New poster here, great site guys! Some questions for you all...

I have plans for my 2006 Ram, Hemi QC 4x4: 6" lift, new tires/wheels, superchips controller, exhaust, and CAI.

My question; is there a logical progression in how to do it all. By this I mean would it make more sense to have the exhaust and CAI installed before the superchips controller? Lift kit before exhaust or vis versa...you get the idea. I realize the lift must come before the new tires so that ones easy, but what of the others? Does it matter?

Also, to any of my Canadian countryman who may be reading or anyone else who may know for that matter, what kind of duties, if any, are charged on these type of truck parts coming into Canada? The only information I have found so far seems to suggest that anything "made in the USA or Mexico" is duty free into Canada. Can anyone confirm this?

Thanks everyone.

 

Although its really personal preference, I would say that you should do the performance mods first, because you will lose some power once you lift and add larger tires.

Also, programmers seem to work at their full potential when the truck already has mods such as intake and exhaust....soo, if it were me, I would do the CAI, then exhaust, then programmer, then lift with tires/wheels.

You may also want to consider new gears depending on what size tires you go with, oh and a good set of shorty headers will help you out low end.

 

first find out if any exhaust modifications will have to be done with the lift kit you want to use.....most likely there will not be any, but some of the kits out there do require some work. if that is the case, obviously do the lift before the exhaust, just so you don't have to do it twice.
if no exhaust mods are necessary with the lift you want, it doesn't really matter what order you do those in. as far as just the performance stuff though, as mentioned above, it is best to do the other mods before the programmer.
the exhaust mods and programmer alone are not going to give you back the power you're going to loose from bigger tires. gearing is the only thing that is going to bring you back to life there. so don't use that as your determining factor for the order to do things.

i'd probably do the performance stuff first just for kicks, and then do the lift and you will definitely want to do gears at the same time, which will all depend on the tire size you go with. then you can go in and adjust your programmer for the tires and gears. and shortly after that, you will realize it's time to upgrade your brakes.

 

thx for the input guys. the exhaust/lift problem was the one i most worried about. one of the lifts i was looking at did require some sort of exhaust modification, i just don't recall which one it was. as for the tires, i hadn't planned on going too extreme with them. 35" or 36" at most. i have the 20" wheels now so i'm alredy sitting at 33" tires, will the extra 2" really require a gearing modification? i have 3.92 now.

brakes too? damn, what have i got myself into! [:-] can you be a little more specific here?

thanks again.

 

running a 35" tire, ideally you would want your gearing to be 4.56s or 4.88s. if it's going to mainly be a pavement pounder, 4.56 should do the trick. it is not 100% necessary to regear, but you will loose plenty of performance with the jump in tire size. besides the power transfer to the rear wheels being sluggish, you will see your gas mileage take a dump.

as far as the brakes, your truck was designed and tuned to run a certain size tire and wheel...the ones that were on it from the factory. anytime you bump up to a larger wheel and tire, your brakes are not going to work as efficiently....this is not just upgrading tire size, it's the same if you went from 20" rims to 24" rims. there is more mass to slow down. it's not just the extra mass of weight from the bigger stuff, it's the 4 things that are directly transfering the power to the ground are now much bigger and will require more to slow them down. 35" tires are not going to come to a stop like your 33s do.
brake upgrades can go anywhere from just upgrading to a larger diameter rotor, to upgrading both the rotor and mulitiple piston caliper. you don't necessarily need to do it right away, but it's soemthing that should definitely be put on your list.

 

makes sense. thx TXST8tj.

one last question then regarding the gearing...will changing the gearing with 35/36" tires to what you suggest put the gas milage back up to, or near, what i'm getting with the stock tires and stock gearing (about 15 mpg average), and is it only the rear gearing that has to change? (ok guess that was 2 questions [8D]) thanks.

 

with a 4wd truck, when you regear, you need to regear both the front and the rear.

4.56 or 4.88 gears will get you back close to stock and best mix of overall performance and economy.

like i was saying, it's not a life or death decision, but i'm sure you will find the truck lacking to some degree from the way it performs now, to the way it will with a bigger tire.