I have an 03 F-250 and I'm wanting to add an 8 inch suspension lift but i don't want to have to sacrifice the comfort of my ride too much.
What are some brands that y'all have used?
Which one would be the best?

 

It's not so much the brand but the height you want that is going to give you issues with ride quality. As a general rule, once you go over 4 inch springs the ride quality goes down the drain. With a 6 inch lift you can get away with 4 inch springs and 2 inch brackets to give you the height without losing the ride quality. If you are set on 8 inch lift you may have to compromise on ride quality. In other words, it will ride like a gypsy s@*t wagon. The other issue you may have is that very few companies out there may still offer lift kits for a truck that is 12 years old and is no longer in production. Most figure that if you wanted the lift you would have had one by now so you may need to look around. I run a ProComp on mine and I think they still make lifts for our trucks but I have not looked into them for some time. If you go with an 8 inch lift you must be looking at 37's at a minimum and maybe even 38's or 40's and with that comes a whole other list of concerns. One last issue for you to think about will be wheel selection and finding wheels with a 4" backspace or less is difficult so you will most likely rub the springs on lockout, how much rub depends on the wheels. I write this assuming you have a 4x4

 

ICON 4 INCH LIFT FRONT SPRINGS WITH ICON 4-1/2" HANGER AND SHACKLE KIT AND REAR INTEGRATED 9 INCH BLOCKS WITH 3/4" UBOLTS IS THE BEST POSSIBLE WAY TO GO, OTHER THAN SWITCHING TO A COIL SPRUNG SET-UP FOR THE FRONT...

 

So I might as well buy the cheapest one?
Are there any brands that I should stay away from?

 

I dunno. I had a 4" Skyjacker on my '93 and it rode like a dump truck!! I wished it had suspension seats in it after...



Jacob, best thing I can recommend is find a lift that has the teflon glide pads between the spring leafs.

 

I recently purchase my 03 with 37's , 22 inch wheels, and 8 inch lift. Rides like a horse and buggy. Thinking of going down on lift to get some ride quality back. Wanna trade suspension and wheels?

 

Scott, my buddy has an old highboy with the same setup as yours. He ended up taking two leaves out of his pack and said it made a big difference. Still plenty of clearance and rides a bunch better. Something to consider...

 

Jacob, if you want the best, check out Rize Industries. Their stuff is really nice riding, good working stuff. Expensive, but if you go cheap, all you're going to get is a rough ride.

 

I just checked and i didn't see anything for the 99-03 f-250s
Could I just be overlooking it?

 

So heres some info on what your going to run into. A "lift" can be gained multiple ways.

1.Very stiff/higher arched leafs that dont allow for any sag/flex. The lose of sag/give/flex and higher arched spings will allow u to gain 8"s of "lift". What you will give up obviously with larger leafs is ride quality, the higher u are also the less your springs can give because you cant have body roll. Body roll at high speed = roll over.

2. You can have slightly larger arched softer springs, and pull the axle away from the frame by doing larger shackles, a small axle block, and a 1" body lift. I personally wouldn't go over a 1" block front or rear. This one should be your best bet. Your shackles will allow for some lift and still allow for swing when your leaf flattens/flexs, as well as your spings giving u lift. The springs will still give allowing for a smoother ride, some body roll will still be in play, but u can dampen it with playing around with different shock rates. If you could do 4" lift spings, 2" lift shackles, 1" blocks, and 1" body lift Id say that would be your safest/smoothest ridding option. You could also modify a sway bar to help with body roll.

3. By far the most dangerous, you could ghetto fab that thing and just put an 8" block front and rear. And probably die.

Im saying all this so that when u find a lift kit, you can easily look at the components and tell if its a smooth riding lift or not.

Thats my .02 by I am just a cave man.

 

I hope you know how to do hub assembly's on the front. You'll be doing them once a year. Brakes, there's another thing you better get used to doing it'll chew through rotors so get O'Reillys lifetime warranty on them if they still have it. Ladder bars are a must. If you have 4:10 gears you'll be ok there if not a set of 4:30s or so should be installed there's another $2k. Plus another $2k or so every time you need tires. Also dual stabilizers I highly recommend which is a few hundred more dollars depending. May as well replace everything that has to do with the steering linkage since you'll be around them anyways and need an alignment. You should have a Dana 60 so you don't have the worries of the spyder gears blowing apart.

Luckily you're only worried about how it's going to ride. if you do it what I call the right way you'll go all spring lift. I went with BDS not because of the cost but because of the warranty. With big tires you'll be able to play with the tire pressure quite a bit in order to smooth out the ride... Kinda. Iirc there was 11 or 13 springs just on the front and I don't remember how many on the back

 

Check out the leverage link system for the front; then the rear is the same thru '07. They don't have photos of them on the website, but you can call 'em. You can go with the '08 longer springs also. Then their ladder bar system is the bomb!