leveling kit for 1997 tahoe

On 2005-11-28 16:55, cummins freak wrote:
turn up the torsion bars

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I agree!!! :silly: Join the club. I gave mine a few turns on my truck. Nothing drastic, just to bring it up 1-2". Mine sees other than pavement (come on, PAVEMENT SUCKS), but the difference versus stock, isn't going to make my CVs or balljoints go to hell in the next few months. I've put 40k mi since I adjusted them, plus however many mi they had on them before that (I second owner of truck) and there are no signs of failure. I also cranked them on a '01 F150 my family has. It now has 100K mi and all original front parts.
The ride is the same. It feels the same, not stiffer like I have heard people say. I can't understand how it is to make your truck ride stiff. Think of a coil spring, then put a spacer on it (like a little kit for a dodge). The spring rate didn't change any. but the ride height did. Same principle for a torsion bar. By cranking the bolt on the key, you are changing the position of the key. Your not magically changing the spring rate of the torsion bar. You are simply moving one end of it.

Oh yeah, make sure you turn the bolts the same amount for each side.

On 2005-11-30 23:44, cummins freak wrote:


you are putting more pressure on the "spring" forcing it to hold up the truck so the truck will not have as much give or travel

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More pressure how, the truck still weighs the same; so there is the same amount of force on the torsion bar (other than the difference in the leverage caused by the angle difference of the lower A-arm from stock to cranked, which isn't much). By cranking up the torsion bar, you allow the bar to be twisted farther before you hit the bumpstop, so it would take more weight or a larger force to be able hit the bumpstop. But that doesn't mean the spring rate was increased, you just need to twist the bar more to bottom out.

You can't magically change spring rates. As you stretch/compress/twist a spring from its resting place, the further you go, the harder it becomes. Sit on your tailgate and the truck squats a little bit, put some more people on it and it squats more. Yeah everybody will agree with that... So if you put a 4" block on the rear axle, and you sit on your tailgate, will it still squat the same amount as it did without the 4" block? oke:

By putting a spacer above the coil on a dodge increase the spring rate?! "No", you just moved the spring down. And once again it will just take more force to hit the bumpstop because you are going to compress the spring further than you would stock. But your factory spring characteristics remain the same.

The truck will have more compression travel, and less 'droop' from its setteled position.

That's my theory and I'm stickin to it!