Help. Can't get the rear spring bolt to line up

[serehill]

I put on 3" Alcan springs over the Christmas break. Exact same issue -- used a ratchet strap to carefully pull down on the shackle end of the spring until the shackle mount hole could be lined up with the spring pocket hole. Of course you want to make sure the bolt through the shackle is loose. Don't tighten up anything until you get it all together and back on the ground.

All four springs were "short" in this manner. On the front it actually caused one of the front shackles to invert once the spring was installed (flip up toward the engine, instead of forward toward the front bumper). I fixed that with a long pry bar, but worried that with compression it might flip up again. It didn't.

Gave it about 100 miles to break in, and I have a perfect 3" lift, completely level, with the shackles in perfect position (tilted about 15 degrees forward of straight down on the front, tilted slightly forward in the back).

Totally agree this is more the norm. Glad there is more than one way to skin a cat. I'm glad for that because I have no intention of relocating my bump stops. On uneven terrain the more flex the safer my rig is.

These are my opinions about the way I built mine. I fooled around with a ton of options. Short stopping an axle was never an option. It doesn't mean there's something wrong with that. Teetering on 3 tires is not fun if you don't have to.

[Lumpskie]

Hey guys,

Thanks for all the helpful discussion here. Here's a little more information on the rear springs specifically.

The straight line eye to eye measurement is a full 2" shorter on my Alcan than my stock spring, with no weight on it. Because of that, the eye of the spring can't line up with the shackle, even with it against the front of the shackle mount. I used a floor jack to jack up the axle to flatten the spring to the point where the entire vehicle's weight was on it... still no go. At that point, I tried to carefully pry on the spring to line the holes up... closer but no go.

This picture is with the weight of the vehicle on the axle and shimming above it to flatten it out. Without that weight on the axle, there would be a solid 2 inches of space between the shackle and mount.



I tried lining up the shackle end first and flattening the leaf to line up the front bolt hole. This is as close as I got:


The way the spring is now, even if I got everything lined up, there would be so much preload that the truck would ride like... a truck. My goal for this suspension is to have it ride like a caddy. The only way I see to achieve that is to have proper shackle angles at ride height, with a spring that has a higher arch for lift. The only way I see that you can achieve that is to add more material to the main leaf to ensure that it's mounting points line up with the trucks mounting points without a bunch of preload.

[rocklaurence]

I've had to use jacks n ratchet straps.

[SJTD]

The way the spring is now, even if I got everything lined up, there would be so much preload that the truck would ride like... a truck. My goal for this suspension is to have it ride like a caddy. The only way I see to achieve that is to have proper shackle angles at ride height, with a spring that has a higher arch for lift. The only way I see that you can achieve that is to add more material to the main leaf to ensure that it's mounting points line up with the trucks mounting points without a bunch of preload.

For a cushy ride you want a low spring rate. That rate is in lb/in. To support say 500 lb on a spring with a rate of 500 lb/in the spring will deflect 1 in. If the rate is 250 it’ll deflect 2 in.

So with a cushy low rate spring the vehicle’s weight will use up a lot of travel to get to normal ride height and you have to expect to compress it to get it on. Doesn’t mean it’ll ride hard.

[Lumpskie]

I test fit the front springs today. They fit fine. I had to flip the shackle like you guys mentioned but i could get everything to line up.
If the rear springs fit like this, I would just run them:


So i called Bill and told him my issue. He said he'd build me a new main leaf to my specs. I'll pick them up in Grand Junction on Thursday. I'll let you guys know how everything turns out when i install them.

[acct21]

The one thing I'll say about Bill at Alcan: he will absolutely make it right.

[Lumpskie]

^You can say that again. This is the third suspension order I've made with him for exactly that reason. On my Yota, I designed a totally custom setup with custom length, height, rate, shackle length and orbit eyes. We had an issue with the springs coming in 1.5" too short. He took them back and I ended up with the "perfect" semi-stock suspension setup on my truck. I max out travel on 12" shocks and the spring have held up to some serious abuse!

He mentioned that he'll have my new springs pre-fabbed for me on Thursday so, when I show up he'll pull apart my packs and put the new main leafs on right there. While his guys are doing that, I asked if I could get a quick tour of the facility. He said he'd be happy to show me around. I'm planning on taking some pictures of the shop and how they bake/build their springs to post up on the boards here. It might be cool for some of Bill's other customers to see what the operation looks like...

[Lumpskie]

This weekend, I drove over to Alcan and Bill's guys swapped out the main leafs for new ones made to my spec. The new springs lined up beautifully:



Big thanks to Bill and Alcan for working this out for me. Hopefully, I'll have all the springs installed by next weekend.

[Lumpskie]

Final thread update for searching purposes: The new springs lined up beautifully and the new ride is already smoother than before.

For the record, i needed 2" additional length in the rear springs and 3/8" up front... see my build thread for the details.