Flipping the 2nd leaf spring and bolting it ontop of the 1st leaf spring?

[lvin4jc]

I'm working with a '62 F100 here. It had 6 leafs up front (I-beam axle) stock, I took out the bottom three and dropped the front end a few inches, but of course I want more. I have fully researched flipping the axle, MII setups, dropped axles and drop leafs, however I have other things that i'd rather spend what little money I have on.

I ran across an idea that sounds reasonable enough, basically a poor mans way of accomplishing a reverse eyed main leaf. The idea is to take out the 2nd leaf, flip it upside down and bolt it down on top of the main leaf. That way you still have the strength/support of the same number of leaves (3 in my case) but it flattens out or lowers the leaf pack and therefore the location of the spring eyes.

Maybe this is an old trick and some of you more, um... "seasoned" rodders will know any pro's or con's with this setup. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

- Joe -

 

[HOT40ROD]

Never herd of it before but I could not see how it would not work. They are spring steal and should be able to bend either way.

 

[rainman]

Thats one I havn't heard of either, keep us posted if you try it.
I'm not entirely sure I understand what you're saying, but it does sound reasonable!!

 

[lvin4jc]

Good, I didn't see any drawbacks either, I think I will try it, i'll take pics through the process and post 'em up, along with what it does to the ride height. I love cheap mods that actually work!

 

[fuzz]

I had a 64 F100 that I did this same thing to it. Flipping the main leaf dropped it down on the bump stops and gave me no suspension travel. I had to put it back stock. What I suggest is do some measuring before you do all that work and have to do it twice like I did. The truck looks real good in your avatar, I'm just sayin...

 

[lvin4jc]

I had a 64 F100 that I did this same thing to it. Flipping the main leaf dropped it down on the bump stops and gave me no suspension travel. I had to put it back stock. What I suggest is do some measuring before you do all that work and have to do it twice like I did. The truck looks real good in your avatar, I'm just sayin...

The truck in my avatar isn't mine, it's a photochop of Sam Fear's '63

Your response came about 30 minutes too late I already did one side and guess what? It's sitting on the bump stop... I flipped the third, in my case bottom, spring because the 2nd spring is longer than the space between the eyes of the main leaf and I didn't want to cut it.

While I was under there I noticed why my truck has a little lean to the passenger's side. The rancher that owned it before me must have replaced the driver's side spring with one from something else. The rear eye is almost twice the size of the other one and the shackle on the front is just strap metal with two holes in it, it's not like the stock one on the pass. side.

The main leaf on that side even looks a little thicker than the pass. side. When you jack the truck up by the bumper the spring pack on the pass. side flexes a lot more than the bigger one on the driver's side.

I would love to go with mono leafs but I wouldn't love to spend $400+ and then ship them. So what I may do is switch the spring I just flipped back to the way it was and take the bottom 3rd spring out of the driver's side alltogether. I'm guessing that 3 springs on the pass. side and two on the driver's side with the thicker main leaf will give me a lower than stock ride that's level from side to side.

It won't be as low as I want but it may be as low as I can afford...

It will also make my drag link almost perfectly level (the steering box end was higher than the pitman arm end originally) and should avoid bumpsteer. And I really think that if I flip the front axle itself i'll be right back on the bump stops again even if I put all the leaves back in, plus all the leaves rides like a conestoga wagon.

 

[lvin4jc]

I decided to pull the bottom spring out on the driver's side out leaving two springs, one of them being the thicker main spring. My plan was to get that set and then change/add springs to the pass. side until it leveled out. Well, once i pulled that spring, bolted it back together and let 'er down now that side's resting on the bump stop too.

I'm done with her for the day, had about all the fun I can handle for one day. The good news is now it sits pretty level from side to side and it his a nice little rake to it with the bottom of the front bumper 11" off the ground. This truck has both rubber bump stops and a half leaf that sticks up and to the rear of the axle with a plastic anti-squeak piece on it, sort of an overload spring once you bottom out? The part that rubs the frame is about 2" above the top of the leaf pack.

My question is this, since I like the look and i'll put very few miles on this, is leaving it on the bump stops an option? The shocks are most certainly doing nothing at this point, so once I replace them, maybe with air shocks would leaving it this low still cause problems? Take the bump stops off? Suggestions?