We recently finished the heidt's MII front suspension installation and when the smoke cleared it appears we were sent the 2" drop front spindles. I think the truck looks a little goofy now since the front end sits so low and the rear end sits so high. The obvious alteration was to lower the rear end a few inches (2"-3"). I was told to just heat up the old leaf springs and bend them, remove some leaves, etc... but then I thought that the best way to do this (and the safest) would be to purchase a set of 3" drop Posie springs (from Speedway) and install them. $400. (with shipping), another $45. for the new U-bolts, and $50. to a buddy for helping me and using his garage. $500. later and we were done... and it sat EXACTLY the same height as before! Grrrrr!!!! Maybe it's because the original set had a few leaves removed, or maybe these just don't lower it 3" as advertised). So I've been racking my brain on the best way to lower this truck in the rear without hitting my wallet again, but also maintaining safety. I found this build (which was a link from a thread on this forum):
1951 Ford Truck Project Pics - THE H.A.M.B.

This sounds very feasible. I have been thinking about removing the rear shackle hangers (which are currently bolted, not riveted to the frame) and bolting the right side hanging to the left side of the frame (inverted), and vice versa for the other. Since the Posies have the eyelets (to the shackles) which runs from the top of the leaf (rather than the bottom) I can't see how this wouldn't lower the rear suspension and allow the shackle to pivot to the rear 9without binding) when the spring is under pressure (since obviously when a leaf spring is compressed it also gets longer). Here are my drawings (see below). Will this work? ... thoughts? (there's a little more than two inches of clearance above the frame before the bed comes into play so i have the room to do this.

Wally

1951 F1- "Lucille"

 

My only concern would be that you are lowering the rear of the spring, but not the front. The axle perch won't be level.

 

Hey Wallster,

To lower the rear you don't flip the rear hangar for the reversed eye springs, it's the front hanger you flip and use reversed eye springs. The reversed eye goes to the front of the truck into the flipped hangar. Your drawings show the rear hanger - that's not the one you flip.

With stock eye springs, if you move the front hanger up:



this will lower the truck about half the distance of the move. Mine moved 3" up, so I expect a 1.5" drop.

The rear part of the spring can be lowered with extemded "Y" hangers - this is a stock one:



where you buy the extended "Y" (I think they're 2" longer) which gives an additional 1" drop.

You can also take leaves out of your spring pack to do an economy lower job. There's articles on this site about this as well as instructions in the Mid 50s catalogue.

I've been hard at work lowering mine, I just bought the Posies 3" lowering springs with reversed eye and I have the front perch relocate.

 

Ok, I am jumping in here for the opinion, not criticism. I have my rear shackles reversed in the rear as Wallster shows in the diagram. Granted I had to deal with pinion angle/etc. because of using different salvage yard items.

I have reversed the shackles on other projects to achieve the same thing that Wallster is trying to achieve, with no problems at all. Yes...pay attention to your pinion angle. there are angle shims that can be used for that and they are not expensive.

Yes raising the front spring mounts can be done too. I guess I read this as a "DON'T DO" and I want to make sure what the opinion is?

Some vehicles have them like Wallster's second pic. from the factory.

 

Hi Jeff and Nichole

I have reversed the shackles - mine came that way, so I didn't realize the older trucks (mines a 56) didn't already come with the shackle with the "Y" up - I didn't know that was a mod on some models. I LEARNED SOMETHING NEW!

With my model, in the rear, you can get extended "Y" hangars for lowering.


Yes raising the front spring mounts can be done too.

As far as the raise of the front perch, I did it based on what I learned from FTE as well as others. It will be interestting to see if there is some detriment to the front perch raise

 

As far as installing these (Street Slider) Posie 3" drop springs on the truck with the shackle hangers in the original configuration, (refer to drawing below), should the "A" side be installed towards the rear (or the front) of the truck? (I questioned this when we installed them but I honestly couldn't decipher which way they're supposed to go and their were no directions with them). I tried to phone Speedway and Posie but both were unavailable to answer this on Saturday (and nothing on their website). I may have them backwards. If they were backwards would it not lower the rear of the truck like described?

Thanks,

Wally

1951 F1 - "Lucille"

 

I had 2" drop spindles on my TCI M2 suspension. I'm planning on going to a smaller diameter tire/wheel combo (compared to the Explorer rollers currently on the truck)which would drop the front even more. As it was, the motor cross member was so low I couldn't slide the floor jack under it. My solution was to put regular non-drop spindles on the truck. Come to find out, the spindles were in fact M2 spindles ($99.00 delivered from Ebay). Maybe you should just raise your front instead?

 

My friends call me Jeff for short!

She was interested about 2 hrs into registering here...then on to something else...

 

Hey Wally,

I really like your drawings - they really help.

The reasoning I used to place the "B" end to the front was that in some reading it is said to flip the bracket so the reverse eye end of the spring doesn't bind. Since my rear bracket has the "Y" hanger, I concluded that the reversed eye shoud go forward and flip the front bracket.

It doesn't seem that lowering would be affected if the reverse eye was to the rear and if there's no binding of the eyes, there may be no harm, but like you, I had to try to figure out which side goes where (no instructions) and the reverse eye forward to me makes sense.

I'll call Mid - 50 today and see what Diane has to say.

Joe

 

OK - Then Jeff it is!!!

You're a lucky guy that Nicholle is so supportive!

Joe

 

I just heard from Posie's Rods and Customs and they wrote: "The eye that is not a full reverse or stock eye would go to the fixed frame
mount. The reverse eye would go to the shackle".
So referring to the above rendering, the "A" side would be attached to the front spring hanger, and the "B" side would be attached to the rear shackle (which is attached via the rear shackle hanger). The graphic above depicts the proper installation on the driver's side (if you were looking under the truck). This is how we installed them and it did not lower my '51 F1 3" as described on their website. It was lowered (maybe) 1/2" at the most. Back to the drawing board!

Wally

1951 F1 - "Lucille"

 

I know other members have done this, but since I'm new at this, I wanted to find some backup. I was going to call Mid 50s this morning and while looking up the phone number in the catalogue, found the answer to flipping and moving front spring hangers:

This info was taken from a 53-56 catalogue and mine is a '56 - so if your truck is of a different configuration, it might be different - but if your front hanger is the same as shown, it's your answer.

From the Mid 50s catalogue 2011 version, page 155:



Newest catalogue available for download:

Mid Fifty F-100 Parts - Catalog Request

Hey Wally, I just read your edit and it looks like we have conflicting information - where the Mid 50s catalogue says the opposite of what you were just told by Posies!!! ARGHHHHH!!!

Maybe it's the difference in the years of trucks????


EDIT: Hey Wally - I just noticed that my rear springs have one end longer/shorter than the other and called Posies myself to see which end goes where. I was lod the long end goes to the rear, which is the rever eye end. I guess the mid 50s photo from for double reverse eye springs. Good luck on your lowering - I'll post photos of mine when the wheels are back on the ground (likely a couple weeks) Joe

 

This may be a question of model years. These specific Posie Super Slide springs are labelled as item #152R - 1948-1952 F1 rear leaf springs. There are two other item numbers for 1953-1954 (item #154R), and 1955-1956 (item #155R). So I'm not positive which is correct. I'm hoping that the person at Posie's gave me the correct info since I gave him a diagram of the springs, the item number, and the year, make, and model of my truck. But then again it's been a pretty nutty week!
I'll look into it a little further.

Thanks,

Wally

 

On the hamb I talked to a guy running posies with reversed eyes and he flipped his rear front hangar. Just something to think about. I would try extended rear hangers to get the drop

 

problem solved! We ended up talking to the spring guy we know (who bent up our u-bolts) and he said to remove three leaves on each spring (still leaving five including the main leaf. Sure enough, dropped her 2" and even rides much better. This week she's getting her wheel alignment. The front springs have settled down into place and the front wheels are showing positive camber.

Thanks for those of you who piped up with comments. Here are a few photos taken today.

Wally

1951 F1 - "Lucille"