Did you only change the shocks? Please post the part nbrs for them. Btw, it looks awesome!Well, one of these is not like the other!!
Back end is an inch lower than I'd thought it'd be, but the truck is fully loaded. A level shows its still a touch tail high, still will look to re-work the springs to get that missing inch.
20" Rancho RS9000's in the back, FX4 shocks in front, un-cut originsl rwd front springs. Rides much nicer over road imperfections.
Very pleased with my guesses and plan, truly hate Ford's on-line parts catalog.
Hi Chris,
DAMN !!! THAT is SEXY !!!
Looks good! Thank you for the insight.Love the Ranger, but it's too tall for my needs so I decided to "fix" both the height and harshness over road imperfections.
The original plan was custom springs, then my wife adopted an FX4 and I noticed both an improved ride, and an extra 2 - 3" of height in the back.
The plan changed to FX4 front shocks FX4 rear springs and custom front coils.
Wading through Ford's on-line parts catalog it appeared that the FX4 and 4WD shared rear springs so I bought a pair of used 4WD rear springs. Turns out no, 4WD and RWD are the same. Grrrr
Had local spring shop re-arch the 4WD springs to add 2 1/2" of arch.
From there, a pair of 3 1/8" spring perches are a tight fit on the 80mm axle tube, a pair of heavy spring plates and 4, 9/16" x 9" square u-bolts gave me a bolt in axle flip.
Add in a pair of 20" Rancho RS999341 (Early 2000's Nissan Frontier) adjustable rate shocks to complete the package. A bit of Amazon 12mm x 16mm aluminum tubing cut into 4, 40mm spacers and shocks were a snap to install.
Did have to cut grooves in the spring perches for the u-bolts.
Cheap angle finder to set the pinion angle and tighten the u-bolts to clamp and hold everything together.
Up front, I took a real different path. A pair of like new take off FX4 struts were disassembled, along with the original struts.
Cut new spring seat retainer grooves in the FX4 shock body 1 1/4" below original for a 2" drop using the oem RWD springs. Did not want the stiffer FX4 springs, nor did I want to stiffen the OEM spring by shortening it get the drop.
Once everything was back together, got full weight on the suspension and again, used the angle finder to dial camber back. Bit of tape measure work to dial toe back in and it'll be good till I use up some Fordpass points for a proper alignment.
The ride quality is vastly improved, expect the lower CG will help handling and both cabin and bed access are much easier.
The back end is an inch lower than desired. Not sure if I'll add some arch to the overload leafs, swap out the overload leafs with a couple std leafs, maybe just settle on some BDS shackles or keep hunting a set of FX4 springs.
Might move the axle forward just a bit on the springs if I do crack everything loose, had a couple options and did not want to risk over compressing the driveshaft slip joint. Maybe erred on the side of caution.
Shoot them an e-mail. I sent them one April 2nd and they replied that it won't be available until "the end of the year". Maybe a few more inquiries will speed up the process or show that these kits are in demand
?
