After a offroading trip, i found that i managed to break the front passenger leaf spring and bend the other. It would figure these broke a few months after replacing the bushings with poly. But at least that meant it would be easy to disassemble.

This factory suspension is a very poor design. It only had about 2 inches of up travel before it hits the bump stop. The leaf spring will naturally resist twisting but while used in TTB axle is forced to twist making it always binding. The beams on the F250 are shorter than F150/Bronco meaning it will try and twist more for the same amount of wheel travel.

I tried to call a few places and the price for springs locally was very high. Online the springs were cheaper but the shipping was very high. Doing 2 inch lift springs was stupid expensive, it would have been cheaper doing a 6 inch lift than a 2 inch.

I finally decided that i would order my leaf springs from General Spring KC as recommended by many people. Because shipping was high, I decided to order 3 pairs of leaf springs and have them freight shipped.

Because the truck only has 2 inches of up travel before hitting the bump stop and lifted leafs are very expensive, i decided to try F350 solid axle leaf springs. they are about 1.5 inches taller and the spring rate was similar to my stock leafs.

My F250 is a light duty and used code 5 front leaf springs which are unavailable. The next leaf spring to use would have been significantly stiffer than stock.

I ordered 3 pair of leaf springs from General Spring KC as well as 2 pair of rear shackles and bolts.

The leaf springs were actually pretty cheap being 110-130 bucks each. The shipping is expensive. So i decided to order 3 pair of leafs and have them freight shipped. Shipping was still 220 bucks

43-516 (F350 solid axle front) leaf springs for the front of my F250. They are a similar spring rate to my stock unavailable springs, softer than the recommended replacement springs, but add about a 1.5 inch of lift.

43-695 (2450lb F250 rear) leaf springs will go in my F250. They are stiffer than the stock leaf springs and should help it for towing. They also seem to have raised the rear of the truck some

43-689 (1700lb F250 rear) leaf springs will go on my 96 Bronco to replace its current F250 leaf springs. These should ride softer since I do not tow with this truck. They have similar spring rate to stock bronco leafs but 3 inches more arch for a budget lift kit. these with a 3 inch block is how i have 6 inches of lift in the rear.

Also ordered 2 pair of rear shackles. The front shackles on the F250 i recently put new bushings in and are in good condition.

the 'F350 solid axle front' leaf springs

Tuff Country drop bracket kit for 2 inch lifts.

WULF brand adjustable leaf spring leveling kit with U-bolts

stock, the truck only has about 2 inches of upward wheel travel before it hits the bump stop. while offroading i hit it constantly. this is my main reason for doing a small lift kit in the front is to help stop bottoming the suspension out

new F350 solid axle leaf spring

original F250 'light duty' TTB leaf spring

the new leaf out of the box is about 1.75 inches taller than stock. but it has a 3/8 inch plate on the bottom that will be removed so it will be abit under 1.5 inches of lift

I am going to use the adjustable leaf leveling kit to make up the difference. But that 1.5 inches is what is going to give me more wheel travel before hitting the bump stop, the leaf plates will not

removing the 3/8 in factory plate and adding two 1/2 leveling plates gives right at 2 inches of lift. I decided to add a third plate on the actual install to make it 2.5 inches of lift.

i regret doing so because the front is now higher than the rear of the truck. opps. I will have to lift the rear some more

The new leafs, leveling kit, and drop brackets installed. Also new poly bump stops

I decided to go for a 2.5 inch lift. I should have stuck with 2 inch but the process to change it now is a huge pain.

The front drop bracket installed was pretty smooth and easy. the rear drop bracket was more of a pain due to the crossmembers curvature making the holes not line up easy. drilling the holes for the larger bolts also was tricky.

mounting the beam to the leafs was NOT fun. getting the centering pit to line up with the hole in the axle was a huge pain. Did i mention this suspension design is trash?

the original leaf springs. i drove on that broken leafspring for about a month.

a shame i jsut replaced the bushings with new poly bushings just a few months ago

this truck with its new 2.5 inch lift kit did make the steering geometry pretty bad. even factory the steering geometry was not very good. after the lift, i corrected the alignment but it still could feel a major difference in the steering for the worse.

even with only a 2.5 inch leveling kit, this is almost the equivalent of a 6 inch left on an f150/bronco. the more parallel the tie rods are to the beams the better. the tie rod flip would raise them up about 3 inches. the pitman arm drops them about 3 inches

i defiantly planned on doing a drop pitman arm. but i considered doing a tie rod flip also. the reason i did not do a tie rod flip first was due to the risk that the leaf springs might hit the tie rods during articulation. after the drop pitman arm, there is no chance of them hitting.

adding a 3 inch drop pitman arm did help bring the geometry close to factory.

i may still consider doing a tie rod flip on the knuckles. with the drop pitman arm, there is no chance of the tie rods ever hitting the leaf springs.

my original rear spring code was Code 6. they a 1700lb rated spring used on the 'light duty' F250. They are more of an F150 leaf spring but about 3 inches more arch

my new springs are 2450lb rated used for an average F250 gas trucks. It should help tow better without being overly stiff.

the newer spring has less arch but more thickness so they even out for overall height. but because they are stiffer, they did raise the back of the truck some

also put in new shackles and hardware

the bolts for the rear leafs were worn pretty badly. always good to get new bolts!

new rear leafs are in

new front and rear leafs on 33 inch tires. might have to consider 35 inch tires next time