When I purchased my
first diesel truck, my goal was aimed at towing the toy hauler to the dunes
without a struggle. The Duramax engine with the Allision transmission took
on this task with no hesitation. In stock form it towed great, but I felt it
was lacking in the suspension and off-road capabilities. This truck is a
daily driver, as well as a tow rig. I needed it to ride better on the bouncy
California freeways, tow a heavy load and, be capable while off-road. This
truck is not the typical pavement queen, it will see off-road action! The
OEM heavy duty suspension was stiff and the narrow tires were not to my
standards. I decided to add a lift kit and wider tires to make it fit my
needs. After lots of research, I decided to use the California Super Trucks
(CST) lift along with Fox Racing Shox. Since CST started in
1996, they have designed and developed a lift kit for just about any truck.
Plenty of research and development goes into their kits. All of this R&D is evident in the quality parts and the off-road trucks they build.
Take a look at their web site and drool over some of their race/show trucks.
Amazing stuff! One thing that stood out to me about their lift was the one
piece sub-frame and the replacement upper control arms. With these
components and dropping the factory suspension down a true 6?, the CST lift
kit offers strength and durability. Keeping the stock angles on the
tie-rods and front axles ensures no extra wear and tear on these components
which means no extra costs in the future. Other great features include
supported upper control arm drop mounts, heavy duty steering drop down
brackets with heim jointed support links (link to
heim.jpg) , and, for my application with 4 wheel drive, the
differential is dropped down a full 6?. 
To keep this truck riding smooth, we chose CST?s dual shock hoop in the
front with Fox Racing Shox with the added reservoirs. In the rear end we
opted for a taller leaf spring (link to
spring_compare.jpg) rather than lift blocks. We felt this would help
with less axle wrap, as well as enabling better off-road capabilities. The
leaf springs are actually for a ½ ton truck. This worked out well for us as
it made a huge difference in how it rode on the freeway.
I also needed this truck to
be able to tow a heavy load and these springs alone couldn?t handle the job.
I decided to install a set of Firestone air bags with a compressor. This kit
comes with detailed instructions and I was able to do the complete install
in a couple of hours. The compressor is very handy and allows me to adjust
the amount of air on the fly. I replaced the stock rear shocks with a set of
Fox Racing Shox to compliment the front. The Fox Racing Shox has
proven to work great both on-roads, as well as off-road. Fox has been a long
time leader in the shock industry. Back in 1974, Bob Fox first used a
prototype air shock on a Maico dirtbike. Since then they have become huge
in the off-road industry for everything from mountain bikes to high dollar
desert race cars. Fox races what they sell and can be seen at just about
every off-road race testing and improving their design. For this truck we used
 four
8? shocks with reservoirs in the front and two 12? units in the rear. These
are the 2.0 non-coil over models. The 2.0 models feature a smooth bore
seamless alloy body, a high-flow/large bore damping piston with high quality
valve shims, is nitrogen gas pressurized, has Teflon lined steel spherical
bearings, billet aluminum end caps and are can be easily rebuilt by the
customer. Fox assembles everything inhouse and ships to it?s distributors. I
had Empire Motorsports sent a set of their beefy, polished aluminum
reservoir clamps for the front shocks. These are larger than most clamps and
only 1 is needed for each reservoir. Other items to make this
project come to life include the KMC XD325 wheels. These are 17? in diameter and 9.5? wide. They feature a large
reinforcement ring on the outside of the wheel with a smaller one on the
inside. For tires we used a set of 35x12.5x17 Pro Comp A/T?s. Since this
truck would be used primarily on the road and in the sand, I chose the all
terrain tire. These tires are not overly noisy on the road and work
extremely well in the sand. This wheel and tire combination looks great, as
well as providing a strong footprint on the ground. 
I had the lift kit
installed at Off-Road Warehouse in Escondido, CA. Jesse ?the man? Martinez
did most of the work. Jessie has installed just about every type of lift kit
on the market. He made numerous comments on how well the CST kit was made
and how well everything fit together. One thing he really liked was how all
the hardware for the kit was in marked bags. Lots of time was saved by not
having to hunt for the right bolt. Without going into a
step by step process of the lift I will touch on some highlights. Obviously
the 1st thing is to remove all the stock components
(link to onthelift_lrg.jpg) like wheels, the front and rear suspension components and the steering and
differential brackets. Jesse also had to cut out the stock bump stops.
(link to cut.jpg). Once everything is
removed, it?s time to install the good stuff! Jesse started by installing the 1 piece sub-frame (link to sub-frame.jpg). Once that is in place, the steering components get bolted in along with the
upper control arm drop down brackets and the control arms. The lower
control arms are bolted to the one piece sub-frame. Once everything was
tightened up, Jesse installed the OEM spindles, (link to spindle.jpg) brakes and the dual shock hoops. In the rear end the process is pretty straight forward.
The OEM leaf springs are replaced with the taller spring packs. The FOX Shox
are installed and everything is bolted back together. It turns out the spacers on the end
of the shocks were too narrow. The Off-Road Warehouse crew were able to make
some new spacers that fit perfectly. The last step is to install the wheels
and tires, align the front end and it?s finished! I want to extend a huge
thanks to Jessie and the Off-Road Warehouse crew for the fantastic job they
did! Since the addition of
the lift kit I have put the truck through some serious testing. On the
freeway it does still bounce somewhat but is still much better than stock.
Off-road the ride is amazing! The Fox Racing Shox offer a very plush ride
and the taller leaf springs allow the rear axle to articulate on uneven
terrain. The wider tires seem to float over the sand, where as the narrow
stock tires would seem to dig in. After a few moths of
driving with the lift kit installed I decided to try a sway
 bar.
The truck felt pretty stable, but I felt I could improve that with the
addition of a Frederico Racing rear sway bar (link to
swaybar_kit.jpg) . Some say a sway bar on an off-road truck is not
necessary, but our truck is mostly used for towing. This sway bar is made of
solid 1 ¼? 4140 chromoly and it bolts in with no modifications needed. Once
installed, I immediately noticed a difference just pulling out of the
parking lot. It turns out I never really realized how much body roll this
truck had. Making tight turns or even changing lanes on the freeway, I
noticed that the truck felt much more stable. So much so, that I now noticed
that the front end felt ?tippy? even though it comes with a sway bar from
the factory. I decided to install Frederico racings front sway bar as well.
The OEM sway bar is a 1 ½? hollow bar where was the Frederico bar is solid
chromoly. You can expect a 10-15% increase in roll stiffness by upgrading to
a solid bar of the same diameter and geometry. Over all I am very
pleased with everything that was added to this truck. It looks great and performs even better. Towing close to 12,000 pounds the
truck is very stable even with the taller ride height. But I?m not finished
with this truck! By adding the larger tires I reduced the gas mileage as
well as the gear ratio which means less power. 
Stay tuned for more goodies and more power! CST Performance Suspension
http://www.californiasupertrucks.com/ Fox Shox
http://www.foxracingshox.com Pro-Comp Tires
http://www.procomptires.com/ KMC Wheels
http://www.kmcwheels.com/ Off-Road Warehouse
http://www.offroadwarehouse.com/ Firestone Air Bags
http://www.firestone.com Frederico Racing
http://www.fredericoracing.com
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