Well, I just bought a set of Sanderson headers on an auction site at a sweet price. And next week the truck goes to my buddys garage to get her ready for the road. Even bought a pwr disc brake kit from POL.com. Shes been sitting for a year and now finally the ball are rollin! I will post some pics soon.

I really want to lower it, but keep the straight axel. Thought about flipping the front and rear springs. ANyone ever flip the front??

 

Awesome search feature! Check it out.

Seriously, I think this was beaten to death within the last 6 weeks.

Flipping the springs themselves (to they arch like this "u" instead of "n") is frowned upon for structural/integrity reasons. And the axle would likely be on the frame rail and/or oil pan anyway.

Flipping the straight axle above the springs can & has been done - search Garbz2 for "Christine" - he did it & didn't like it.

Better options - mono leaf springs - if they won't hit your pan or frame rail. On my '63, I would've had to c-notch the frame & get a new oil pan.

Next option - there are links here to vendors who offer dropped i-beams, where the axle is essentially heated & stretched/bent (like they did back in the old days) to get your truck lower. Cool option - loads of work to get it right & limit bump steer (I said limit, because you really can't eliminate bump-steer with an i-beam).

Mustang 2 setups are generally pricey, and most here frown upon them for their "light-weight" roots, and while I'm no expert by any stretch, I'm inclined to agree.

There's a co that offers a crossmember to use c4 corvette suspension (flat out engineering, I think) - but good luck finding cheap donor parts in usable condition. If a vette's in the boneyard, you know it was ridden hard & put away wet.

Another option is the Dakota front end offered by something industrial - Garbz2 can tell you all about it - he's running one & loves them. Myself, being a non-Dodge-fanatic, opted for the best ford option in my mind --

The 2003-2007 "panther platform" from Ford (Ford Crown Victoria, Mercury Grand Marquis, Merc Marauder, Lincoln Town Car) utilized a bolt-in cast aluminum crossmember that holds the whole suspension & comes with power 12" disks, power steering, huge sway bar and has the benefit of being potentially the cheapest option out there. How so? Price up rebuilding your steering column, rebuilding your front end (king pins, tie rods, etc), a disk brake upgrade, the drop mono leafs or dropped I beam, etc, and you can see you're hovering in the $1500-$2000 range, right in line with most of the other options out there. Guys on this site have nabbed the complete front end out of these cars for under $500. I got a whole wrecked 2004 cop car & am using the front suspension, engine, trans, driveshaft, rear axle, exhaust (most of it), wiring harness (I want that engine to run!), antilock brakes, rims & tires, brake pedal/master cylinder/booster, gas pedal, ebrake pedal, interior dome/map light, fuel pump & sender, most of the AC system (I'm going with an aftermarket '65 mustang style unit for under the dash, crown vic for the underhood stuff), radiator, trans/ps cooler, oil cooler, electric fan, battery, as well as miscellaneous other bits & pieces (like a bucket of hardware - bolts & clip-nuts that'll replace all the rusted ones I broke &/or cut to get the '63 apart) - all for around $2k. And I've got a guy coming this week to buy the seats & a fender for $350, taking my cost even lower. Hey, it's a lot more work and takes using your melon for more than a hat holder, but isn't that the fun of it?

Good luck with whatever route you choose, but before you choose anything, find your zen & become one with the search feature and read, read, read, read & then make an informed choice - that's what this website is all about!

Good luck!

 

You can bend or tune those springs by rebuilding the packs or de-arching them. It takes some experience, but oldtimers would do it with a trip to the junkyard, a bfh, and a peice of track (railroad). I have seen some home presses posted around too. Folks, and you, should simply take them springs up to the local spring shop and have them dearched.


I strongly recommend nobody DOES NOT do this to a spring, don't blame me if you hurt yourself or someone else!

For the inquiring mind though:


A lot of little presses moving down the spring is how they do it, kind of like hitting it with a hammer.

John

 

You can also look into the Aerostar front end. It gets lots of bad press on here, but I don't understand why. It is by far the most economical route to do if you dont mind a little bit of fabrication. The crossmember for the dakota install is high dollar, and the dakota only had a 5 bolt wheel for like 2 years, so if you can't find that model front end you have to buy new hubs and rotors for the 5 bolt. The aerostar took about an hour to line up, and I think it took my buddy 2 hours to weld it up...and he welds slow.

ROb

 

Thanks for all the info guys. I really want the original look and want to keep the straight axel. Think I might look into the lowered axel or new leaf springs. The route Im going is 'ol school Kustom

 

The Dakota Spindles accept 88 92 dodge D100 rotors and caliper brackets. Giving you guess what five on five and a half bolt pattern. Don't need to mess with two differing bolt patterns as with any other kit on the market. I find these in yards for about 50 bucks.

As for getting a IC cross member everyone is SOL until Adam gets it up and running in Seattle as he now has the Dakota based patterns and equipment to build them. I would expect they will up and avalible in about six months. Steve is no longer building them in Phoenix.

For a drop axle contact Dave Mann at Roadsters.com and he can take care of dropping your stock axle.

I like the Dakotas for the simple fact is i built them and know just what went in to the design, The Dakota and the F100 are almost identical in weight and bias.

I am still not sold on the Crown Vic as it is way too wide. If it was not as wide as it is it would be the hot ticket. But no one has yet to real world run one and see what will break or fail i am leery of the aluminum upper spring perches. The CV is also a 50/50 bias as engineered where as a truck is 75/25.

Garbz