But the tie rod is mounted on the bottom of the stock knuckle and on the top of the 1500 knuckle which is "straightening" it out. You could flip the tie rod on the stock knuckle with the same result, you'd still have the a-arm issue though.

 

Negative, it's a "wedge" bolt.

 

Ahh...yes. I stand corrected.

 

Sorry. Not going to work. The tie rod has to have the same pivot length and angle as your lower arm or you get bump steer. Already tried it on stock knuckles with heim joint tie rods. Also changing the upper arm angle without changing the lower will mess with camber change throughout your range of motion.

 

Now that's the sort of feedback I was looking for!
I had thought of the camber angle change but not the bump steer.
So I would also have to lower the bottom control arm the amount that the knuckle is taller than the Dakota one?
That would bring the lower into the same angel as the steering and upper.

 

You can play with the angle of the 2 arms in relevance to eachother because all that's going to do is mess with camber. As long as the tie rod stays the same angle as the lower.

 

Thanks Cody.
I think I will forge ahead and get it on its wheels with the 1500 stuff that I have.
Then I can add the lower drop cross members.
My company builds equipment so we do get a lot of stuff cut with CNC plasma, water jet and laser, just need to spend a bit of time drawing them up.
I wish I was going up 6" so I could buy your kit but my wife and kid would never be able to get into the truck!

 

Sorry, started following late...at first when I started reading I was like "Ok, this seems doable as a Low cost suspension lift" ...but now after all this CNC, Plasma cutting, differential talk, I'm wondering what kind of costs do you have invested so far (like obtaining a 1500 Knuckle from a "pull-a-part" place)...plus, for those of us without daily access to CNC machines, the probable cost to have someone fab up something for us?

 

Alot....

 

Cost is not as much as you think once the setup is done so I could have run a few off.
We do get a LOT of this done.
The parts would have been cheap. I paid under $100 for the 1500 knuckle, lots of them on EBay, then about $200 for the new brake rotor and hub bearing so a total of about $300 per side.
The big problem is the 1500 knuckles wont let the wheels turn very sharp.
The knuckles are quite a bit thicker in the area where the Dakota steering stops and sway bar links are.
I did remove some material from the knuckle but it got to the point where I could see it would take too much material to get the proper steering angle back.
I'm afraid this one wont fly.
I like to try different things but know when I'm beat... for now.

On to the next project, larger injectors, more POWER.