Front Ride Height

I have had a change of heart with my truck, and decided not to lower it as it will pose a problem with my typical use for it. I got my hands on some old school eagle alloy wheels, 15x8s, and they have a LOT of offset. I'm not against cutting the fenders, but would prefer any alternatives. I like the way the truck sets with the wheels, but if I could get 2 more inches of height in the front I would be happier.

I've look around on the forum and have found quite a few old threads about using John Baker (can't find any) or having custom springs made. I also saw that Ranger springs may work, which means if I van get a higher lift speing for a ranger then it may be what I need?

Of course there is the issue with the control arms and such, but I am not looking to go up a whole lot. It may see a SAS in the future. But that will be next year after the baby arrives at the latest.

Take in account the front is setting higher in this picture because I have a complete spare engine and trans in the back of the truck making it raise up a little.

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I like the look, and honestly I would leave it, or maybe even lift it. If its 2wd it's on the ground if it's a 4wd say hey to the Cessna airplanes!

Here are a couple of guides to follow with suspension and wheel offset. Excessive wheel offset (above pic is a prime example) will cause bump steer. It ain't fun or safe. If you haven't experienced it at speed, keep a clean pair of pants in your truck and your distance from other cars - and that's on a dry road. In the wet, have a tow truck business card in the sun visor and a pre paid funeral plan in the glove box ready and waiting. With control arm suspension like in a MM and a lot of older cars, the extra offset is rough on control arm bushes as well so if yours is already tired this will chew them up. Add raising the suspension height on top of this - raising the centre of gravity in a vehicle negatively affects handling and road holding. I can't tell you what to do but if I advised someone to do the above mods, I'd deserved to get my ass handed to me. I know it sounds like I'm being heavy handed, but it's better than finding out why we haven't heard from you in 6 months from a FB post about you dying behind the wheel...

A small increase in offset, lowering the ride height, adding a stiffer front stabiliser bar and dialing in the front camber - you get handling and more sensitive steering response. This is a far more enjoyable driving experience than choppy handling and feeling like a front tire is going to tuck in under the front of your truck and disappear.

I have run large offset like this before on small trucks time and time again. Never personally had an issue with bump steer, even on a 4X4 locked in high hammered down. I know making changes to overall scrub radius can cause wondering, or a shaky feedback if you have worn out parts, but I've never seen it cause bump steer myself. I always buy moog suspension parts and polyurethane bushings with no issue on wear if anything poses a problem. The ball joints and hubs will hate me of course, but never had one break.

I want to raise the front because if I hit a bump I'm sure the fenders will catch some tire. I was debating on pre-running it. I may just have to pull out the welder and run an I-beam or long travel cross steer setup.

thats true, but if you don't go 100 mph around a hairpin your tire shouldn't fold. I personally have never been in a bad handling lifted truck. except for Ford, dad has a 08 and the tire folds like paper, as well as the 78 because of the offset spindles (but its actually lowered a bit) but I have never seen a lifted truck with bump steer. now I have actually driven a lowered car and experienced bump steer. its a Lil scary. but if it were mine it would b factory height rear and leveled front. don't bother squatting, unless you wanna say hello to understeer on a wet road and wind up wrapped around a tree like my friend did last Monday.

2 things i hate: lowered 4x4 trucks and squatted trucks. lifted4lyfe

Yeah I'm hoping 2 inches will level it out. If it ends up being a little too high I can always add a helper speing in the back.

My friends SAS S10 we are building with coil over suspension at about 16"s may need a track bar due to bump steer. But we also did a gearbox drop, extended steer shaft with added joints, and cross steer on 40's with full size axles. I have known extreme steering geometry changes to cause bump steer, but not offset alone.

Curious if spring spacers may help. I know the spring rate won't change, but if it could just level it out, that would be ideal.

yeah thats a good idea

you can always adjust your steering buckle

when you move the steering knuckle relative to the steering rack you change your steering buckle angle so that it is no longer at a straight angle. if you do lower it you need to adjust the steering rack or even the steering buckle mount location, maybe a spacer, and it will realign the steering and it will not bump steer.

Lowering a car "shouldn't" radically alter steering buckle as you're dropping the centre of gravity into the suspension travels' normal range of movement (unless you're riding without bump stops but that's a different kind of fail) You may need to think about using modified fenders if you're worried about a tire biting into metal at either end of full lock on a bumpy road.

I've had a car that experienced bump steer. It was a Lancer fastback (Celeste) that was running 15x7.5" wheels with a +40 offset. It's a pretty lightweight car and I didn't lower it, only stiffened up the suspension front and rear. The front tires still managed to just stay inside the wheel wells up front so the over track wasn't drastic. One day I caught a rut in the road (3 lane expressway on an overpass - and it was a pretty poor road...) and the car did a near full lane change by itself. I was lucky there was nobody on the inside of me or I would've destroyed them. I was a lot more cautious with how I read steering feedback after that but it didn't help when I got T-boned about a year later :(

Yeah. Offset does change the movement because that's your ground contact. So if you spread your tires you move your suspension less and you really change geometry. Think of your tires as the pivot point, not the car. Now working with a lifted car you change the geometry so that the car is the pivot point, and that's when you get into ford mustang handling (rolling like a log) but a little lift should be fine. It helps withoffloading, approach angle, departure angle, and ramp breakover. These shortened regions cab 4x4 models were actually close to the Ford raptor in those measurements. You change that too if you ever think about going offroad.

Anyone know the spring rate on the factory coils? Haven't been able to find it. But what I have found is that the coils out my buddies old '98 Dakota are the same outside diameter at the buckets and spring diameter. They may have to be cut, as they are 13" uncompressed, compared to I think 11" for our MMs I read, and I'm not sure how much less they will compress without having the numbers for comparison. It is worth a shot though.

you wanted lift - the uncut Dakota coils may do the trick...

Yes. I wanted roughly 2" to level the truck. Even though the coil is 2" taller uncompressed, it may be stiffer. Bottom coil bucket to top the factory one sets compressed at roughly 8". If the Dakota spring has more load tension it may not compress 3 extra inches.

I guess it will be trial and error here with that.
I plan to trim the fenders a little for turning radius mainly, but if can be avoided not just hack them or waste time making large flares on stock control arms. I believe leveling the truck will prevent the top of the tire hitting the fenders, if not, a little off the top won't hurt.

What is the diameter of the spring, coil and coil count and I can tell you the rate.

I was reading what y'all talking about and noticed towards the end yall talking about using the coils out of a 98 Dakota. Idk if the 2wd have em but my 99 4x4 has a torsion bar front end. But I'm having a issue with my 90 ram 50. I just got it and have worked on it a lot to get it running. But now it's down again and I'm stumped. The oil pan sat down on the front diff and started leaking oil. Replaced the motor mounts and it helped hardly at all. Nothing looks broke. And suggestions?