NButler's River Rock Green 100 Series (1 Viewer)

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Did the 295 fit without a lift?
 
@SPACEBOY @MountaineerLC
Good new guys! Just got back from the tire shop and after a road force balance the truck is back so factory smooth ride. The tech said the tires where "a few ounces off balance". So thankful for an easy (and free) fix.


Nice rig! A couple of things from my view:
  • OEM shocks are great if no armor
  • Change all sway bar bushings - inexpensive, fairly easy, and will make a noticeable difference if still original
  • with that many miles I'd also be thinking inner and outer tie rods (probably source of tires rocking back and forth when you checked them - also fairly easy) as well as ball joints (more challenging but doable)
I just did all of 2nd and 3rd point and it transformed the ride of my 2001 with 150k (with some dirt road miles on it). There quite a few excellent threads on here to guide you through (ball joints especially)

Thanks for the input. Im not afraid of turning a wrench so I'll look into a further. Might be nice to do at the same time as the shock install since the truck will be in the air. I am curious what jack stands you guys like to use. Mine are all too short even on full extend. Works well for lowered BMWs not so much for a LC! :)
 
Did the 295 fit without a lift?
Yep. 295/75/16 is pretty much agreed to the biggest size that fits with a factory ride height.

Ride height was something I meant to post about but I was distracted by the tire vibration. The night before I got the tires installed I gave my torsion bars 4-5 rotations to level out the front to rear visually.
 
@SPACEBOY @MountaineerLC
Good new guys! Just got back from the tire shop and after a road force balance the truck is back so factory smooth ride. The tech said the tires where "a few ounces off balance". So thankful for an easy (and free) fix.




Thanks for the input. Im not afraid of turning a wrench so I'll look into a further. Might be nice to do at the same time as the shock install since the truck will be in the air. I am curious what jack stands you guys like to use. Mine are all too short even on full extend. Works well for lowered BMWs not so much for a LC! :)

Glad you got the vibration figured out! Would be good to do all at once but will be time consuming and worth it fyi. I use 6 ton jack stands.
 
@SPACEBOY @MountaineerLC
Good new guys! Just got back from the tire shop and after a road force balance the truck is back so factory smooth ride. The tech said the tires where "a few ounces off balance". So thankful for an easy (and free) fix.




Thanks for the input. Im not afraid of turning a wrench so I'll look into a further. Might be nice to do at the same time as the shock install since the truck will be in the air. I am curious what jack stands you guys like to use. Mine are all too short even on full extend. Works well for lowered BMWs not so much for a LC! :)
Good deal! Glad it worked out. BTW, dropped those seat bracket covers in the mail this morning
 
I thought the truck and my future self might appreciate preventively replacing the heater Ts.

I noticed a tad of dried red coolant...

Untitled by Nick Butler, on Flickr

Whoa, so glad I did. The drivers side crumbled apart before I could get the hose fitting off. Yikes! That was a massive headache waiting to happen.

Untitled by Nick Butler, on Flickr

Best $25 bucks I've spent in a while! :)
 
Congrats and welcome! That's one of my favorite colors for the 100 series.

You're off to a good start for a road-truck. One thing to note, you may have already read about it: these trucks like and kinda require a little bit of rake front to back. If your truck is totally level front to back, you may experience some lightness or wobbling in the steering wheel when accelerating. Usually 3/4"-1" is sufficient to keep everything feeling good.

Sometimes it's not a big deal, but I learned real quick one day around a sweeping turn that my '00 at the time did NOT like running level F/R.
 
Congrats and welcome! That's one of my favorite colors for the 100 series.

You're off to a good start for a road-truck. One thing to note, you may have already read about it: these trucks like and kinda require a little bit of rake front to back. If your truck is totally level front to back, you may experience some lightness or wobbling in the steering wheel when accelerating. Usually 3/4"-1" is sufficient to keep everything feeling good.

Sometimes it's not a big deal, but I learned real quick one day around a sweeping turn that my '00 at the time did NOT like running level F/R.
Thanks for the input. She feels pretty good on the overall now with the front really close to 1” lower than the rear. However, There is still a slight vibration at highway speeds, which I think is still the tires.
 
Shocks are here and they look good!


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I spent about 45mins fussing with the front upper shock bolt. No dice! Gahh! So ****ing annoying how it just spins. I used my channel locks the best I could but I just chewed up the tippy top above the threads.

My next attempts will be a pipe wrench on the upper body of the shock?
Going to buy a torch to get some heat on the top but?

Definitely looking for any advice!
 
Strap wrench and find a way to get it wedged against something while you're turning the nut.

Or get a friend with some badass forearms.
 
Strap wrench and find a way to get it wedged against something while you're turning the nut.

Or get a friend with some badass forearms.
Unbolt the bottom first, hold the nut on top from turning with a 22mm. Then turn the actual shock down? So you're threading the shock out of the nut rather than the other way around. Make sense?
 
Interesting idea. I’ll try that.

Unbolt the bottom first, hold the nut on top from turning with a 22mm. Then turn the actual shock down? So you're threading the shock out of the nut rather than the other way around. Make sense?
 
Hey guys,

I got the fronts done! An 18” pipe wrench was the ticket. For any who hasn’t done the job yet, use the pipe wrench on the upper shock body then brace it against the control arm while you spin the top nut.

Also hit it with PB blaster and some heat if you can.

My end results are ridiculously gold. Just backing out of the driveway on the street I could feel how much tighter the front end felt. Such a serious improvement! Really happy to give this truck some new life.

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Finally got a night to work on the truck and tackle the rear shocks. I’m not sure why the fuss online about drilling a hole... it’s one of the simpler projects I’ve done. I’m no expert but after enough years turning a wrench it was really straight forward.

For anyone who hasn’t done it, you’ll need:

22mm Wrench. A Ratcheting flex head will make the whole job easier.
19mm socket
Pipe wrench (to hold the shock)

Without a doubt remove the spare tire. And leave your shocks compressed if they are tied together. Mine weren’t and it was super frustrating trying to compress them by hand while under the truck.
I had the whole thing done, including jacking up and removing the tire, in 2 hours on the dot.

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Spent the last weekend getting new sway bar bushings and end links. What a pain in the ass job!

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The new bushings were so hard to get threaded. Also the broken sway bar bracket bolt really slowed me down. I assume the only way to get it fixed will be to remove the torsion bar and drill it out?
 
Very Nice. Do you know about how many inch lift you have on the OEM shocks and the adjusted torizon bars?
 

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