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Help figuring out my lift

Mike406Jimmy

Mike406Jimmy

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Hey everyone, I looked through the search engine trying a few combinations of key words and haven't been successful so I humbly come to you with my first post.

I have a 1977 GMC Jimmy I recently bought and it has what appears to be a 6" pro comp lift but I'm not sure and don't know how to tell. I am wanting to upgrade my front shocks being as the shafts are very old appearing with rust/pitting out. I measured my spring eye to eye at it is 48" long and the pro comp explorer shock measured 19 1/2" inches eye to eye installed at what I'm guessing is roughly half compressed (correct me if I'm wrong). The rear leaf measured 52" the shock is 24" eye to eye and I have 4" blocks in the rear. I'd like to replace the front shocks first with bilstein 5100 series shocks but want to make sure I buy the correct length and valving for my rig. I would like to go for as much travel as possible with my setup. I am also open to the idea of upgrading to ford shock towers to increase my useable travel. I'm not caged on 35" tires with a 33" spare on the back and a small block 406 so I should be around stock weight still.
Thanks in advance Any and all input is appreciated.
 
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Okay so with 12" between the top of my axle tube and the bottom of my frame, and 8" being stock height I have a 4" lift.
 
So to maximize your articulation you must flex test without shocks. Preferably no other limitation either. Looks like your brake lines are decent. In the rear often times the e brake cables limit travel.

Flex it ( fork lift, engine hoist, rti ramp, loading dock). Just what ever you use has to be enough to force you to lift a tire. And remember when flexing you are measuring opposite ends. In order to fully articulate the front you need to lift each back tire. To fully articulate the front you have to lift each rear tire

Measure and order accordingly
 
Yes the front brake lines are extended and came with the lift kit. I don't know about my E-brake though, it hasn't worked since I bought the truck lol I'll have to pull out the engine hoist and test my flex. And to clarify, in order to check the articulation of let's say my front drivers side wheel I would remove the shock and lift the rear passenger side of the truck until the front left does what?
 
So lift passenger rear to check compression on drivers front and rebound ( droop) on passenger front.

I tend to do all 4 corners cause things can be different side to side.

With engine hoist remember hoist on its heaviest setting and if your doing it with the wheel and tire on be careful the hoist arm doesn't hit the wheel well lip.

I have used this method dozens of times but I have seen a couple guys who ruined their engine hoist and very nearly ruined themselves cause they weren't careful
 
Thanks for the heads up! Would it be better to just remove the wheel then? And I'm not sure if I'm understanding quite what to measure. You said "opposite ends" Am I measuring the distance between eyes to see the minimum and maximums? Sorry I'm a newbie
 
The easiest thing to do is find an old wheel and loop or weld chain to it. Then just bolt the old wheel on

I'm gonna have to take pics next time I do it.

Trying to find your minimum and maximum distance between shock mounts. Also a great time to look for other limiting factors.

Finding those distances will tell you if you need to extend your shock mounts. Or if your stock mounts will work.

Every shock specced by a lift kit limits your rebound ( droop) by quite a bit.
 
I had to go back through Zims build thread but here is a pic using an engine hoist to flex the suspension



What I would consider the correct way to do it
 
and in your pic you have swaybar disconnects .

remove the pins and this will get more flex . then reconnect for street driving .

should be a little bracket on 1 side to swing the bar up to and pin it in to hold it up/out of the way .

just cause it has brand X shocks don't mean its same brand lift parts .
 
Thanks for the tip I wouldn't have known about the disconnects otherwise. I'll check for the bracket it should mount to when I get home from work. I'm curious to compare the articulation improvement from before and after removing the sway bar. Also can you tell me about the shock that runs parallel across the front axle, it's not looking the best either and I'm wondering if I should go ahead and replace it when I do my front shocks
 
steering dampener on the axle . its not a reg shock . its built different inside .

if it look crappy change it . wont hurt to do that .
 
Any recommendations on brand or is it something that any generic replacement will do just fine?
 
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