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415 hits | 69.68 KB | Posted: 1/25/08
Out with the old

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387 hits | 60.53 KB | Posted: 1/25/08

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362 hits | 72.95 KB | Posted: 2/7/08
Off with the TTB coil buckets. Very minimal rust behind them.

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420 hits | 71.56 KB | Posted: 2/7/08
Driver's side coil bucket

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420 hits | 72.58 KB | Posted: 3/17/08
Driver's side coil bucket, note that I couldn't use the lower front hole in the bucket, so I drilled...

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400 hits | 73.04 KB | Posted: 2/7/08
Passenger side coil bucket mounted

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382 hits | 70.12 KB | Posted: 2/7/08
Cage arms with old style mounts, Bilstein 5150 14" travel shocks.

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420 hits | 69.26 KB | Posted: 2/7/08
Weld on radius arm mounts for Cage arms instead of C's.

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329 hits | 69.88 KB | Posted: 2/7/08
Alloy USA 35 spline outer shafts, stock inners, Spicer greasable u-joints.

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361 hits | 63.16 KB | Posted: 2/7/08
Stock Ford '97 F-350 shock towers

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328 hits | 73.51 KB | Posted: 2/7/08
'79 Dana 60, with ARB and 4.88 gears.

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407 hits | 74.19 KB | Posted: 2/7/08
My first attempt at a new tranny cross member, formerly Josh's trailer hitch. It's a great design a...

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401 hits | 62.71 KB | Posted: 2/15/08
New cross member. Same basic design as the trailer hitch, but made with 3/8" angle instead of 1/4",...

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381 hits | 63.31 KB | Posted: 2/15/08
Other view of the new cross member.

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367 hits | 68.02 KB | Posted: 2/15/08
My first attempt at a foot to mount the tranny to the new cross member. Very similar to what some o...

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347 hits | 61.56 KB | Posted: 2/15/08
So I ended up fabbing this much beefier foot instead.

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385 hits | 64.64 KB | Posted: 2/15/08
The new foot is made out of 2 1/2" box tubing with a 1/4" wall. I didn't want it to fill up with wa...

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351 hits | 66.99 KB | Posted: 2/15/08

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347 hits | 66.23 KB | Posted: 2/15/08

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323 hits | 66.16 KB | Posted: 2/15/08
Assembled tranny cross member. Note the two little tabs for the transmission wiring harness to bol...

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338 hits | 68.65 KB | Posted: 2/15/08
Cross member primered.

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337 hits | 70.17 KB | Posted: 2/15/08

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343 hits | 71.59 KB | Posted: 2/16/08
Painted

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335 hits | 73.41 KB | Posted: 2/16/08
New cross member mounted under the truck, and the radius arm mounts are mocked up for mounting.

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401 hits | 70.38 KB | Posted: 2/16/08

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382 hits | 68.36 KB | Posted: 2/16/08

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383 hits | 62.11 KB | Posted: 2/16/08
Tabs on cross member for bolting tranny wiring harness too.

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351 hits | 68.19 KB | Posted: 2/29/08
Coil cups mounted on lower radius arm mounts. I drilled the mounting holes out from their stock 7/1...

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356 hits | 65.01 KB | Posted: 2/29/08
1/4" spacer between coil cup and radius arm mount, which lets coil cup sit flat. Without the spacer...

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368 hits | 65.35 KB | Posted: 2/29/08
Note that with the 9/16" nuts the sides of the radius arm mounts will hold them captive, so there is...

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387 hits | 68.58 KB | Posted: 3/1/08
Removed anemic stock power steering cooler.

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365 hits | 70.35 KB | Posted: 3/1/08
Cut the end of the tube with the fitting off.

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326 hits | 69.17 KB | Posted: 3/1/08
Bent tube 90 degrees, then added a 3/8" compression fitting to 1/4" NPT adapter, which allowed me to...

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335 hits | 60.33 KB | Posted: 3/1/08
Installed back on power steering gear box.

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344 hits | 73.66 KB | Posted: 3/1/08
With the stock power steering cooler out of the way I now have room to cut out the front side of the...

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356 hits | 67.26 KB | Posted: 3/1/08
Chunk removed from TTB cross member.

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359 hits | 68.53 KB | Posted: 3/1/08
Plasma cut the front of the cross member off. No going back to the TTB now!

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328 hits | 68.37 KB | Posted: 3/1/08
New cross member reinforcement plates, 1/4" thick.

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354 hits | 70.62 KB | Posted: 3/1/08
Upper cross member brace welded in. It clears the front of the oil pan by a good inch and a half, s...

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359 hits | 72.82 KB | Posted: 3/1/08
Lower brace welded in. Boy I suck at out of position welding.

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352 hits | 66.6 KB | Posted: 3/5/08
Instead of routing the air line over the bearing cap I routed it around the bearing cap to avoid hit...

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321 hits | 65.09 KB | Posted: 3/5/08
I did end up needing to do a little clearancing in the diff cover. I wasn't too surprised to need t...

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393 hits | 70.25 KB | Posted: 3/5/08

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354 hits | 68.17 KB | Posted: 3/5/08
I went ahead and wire wheeled off some paint on the axle tubes for welding on the radius arm bracket...

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323 hits | 64.25 KB | Posted: 3/5/08
Ground down the mounting area for welding.

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329 hits | 66.99 KB | Posted: 3/6/08
At long last, the D60 gets wheeled out of the shop! Pushing it around on a creeper is much easier t...

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327 hits | 69.99 KB | Posted: 3/6/08
I had originally intended to leave it all on the creeper during the set up, but it turns out that wa...

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349 hits | 69.87 KB | Posted: 3/6/08
Either one of these angle finders would be fine to use, but the digital one is easier to read and mo...

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360 hits | 67.41 KB | Posted: 3/6/08
Not having the knuckle hung on the C makes it a little easier to measure the caster.

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360 hits | 67.32 KB | Posted: 3/6/08
On this '79 axle the spring perch is only .2 degrees forward of the C, so that makes it a pretty goo...

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355 hits | 72.99 KB | Posted: 3/6/08
I went ahead and assembled the Cage arms and mounts.

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387 hits | 72.67 KB | Posted: 3/6/08
A coupe of plumb bobs hung through the center bolt hole of the coil bucket help get the axle centere...

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370 hits | 67.99 KB | Posted: 3/6/08
Arms in place, and I jacked the pinion up with my tranny jack to set the caster to the right spot.

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394 hits | 68.79 KB | Posted: 3/6/08
This seems to be the best way to measure the position of the coil cups to make sure they're dead eve...

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379 hits | 64.98 KB | Posted: 3/6/08
Radius arm brackets are just held in place for mock up with a C clamp.

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338 hits | 71.31 KB | Posted: 3/6/08
I ran out of daylight, and all of these measurements to make sure it's all perfectly square are a PI...

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347 hits | 38.19 KB | Posted: 3/13/08
Made a story board to work as a go/no go gauge for the proper compressed coil height. It greatly sp...

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365 hits | 66.1 KB | Posted: 3/13/08
Had to shim the jack stands to get the axle set to the proper ride height.

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334 hits | 74.16 KB | Posted: 3/13/08
Using a spring clamp to hold the plumb bob string makes it much easier to adjust the plumb bob heigh...

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328 hits | 66.54 KB | Posted: 3/13/08
Also, when setting up the plumb bobs make sure that they are both in the same spot on the coil bucke...

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349 hits | 69.21 KB | Posted: 3/13/08
Before you can set up the radius arms first you need to center the axle under the truck. The king p...

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350 hits | 63.67 KB | Posted: 3/13/08
After the axle is centered you need to make sure that the radius arm mounts are sitting square on th...

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347 hits | 58.78 KB | Posted: 3/13/08
You can use what ever too you want for checking to see that the mounts are sitting square, but I fou...

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336 hits | 66.67 KB | Posted: 3/13/08

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361 hits | 68.63 KB | Posted: 3/13/08
Now center the coil cups on the plumb bob. Take measurements both side to side and front to back.

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366 hits | 65.27 KB | Posted: 3/13/08
Now raise the rear of the axle at the pinion to set the caster angle to where you want it. Go back ...

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345 hits | 66.75 KB | Posted: 3/13/08
Make sure your tack welds are strong, because the next step is to wheel it out from under the truck ...

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355 hits | 68.75 KB | Posted: 3/13/08
In the process of moving the D60 around my long suffering HF tranny jack got owned. RIP cheap trann...

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362 hits | 72.32 KB | Posted: 3/17/08
I needed some additional clamping to make sure that the radius arm mount sat flat on the frame while...

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355 hits | 67.92 KB | Posted: 3/17/08
I just put in a couple bolts through one side of the bracket to hold it temporarily while I'm workin...

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339 hits | 69.85 KB | Posted: 3/17/08
1.5 inch per foot tapered reamer, ready to ream the knuckles for knuckle under. Remember to use a l...

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392 hits | 72.76 KB | Posted: 3/17/08
Reamer in the knuckle.

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373 hits | 71.88 KB | Posted: 3/17/08
Knuckle reamed for knuckle under using Chevy TRE's. Note the space between the TRE and the knuckle,...

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357 hits | 71.35 KB | Posted: 3/17/08
A shot of how much was reamed out.

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339 hits | 67.93 KB | Posted: 3/18/08
Cleaned up the slingers in the sand blasting cabinet. Damn I love that sand blaster, it made these ...

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345 hits | 67.86 KB | Posted: 3/18/08
I welded some little DOM guards onto the lower king pins to protect the zerk fittings from getting s...

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333 hits | 69.34 KB | Posted: 3/18/08
Mounted the knuckles. It takes a clamp to compress the spring enough to get the cap bolts started.

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351 hits | 70.13 KB | Posted: 3/18/08

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398 hits | 68.02 KB | Posted: 3/18/08
Got just a touch of interference between the knuckle at near full lock and the lower coil cup. Moun...

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345 hits | 67.89 KB | Posted: 3/19/08
Passenger side TRE, with tube adapter & jam nut.

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346 hits | 65.13 KB | Posted: 3/19/08
Driver's side TRE, with tube adapter & jam nut.

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343 hits | 66.49 KB | Posted: 3/19/08
Once the TRE's are in place, adjusted to where you want them, and knuckles placed parallel, you can ...

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330 hits | 71.65 KB | Posted: 3/19/08
I'm using 1.5" O.D., 1" I.D., 1/4" wall tube. Here it is getting cut to length.

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367 hits | 64.93 KB | Posted: 3/19/08
Cut tube end with tube adapter seated.

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360 hits | 66.86 KB | Posted: 3/19/08
After the tube is cut I chamfered the cut edges on my belt sander to open it up for a fatter weld ar...

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373 hits | 68.75 KB | Posted: 3/19/08
Get everything fitted up and drop it in place or a test fit before welding it.

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369 hits | 42.38 KB | Posted: 3/19/08
Crap, another interference problem. The tie rod hits the diff cover when turning.

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357 hits | 65.9 KB | Posted: 3/19/08
Worse, it's hitting the diff cover when the steering stop bolt is still 1/2" from the C.

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328 hits | 69.7 KB | Posted: 3/20/08
Having seen way too many bent tie rods I wanted to do something to beef mine up. My tie rod is alre...

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379 hits | 69.47 KB | Posted: 3/20/08
If you do this make sure you chamfer the edges so the won't mushroom out while you're driving it in...

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354 hits | 48.03 KB | Posted: 3/20/08
Can't have it sliding around in there, so I welded it in place on both ends. It's about six inches ...

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362 hits | 56.4 KB | Posted: 3/20/08
Welded on the hex tube inserts.

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340 hits | 55.31 KB | Posted: 3/23/08
Okay, so I had to saw one of the tube adapters off of my tie rod. That sucks bad enough, but now yo...

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333 hits | 56.09 KB | Posted: 3/23/08
Solution: Weld a 1/2" nut to the center slug. Weld it inside the nut so you don't wind up accident...

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360 hits | 65.91 KB | Posted: 3/23/08
That second nut gives you something to thread your slide hammer adapter into, and the slide hammer w...

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319 hits | 67.03 KB | Posted: 3/23/08
Looking down in the end of the cut out tube adapter you can see that it was only threaded in a half ...

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341 hits | 57.87 KB | Posted: 3/23/08
This time when I welded in a tube adapter I put something threaded into the adapter to not allow the...

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333 hits | 68.42 KB | Posted: 3/23/08
Since I had already messed up a couple TRE's, I went ahead and cut off part of their threaded sectio...

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349 hits | 72.65 KB | Posted: 3/28/08
Reaming passenger side TRE for the drag link end.

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329 hits | 57.94 KB | Posted: 3/28/08
Passenger side drag link end welded on.

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287 hits | 71.5 KB | Posted: 3/28/08
Tie rod in place, doing a quick toe in alignment. I just put a couple short boards on the spindle s...

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357 hits | 70.52 KB | Posted: 3/28/08
After the quick tie rod alignment is done, next the drag link is mounted.

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338 hits | 56.54 KB | Posted: 3/28/08
If you care, 8.2° drag link angle.

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387 hits | 68.82 KB | Posted: 3/28/08

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402 hits | 58.35 KB | Posted: 3/28/08
Note, plenty of room between tie rod and drag link. Getting the round tube adapters for the passeng...

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381 hits | 71.14 KB | Posted: 3/28/08
Drag link from driver's side.

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352 hits | 69.06 KB | Posted: 3/28/08
Lowered radius arms to finish drilling bolt holes in frame.

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372 hits | 57.86 KB | Posted: 3/28/08
Drilling holes in the frame is a pain in the ass, especially big 1/2" holes. This 1/2" bridge reame...

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345 hits | 71.64 KB | Posted: 3/29/08
Test fit coils to verify ride height. Brand new coils put in place for the first time, 20" compress...

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355 hits | 71.77 KB | Posted: 3/29/08
Full droop, 26". Clearly they will droop more when the full weight of the axle is on them.

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358 hits | 64.81 KB | Posted: 4/10/08
External axle tube seals.

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346 hits | 38.67 KB | Posted: 4/10/08
Started working on the bolt in frame boxes. I was kind of dreading the upper mounts for these, but ...

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376 hits | 59.74 KB | Posted: 4/10/08
You can see that I needed to but weld an extension onto the angle that I used to fab these frame box...

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387 hits | 56.28 KB | Posted: 4/10/08
Once it's in place I center punched the bolt holes for drilling.

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381 hits | 69.8 KB | Posted: 4/10/08
Cut some spacers from 1/2" pipe.

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341 hits | 60.74 KB | Posted: 4/10/08
Bolted in place. The upper bolts go all the way through and have a spacer in between the box and the...

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371 hits | 57.94 KB | Posted: 4/10/08
Here is a good shot of the inside of the frame box and how everything is bolted together.

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417 hits | 68.65 KB | Posted: 4/10/08

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338 hits | 67.25 KB | Posted: 4/10/08
You can see that there is a LOT more stuff to contend with on the drivers side. Fuel lines, brake l...

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343 hits | 64 KB | Posted: 4/27/08
Hole drilled in radius arm mount for through frame brake fitting.

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318 hits | 59.71 KB | Posted: 4/27/08
Makes a nice mount for the AN3 flex lines to the caliper.

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340 hits | 30.53 KB | Posted: 4/27/08
Back side of radius arm mount. This trough frame adapter has a 1/8"NPT fitting on the back side, wh...

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366 hits | 71.57 KB | Posted: 4/27/08
Ran a 3/16" hard line to the splitter block where the single brake line drop is going to come down. ...

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316 hits | 72.62 KB | Posted: 4/27/08
Trac bar fabbed and painted. It's 36 3/8" center to center if I recall.

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330 hits | 72.89 KB | Posted: 4/27/08
Started working on my trac bar mount. With misalignment spacers the 7/8" heim mounting width is 2",...

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357 hits | 70.12 KB | Posted: 4/27/08
When selecting a trac bar bolt make sure you use one that is long enough to let the shoulder of the ...

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334 hits | 74.15 KB | Posted: 4/27/08
Sawed out a 1.75" hole to allow the heim room to pivot.

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337 hits | 71.1 KB | Posted: 4/27/08
Sawed out the bottom of the hole.

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325 hits | 68.52 KB | Posted: 4/27/08
Heim in the trac bar mount

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341 hits | 71.37 KB | Posted: 4/27/08
Side view

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330 hits | 45.61 KB | Posted: 4/30/08
I've noticed that some coil buckets have this thing at the bottom and some don't. Why is it there? ...

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322 hits | 74.09 KB | Posted: 4/30/08
Tacked the upper mount into place just for mock up. I think it's ultimately going to need to be abo...

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408 hits | 69.75 KB | Posted: 4/30/08

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353 hits | 68.24 KB | Posted: 4/30/08
Here's my lower mount.

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334 hits | 63.85 KB | Posted: 4/30/08

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339 hits | 68.6 KB | Posted: 4/30/08
Mocked up on the axle, not even tack welded in place yet.

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357 hits | 68.29 KB | Posted: 4/30/08

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353 hits | 58.74 KB | Posted: 4/30/08

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358 hits | 70.1 KB | Posted: 5/4/08
I decided to make a bolt on upper trac bar mount instead of welding one on. You can see here where ...

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386 hits | 41.42 KB | Posted: 5/4/08
This preexisting hole on the cross member also gets drilled out for mounting the trac bar mount brac...

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363 hits | 66.26 KB | Posted: 5/4/08
Trac bar mount tacked together,

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351 hits | 60.27 KB | Posted: 5/4/08
Here is a better shot of the three mounting holes.

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349 hits | 50.69 KB | Posted: 5/4/08
Upper trac bar mount brace. Note the 28° angle, which is to match the slope of the engine cross ...

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321 hits | 68.79 KB | Posted: 5/4/08
All welded up and sand blasted, ready for paint.

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320 hits | 68.47 KB | Posted: 5/4/08

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340 hits | 67.82 KB | Posted: 5/4/08

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329 hits | 72.94 KB | Posted: 5/4/08

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369 hits | 68.14 KB | Posted: 5/4/08
Painted

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353 hits | 67.05 KB | Posted: 5/4/08
Mounted

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356 hits | 69.32 KB | Posted: 5/4/08

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358 hits | 73.97 KB | Posted: 5/4/08

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355 hits | 61.71 KB | Posted: 5/4/08
I do think it's a little ugly from this angle though. I'm thinking of removing this area with the p...

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356 hits | 69.9 KB | Posted: 5/6/08
I should have taken a pic of this before I painted it because you really can't see it here, but the ...

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349 hits | 73.22 KB | Posted: 5/6/08
Coils and shocks mounted, I used Bilstein 5150's, mounted for 5" up travel and 9" down.

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364 hits | 58.07 KB | Posted: 5/6/08
Outer axle tube seal packed with grease and ready to install. You just pack them with grease, put s...

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363 hits | 62.06 KB | Posted: 5/6/08
Outer axle tube seal installed.

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399 hits | 68.2 KB | Posted: 5/6/08
And at long last...the truck NOT SITTING ON JACK STANDS IN MY DRIVEWAY!

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403 hits | 67.39 KB | Posted: 5/6/08

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417 hits | 63.78 KB | Posted: 5/6/08

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399 hits | 70.52 KB | Posted: 5/6/08

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412 hits | 71.34 KB | Posted: 5/6/08
Trac bar and drag link 1/2 degree off!

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438 hits | 72.03 KB | Posted: 5/8/08
Did I mention that my rear springs are very worn out? The do flex well though.

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418 hits | 73.87 KB | Posted: 5/8/08

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470 hits | 73.81 KB | Posted: 5/8/08

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958 hits | 72.84 KB | Posted: 5/8/08

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511 hits | 73.02 KB | Posted: 5/8/08

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447 hits | 74.28 KB | Posted: 5/8/08

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401 hits | 68.55 KB | Posted: 5/8/08
The axles umbilical cord with the vent tube, ARB air line, and center drop brake line.

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383 hits | 67.05 KB | Posted: 5/8/08

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407 hits | 73.67 KB | Posted: 5/8/08