Box Drop, Part 2

The easy part, the flipping of the leafs, is just that--easy! Drop the U-bolts and stock spring perches, and then remove the leafs at the shackle hangers.

Here, the rearend was being supported by a floor jack while the truck itself was secured on a lift; two pairs of jackstands would suffice.

The Belltech kit included the new spring perches and lower plates, as well as the U-bolts, hardware, and Nitro gas-charged shock absorbers.

You can see that the stock overload spring was left in tact; it had no bearing on the height of the rearend, and as it turned out, did not make the rear suspension overly stiff.

Finally, Performance Online decided that this was the opportune time to try their new cross-drilled brake drums along with a complete brake rebuild kit from Raybestos.

Although you can't "visually appreciate" the drilled drums like you do disc rotors, you will appreciate the advantage of improved stopping and cooler brakes.

The Raybestos rebuild kit consisted of ceramic-coated linings, new wheel cylinders, and all-new hardware.

For some people (like this writer), R&R'ing drum brakes is like figuring out a Rubik's Cube! For Aaron, it took approximately 7 minutes to go from this...

...to this. Some minor alteration had to be done on the backing plates where the wheel cylinders mounted (the ear tabs were bent back for clearance), but other than that, it was a breeze.

The effort put forth to lower the rear was nothing compared to the front...then again, you're not dealing with stubborn tie-rod ends, ball joints, alignment, etc. Nevertheless, thanks to Performance Online and Belltech, our "better-left-alone" work truck is coming along quite nicely! With greatly improved handling and stopping characteristics, our swap meet/junkyard runs are much, much more enjoyable now!