Hi all.

I have a 91 ranger, extended cab 3.0L, 2wd.

One leaf spring on either side is broken (shocks are gone also), so the truck is sagging pretty bad right now.

I went to the junkyard and picked up some used ranger springs for $50.00 a side. (I did this before reading about the explorer spring swap).

I was going to just swap them in but the I started thinking about possibly adding a spring form my old pack to the new (used) pack to give me a little more payload capacity.

I a completely new to this type of thing, know nothing about leaf springs or suspension. But after reading about what some people here have cone with their spring pack I figured if Ialready have the extra springs here I may as well use them.

My goal is not to get a lift or anything (if I end up with a little extra height that’s a bonus, but not the goal), I use my truck to get my race bike to the track and back. It is a decently heavy payload with the bike, my tool box, spares etc. I think this was what caused the springs to break in the first place.

I'd like to make a spring pack that would be able to cary this load without any problems.

So my question is... will I be ok if I just add in one spring from my old pack to the new (used) pack? I assume all I’d need is a longer centre bolt that holds the springs together?

Also if I do it which spring should I use? I could cut the eyelits out of the main spring and add it under the main spring. Or I could use one of the other ones and just put it in there.

Is the main spring stronger or are they all the same?

Also, are there any negative effects of doing this?

I appreciate the help,
Thanks.

 

Anyone?

...

 

hey buddy,
on my old tacoma i was putting a bunch of sheetrock in the bed, i trippled on accident the payload the bed could hold. we wee driving and evrything was fine until i hit a pothole and the weight came down and broke the middle leaf spring(3 on each side)

when it broke it flew out and cut the shock in half. i got a used set from the junkyard from a 1998 (mine was a 2000)
it was a little longer about 2 inches. the holes werent lined up. we tapped new holes to put the bolt through, put a new shock in and never had an issue again, drove it about another 50k up in new england, until i traded it in.

 

djeclipse, over ten years ago I went through the same thing with my 90 Ranger supercab with the 2.9 v6. However, the springs I used were from an Explorer. I'm not real sure but the Explorer springs may be able to flex a bit more than the Rangers but still give the support needed. Besides replacing the broken springs I cut the eyelets off the main springs and added them under my main springs and then added two other leaves to make it more of an even stair step sequence from the bottom spring to the top one. This gave me six springs on each side. I went to a local spring shop and got the longer center bolt for the pack and also the longer U-bolts for the axles. This raised the rear of the truck a few inches and made it ride more like a truck when empty, but I have not been down on the snubbers since, and I have had some very heavy gravel loads in it as well as complete big block engines or over 30 bundles of shingles. I've not had any springs break or go out of place in all that time. I've been very pleased with this mod for my needs and I would say you're on the right track with yours.

 

Thanks for the replies guys, I appreciate them.

Rangerman stan,it sounds like you did exactly what I want to do but took it even farther.

I have a few questions if you don't mind.

When you cut the eyelets off the main springs how far in did you go?

Also, did you bevel the edges of the springs or put any kind of padding on it? I see the stock springs are beveled and have some kind of padding on them at the ends. I've been told this is so there isn't any extra stress placed on the spring above it (to prevent cracking/ breaking).

Also, for the rest of the pac, where did you add in the springs?

Do you have any pics of the modified spring packwith the extra springs in there? It would help me visualize the entire set up.

Another worry is I am in Canada and they use salt on the roads over here which makes rust. I just hope everything comes apart off my truck. I was thinking about removing the bed to get better access to the schocks and springs for removing the bolts...

Thanks agian,
Vince

 

Vince, I'm in the Detroit area and they don't spare the salt around here in the winter so I know about the rust concerns. You can soak the bolts and nuts with something like Liquid wrench or other liquid to help loosen them up. But you still may have some break off or become unuseable. Removing the bed can be helpfull but not all that necessary. Finding new torx bolts and the nut clips they go into for the bed can be a problem. I had to use some regular hex bolts and self locking nuts because the oem bolts were not available or were about 25 dollars (US) each. Just use grade 8 bolts and you'll be ok. Breaking off an axle u-bolt won't be all that much of a problem because if you add a couple of leaves you will need longer u-bolts anyway. One thing that helped me was I had another car to drive around to get parts I needed once I had it apart. When cutting off the eyelet I only went in far enough to cut the whole eyelet off. I cut it where it would make just the whole loop of the eyelet be gone. And yes chamfering or beveling the cut edge of the spring will help it slide on the other spring when they move and not dig into that upper spring. I didn't use any plastic pads on that spring probably because I didn't want to drill holes in it to hold the pads in place. But I put a dab of heavy grease at the ends where it contacts the upper spring. Those plastic pads do a couple of things. They keep the springs from digging into each other and they help them slide when they move either loaded or unloaded. On adding the extra springs, I tried to fill in the empty space from one spring to the next. Like looking at stair steps that go up at an even interval from the bottom to the top. There are no missing steps. My original spring pack had what looked like a missing step or two from one spring to the next. So I selected the best length spring to fill the missing steps. That may be one thing to the advantage of the Explorer springs being a different length for the other springs in their pack compared to the Ranger pack. You may not be able to fill in the missing steps as easily with another Ranger spring pack. Also be aware that the distance from the front of the spings to the center bolt is different than from the rear of the spring to the center bolt. Keep them oriented correctly and they'll fit like they should. I'll try to get a picture of the springs in here soon. Just recently got a digital camera but haven't used it too much and not sure how to load it into this. I'll check back later.