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Getting ready to start a new piece of the ongoing project. New brakes, calipers,lines, XRF front end everything, energy TTB, leaf spring and shackle bushings, axle seals, wheel bearings and front ujoints.. If I need new spindles then those too if I dont which I hope I don't I will put a blue top steering box on (can only afford one or the other right now) . Going to start Monday. Im thinking it will take most of a week to get everything done. Seems like the project never ends. Should really pull the entire D50 and do inner seals and reseal the pumpkin. I guess I will see how I feel when I get started. Truck can't be down for an indefinite period of time because I need it.
Sounds like a pretty extensive project. Could probably swap in a D60 cheaper 🤔
I don't know much about the D50s, but those sound like quality parts, seen the XRF stuff before.
I have around $1500 budgeted for the project. Upper and lower BJ,tie rods, drag links, sleeves, came to $430 with free shipping. Everything else is pretty cheap until I get to either spindles or steering box. Got the calipers from buybrakes.com for $96 a pop. Bushings came in at $130. Ujoints, axle seals and bearings are cheap. Going to have the drums turned and rotors too if possible. Harbor freight sent a "we miss you" coupon for 25% off so I used that to buy a pneumatic bleeder.
See my edit above. The spindle bearing kit is separate from the wheel bearing kit.
Thank you for your help. Got the pass side leaf bushings burned out today. hub and rotor separated. Front Ujoints were toast. Learned that you cant just yank the pass side axle from the pumpkin. No big deal Im going to take it out and reseal it. Just going to drop the traction beams to do the bushings its all apart anyway.
Looks like it fell right in, shoot this project should be a breeze.
New spindles from Bronco Graveyard made it to me today. Pretty nice. Got the front diff out. Tomorrow I will crack it open to remove the retained axle so I can change the u joints. The spindles came with the inner Timken bearings and the seal that I mentioned above. So really not that bad of a price for them. Im still waiting on u joints and wheel bearings from Rock auto. Should be here Monday. Got all the ball joints pressed into the knuckles today too.
I got both leaf springs and traction beams put back today minus the diff. I'm waiting on diff seals from Torque King. I can see why the traction beam bushings wear. Just torquing the traction beams to the leaf springs put an immense amount of torque on them . A few more days and the front should be wrapped up. Then on to rear seals and brakes. When I am done with this job I will do a write up on what I think made the job easier.
It's been several years but I did a similar but not as extensive overhaul on my D50. As I recall, we are supposed to torque the suspension bushing bolts with a load on the front end, with the truck at its normal ride height. At least that's what I think I remember. Also, once you get it back together and on the road, an alignment is required! I ended up doing my own and I discovered that the range Ford allows for the camber is too wide. The first time I did it, I got it within the limits and I was, of course, watching closely for unusual tire wear. Once I noticed some tire wear towards one side of the tires I realigned it and got the camber right in the middle of the spec'd range. That was a few years ago and no problems at all with tire wear or pulling to one side or any of the issues that the TTB axles are known for. Congratulations on getting the leaf spring bushings out! I resorted to burning mine out and I was afraid I was gonna burn my truck up and shop too!
It's been several years but I did a similar but not as extensive overhaul on my D50. As I recall, we are supposed to torque the suspension bushing bolts with a load on the front end, with the truck at its normal ride height. At least that's what I think I remember. Also, once you get it back together and on the road, an alignment is required! I ended up doing my own and I discovered that the range Ford allows for the camber is too wide. The first time I did it, I got it within the limits and I was, of course, watching closely for unusual tire wear. Once I noticed some tire wear towards one side of the tires I realigned it and got the camber right in the middle of the spec'd range. That was a few years ago and no problems at all with tire wear or pulling to one side or any of the issues that the TTB axles are known for. Congratulations on getting the leaf spring bushings out! I resorted to burning mine out and I was afraid I was gonna burn my truck up and shop too!
I will be taking to the alignment shop after I'm done. Everything has been changed. Drag links, ball joints, tie rods. its definitely going to need to be aligned. I had not planned on doing the wheel bearings, just repacking them and carrying on. After Taking the front apart the axle nuts were so loose I didnt need any tools or axle socket to take them off I just spun them off with my fingers. I didnt think it was a good plan to reuse those bearings after riding how ever many miles and wearing like that. I really don't know how much it matters when torquing the traction beam bushings seeing as Im using energy suspension poly bushings and not the captured rubber type. Both of the shackle bushing were totally eaten through.
Hope you have a good alignment shop that knows how to align those things and is willing to do it right. Most places these days will adjust the toe-in and call it an alignment. I ended up doing it myself for that reason and I learned to get it exactly right, not just acceptable within the Ford specifications.
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