Although I use to lay rubber from lights in 2wd like nothing,

my Jeep Takes more of a beating and it has 33's with a 4 banger but ratio'd to support it @ 4:83 and a rubicon TCase 4:1 ratio (can pop clutch get out in first/4lo and walk beside it up a hill LOL)

 

Plan is it to run it till it breaks. I have 1 35" on for test fitting. We made some headway yesterday. We got the interior seats carpet, etc pulled out. the front bumper.push guard off and rust at the fenders and bottom of cab cut out,

 

2 more pics

 

How much can you turn the wheel with the 35s on? haha. I sortof want to turn my truck into a mall crawler and use 35s, but i'm not too sure.

 

well with 33X12.5 and my 33X14's i got half turn out of the tires with 5.5 backspace... with 1.5 inch spacer making 4.0 inch backspace i got much full turn.... so depending on the width of the 35's and backspaceand width of rim effects aswell i was running 8 inch wide durango rims..

but based on that front shot i see , not alot of room before frame rub lol

 

Actually with the fender cut I did, can go full lock with minimum contact to fender and the front cab mount...not the frame mount for the front cab mount but the cab mount built into the cab.........Has anyone modified that? I can weld a bracket, but if its been done before, please share.
It does not contact the front frame mount....very close though and the frame mount will have to be cut out regardless I think.. Frame contact..not gonna happen as is, even at full flex, tested that.I have not measured the back space on my rims, but I would guess 4" eye balling them. I ordered 1.5" spacers, so waiting on them to come in before I go further on cutting and mods. I like the "full wheel well look", so I will be trying to keep that on this project. Please keep in mind this is a beater, not a daily driver. It wont be road legal...so I free to play abit more than most.

 

I would not do it to be honest. Its going to take some hacking to make this work on mine and I have a 3" body lift and a beater truck. I dont have to make mine look pretty though or street legal. If you do it, plan to make alot of 3 point turns.

 

I'll probably just wait till i straight axle it then. haha

Have my torsion key cranked 3 inches and have a 2 inch body lift at the moment