High steer and pitman arm

[tech180]

Well I need some advice. I only have maybe 3" of space between the pitman arm and my tie rod. I can put my tie rod on the bottom of my steering arms just under the leaf springs and that will give me an extra 3 inches, but the pitman arm could still come in contact with my leaf springs. I am thinking it may be time to relocate the steering box forward on the frame but thats not going to be fun... at all.

 

[MTBLAZER89]

What pitman arm is that?

I could hit mine too before I bump stopped my springs, but I would negative arch my springs to do it.

How much clearance is there between the leafs and the tie rod if you ran it underneath?

You could switch to a TRE on the pitman arm end of the draglink. I guess unless its already drilled for a heim

 

[tech180]

What pitman arm is that?

I could hit mine too before I bump stopped my springs, but I would negative arch my springs to do it.

How much clearance is there between the leafs and the tie rod if you ran it underneath?

You could switch to a TRE on the pitman arm end of the draglink. I guess unless its already drilled for a heim

It clears the leaf springs, just barely. I have half inch spacers on there. I measured how much space I got from the leaf spring to the pitman arm without the tie rod there and its only 5". I am starting to lean towards ditching the leaf springs and linking it, and also finding a shorter pitman arm.

Any recommendations on a where to get a shorter pitman arm?

 

[MTBLAZER89]

I run WFO on one truck and I think ORD on the other they are real similar at a glance.

Do you know what yours is?

Superlift 1104 is the part number most use I believe. Changing to a TRE on that end will give you a bit more clearance at the spring as well.

 

[tech180]

I run WFO on one truck and I think ORD on the other they are real similar at a glance.

Do you know what yours is?

Superlift 1104 is the part number most use I believe. Changing to a TRE on that end will give you a bit more clearance at the spring as well.

I wish I knew what arm it was, there is no visible markings to identify it. Looks like that super lift arm is 7" long, I will go measure mine and see how long it is.

 

[MTBLAZER89]

You could bump stop your up travel to solve the pitman arm interference since your springs prolly shouldn't go much higher than that anyway.

You could try moving the tie rod underneath and see if that solves the other.

 

[tech180]

You could bump stop your up travel to solve the pitman arm interference since your springs prolly shouldn't go much higher than that anyway.

You could try moving the tie rod underneath and see if that solves the other.

shoot, well my pitman arms measures the same as the super lift one.

Yeah, that would work but I was hoping for more flex, specially with the 15" shocks im running.

I can get the tie rod below and that would get it out of the way, but will still hit the leaf springs when tucking the wheels in the fenders.

 

[tech180]

Is there a 4" to 6" long pitman arm out there anyone knows of?

 

[MTBLAZER89]

Well you shouldn't go farther up travel than where your springs get flat. Going past there is bad for them . My up travel is bump stopped before I hit my arm and I run 15" shocks and use almost all of them. About 3" up and 10 down with an extra inch on each end.

If your tie rod clears that clearance should stay pretty good throughout. As the suspension moves up so will the knuckle. It will change through the steering arc though. Move it below and cycle steering on the ground.

 

[tech180]

Yeah, I guess your right. I will give this a try and flex it out and see if all is good.

 

[Fred_M1010]

Is there a 4" to 6" long pitman arm out there anyone knows of?

Yes, I use a dropped pitman arm from a Jeep TJ/YJ, and it's 5.5" long and also has less drop than the superlift 1104 (don't recall exactly how much).
It needs to get the indexing tabs removed and the hole reamed out some.
But if you get it from WFO they've already done that for you.

But first check how long your steering arm is.
With hi-steer it's a big risk that it's so long, so you wouldn't get lock to lock steering with a pitman arm that short...
It shouldn't be much more than 6" with that pitman arm.

I'd change to a regular DLE to get some more clearance.
With a pitman arm with less drop, you might need a bent drag link to clear the engine crossmember btw.

 

[tech180]

So I installed some easy inches I had laying around to get clearance for the tie rod to go on the bottom of the steering arms. I also flipped the bolt around on the drag link. I have 5 to 6" of clearance now. I guess I need to fab up some bump stops.