Finally starting the install

[moop]

got my 6" fabtech lift for my 03 2500hd ccsb, so it's time to install

yes, there is still a little bit of snow and ice


yet another makeshift torsion bar tool, this one made from a u-joint extractor



this is where i ended it for the day.. all of that oil is from the steering box, new one comes in on monday to install while it's all apart
will post pics as i do more to it.. snowing today so not going to touch it

[gwhunter350]

nice Man, cant wait to see it finished!

[Jons92]

Dam that's got to suck installing that in the snow! But, it'll look good when it's done

[gwhunter350]

did you knock the torsion bars out yet?

[moop]

well the snow stopped for a little bit today, so i took a go at the torsion bars

the driver side torsion bar popped out within about 2mins of hitting it with a hammer

the passenger side bested me after about 45mins of smacking it with the hammer, then the snow started blowing a bit too much to keep going


couple more pics of the improvised tbar tool :P




working with snow around isnt too bad..it's been about 5degrees celsius.. hopefully it's clear tomorrow so i can keep going at it

[Ivan D.]

Hey, I replace ball joints in my truck with white fluff flying around and burying my tools, I feel your pain on that. For that torsion bar, would it be unwise to use a MAPP torch to heat the key up a bit, so hopefully it loosens its grip on the torsion bar? You're not heating up the bar itself, just the key, and you're not shooting for it to start glowing orange, so I'd think that may work?

[moop]

Hey, I replace ball joints in my truck with white fluff flying around and burying my tools, I feel your pain on that. For that torsion bar, would it be unwise to use a MAPP torch to heat the key up a bit, so hopefully it loosens its grip on the torsion bar? You're not heating up the bar itself, just the key, and you're not shooting for it to start glowing orange, so I'd think that may work?

i'm almost at that point now, i sprayed the crap out of it with penetrating fluid again today. then beat on it for a good hgalf hour
gave up on that and grabbed a SDSMax drill with a chisel bit and hammered with that for a bit with no luck either. would have used an air chisel, but no air compressor near this driveway:P

i'm still a little iffy about heating it up though, last thing i need is a bill for another tbar

[moop]

well i went at it for most of the afternoon with little to no progress


taking off the lower arms



arms and one bar off



that damn torsion bar that i hate so much, i heated the crap out of the key with mapp gas, didnt help
cant take the crossmember out with the tbar and key still in because it hits the dual 3" exhaust pipes directly above

anyone have some tricks for getting the bars out besides smacking the crap out of them?

[Black90Sport]

i had to loosen the cross member, lay down and kick it to get the key off and bar out.

[moop]

i've tried everything to get the crossmember out with the bar and key still in it. the crossmember is already unbolted

the crossmember holding up the allison transmission limits the movement of the torsion bar

so here's what i just tried this afternoon
stuck a few pieces of scrap metal together plus a 4ton bottle jack and voila:




and it bested me again.. maybe i'll try a 20,000lbs jack :P

[gwhunter350]

you still cant get it out? Holy **** im praying i dont have this issue

[moop]

yeah, i'm almost tempted to cut the bar and get a new one
when the fresh snow melts off, i'll try beating the crap out of it again.
the end of the tbar it even dented in at this point

[gwhunter350]

i wonder why that is....

its almost sounding like thats your only option, but you might want to get two new ones if thats the case

[moop]

well i took another approach.
i cut the rivets off that held the crossmemeber mounting brackets in place so i could just pull the whole thing backwards and extract the tbar on the ground



i was thinking the little bottle jack was about to give, then the tbar shot out and flew up a few inches


pic of the side of the crossmember partially crushed by my tool thing.. doesnt seem like it'll misalign the key though


pic of the undamaged side

now that that's over with i can continue with the work :)

[blackknight]

Wow damn, im glad when i did my keys a while back it wasnt that hard. mine came out with little or no fuss.

keep us updated on the progress its gonna look killer when you are done

[gwhunter350]

well congrats on getting the tbar out

loking forward to seeing more progress!

[moop]

Wow damn, im glad when i did my keys a while back it wasnt that hard. mine came out with little or no fuss.

keep us updated on the progress its gonna look killer when you are done

it's getting painted flat black and front windows are getting tinted :)

[gwhunter350]

i really hope you mean the wheels and not the truck

[moop]

black wheels are in the mail already
but yeah, the truck is going flat black, maybe not completely flat.. just not shiny
i dont like washing vehicles trying to keep them all shiny :P

[gwhunter350]

IMO