homemade lift?
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homemade lift?
i wanna lift up my 98 dakota but cant spend the money on a suspension lift and would rather make my own body lift than spend 300 bucks for one and my rear suspension has my axle on top of my leaf spring so adding a block would lower the truck but i was thinking would it be possible to just switch it around and bolt up my axle below my leafs? and if that doesnt give enough lift id add a block and longer u bolts
Registered User
Joined: Jan 2010
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From: BELLEFONTE, PA
I am not sure about the body lift. The rear axle swap you can do all that, tha only thing you need to watch for is the brake hoses. What i mean is make sure they are long enought. Aslo check your parking brake cable. Now saying that what do you plan to do with the front end you will need to lift the front end also. I don't think you will get that much lift out of the front
Champion
Joined: May 2008
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From: Apex, NC
Honestly, you'll spend almost as much trying to make your own body lift as what you could go on ebay and buy one for! The little bit of money saved making your own, IMO, is not worth the trouble!
As for the suspension lift, yes, you can buy new spring perches and u-bolt pads, measure the pinion angle, line it up, make sure its even, and weld on the new spring perches, but you will have gained around 5 inches of lift on the back that is impossible to compensate for up front! You can try stuffing 2 inches worth of coil spacers up front but that truck is going to have one heck of a stupid looking sweep to it!
So now that I have completely beat down your ideas, let me make it up to you by offering you a much better, easier, and cheaper way to lift the back.... longer leaf spring shackles! The shackles on the 2wd Dakotas face downward (on the 4x4s they face upward). If you get longer shackles, that will push the back of the springs down. Keep in mind though that doing so will cause an angle change in the pinion and you'll have to either get wedged shims, or weld new perches on at a different angle. Shims will probably do the trick though, since the angle change won't be much, just keep in mind that the pinion angle has to be within + or - 3 degrees of parallel to the transmission's output shaft angle!
As for the suspension lift, yes, you can buy new spring perches and u-bolt pads, measure the pinion angle, line it up, make sure its even, and weld on the new spring perches, but you will have gained around 5 inches of lift on the back that is impossible to compensate for up front! You can try stuffing 2 inches worth of coil spacers up front but that truck is going to have one heck of a stupid looking sweep to it!
So now that I have completely beat down your ideas, let me make it up to you by offering you a much better, easier, and cheaper way to lift the back.... longer leaf spring shackles! The shackles on the 2wd Dakotas face downward (on the 4x4s they face upward). If you get longer shackles, that will push the back of the springs down. Keep in mind though that doing so will cause an angle change in the pinion and you'll have to either get wedged shims, or weld new perches on at a different angle. Shims will probably do the trick though, since the angle change won't be much, just keep in mind that the pinion angle has to be within + or - 3 degrees of parallel to the transmission's output shaft angle!
Last edited by 95_318SLT; Jan 20, 2010 at 01:09 AM.
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im not gunna make a body lift kit but im sayin right now id rather make one than spend the money (just bought a truck wallet got really skinny) and i only want like 3 inches of lift soim asking what would be the easiest and cheapest way of goin for 3 inches of lift and how would i go about doing the shackle change?
