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Been busy with school sports but with summer starting it is time to get some stuff done on the build. A couple months ago we swapped the rear leaf spring for a pair from a 2008 F250, these springs moved the rear axle forward 10". We thought about just moving the spring hangers but on this Superduty frame the front spring hanger is welded on and I didn't want to move it. The new leaf springs were almost perfect and after I open up the rear wheel well everything should look good.
We also ran into a problem with our donor truck that the drivetrain and misc. parts were going to come from. The donor had a ton of rust on the body and frame, this would have required buying more parts to complete the cab. Also the donor had a 4.7l V8 and it was running like crap and no good hydroboost power steering pump option exists. We decided to sell the donor to scrap and find a better option. After some searching a 2001 Dakota with a 5.9 magnum AWD was found, zero rust and the body (besides the big dent in the bed) is in good shape. The truck has a a couple small quirks like the transmission doesn't recognize it is in park and the transfercase only operates in 4hi and 4lo. Going to play with the gear select cable and see if it is simple adjustment problem, the transfercase doesn't matter because it will get swapped out for a Superduty NP271. The major benefit of this donor is the 5.9 magnum, obviously the extra displacment is good but the options for hydroboost power steering pump are much better. The 5.9 was used in Ram 2500's that had hydroboost so a off the shelf option will be easy.
In the next few weeks we should start getting small things done on the donor and then its time for a push to swap the body, drivetrain and getting things sorted out.
