14bolt shaved and ready to hang, One quick question?

[KYJ10]

IUm getting ready to bolt up the newly shaved 14FF to my J10. I know the old Ubolts will not be wide enough, so won't I need a wider plate for the top of the springs too? Im thinking that I won't be able to use the exsisting ones. And which ones and where can I get some for finishing up this projest? Thanks, Dennis

[Bob Barry]

You'll need a wider plate. You can fab your own out of 3/8" thick steel, or get one for a Chevy rear axle.

[scotty]

until i found a set of factory rear ones,i was gonna hog out the holes on a couple of extra front plates. the side that the pumkin sits on is fatter,so if ya have 2 of them extra you could do that smile.gif or make em like dr bob suggested

for me,i hate drilling holes more than any other aspect of fabricating things,so it would be worth it to me to scrounge some wrecking yards to find a see of factroy ones...

[sandmanb]

when are you going to hang it? if you can wait a few days i can most likely get you a set.

[tuck]

yeah, shouldn't be hard to find some chevy u-bolts and plates... I just used the ones that came with my 14 bolt

[FSJeeper]

offroaddesigns.com has a ubolt/plate flip kit that flips the ubolt ends and plates above 14 bolt giving you more ground clearance and no chance of dogging up your ubolt ends. I think I paid $50 for my set and they work perfect. It includes the ubolts and plates. No brainer deal if you ask me.

[scotty]

FSJeeper,are you running yours SUA?

i believe he is running his in the fatory SOA maner,so the u bolt plates and nuts are allready above the axle smile.gif

[KYJ10]

Brian, you got mail!!!!!

[FSJeeper]

SOA, Stock 14 bolts have the plates on the bottom with the square u bolts going across the top of the spring with a little retainer and the ubolt ends facing straight down to get caught on everything.

The ORD kit flips this back to the exact same excellent setup the FSJ has in the rear.

[scotty]

i have never seen that setup before :eek:

mine came from a late 70s,2wd 3/4 ton pickup that had the u bolts pointing upwards.

what years have you seen that setup on? all the late 70s,early 80s junk i scrounge parts from has had the same setup that we allready have with upward facing u bolts.

[tuck]

mine came from a 1980 3/4 ton 4wd, plates are on top of the axle...

[FSJeeper]

OK, maybe it is a one ton thing. Every CUCV 1.25 ton truck I have bought has the ubolts facing down.

[Madd Ramm]

I know I am new to the board, but I have gone through this myself.

I forgot to get the plates with my 3/4 14bolt FF, and it was a '79 witht the u-bolts point up. What I did was go to a junkyard where they had some 15 passenger vans and grabbed a set of plates off of a D70 for $5! They have aprox. same diameter tube so they work great! Then, I had a local truck/machine shop custom make me some u-bolts bent for a 3.5" tube so they could wrap around the bottom. That cost me like $30.

Basicallly, any spring plate that goes over the top of the springs and is for a 3.5" tube will work perfectly! And u-bolts can be made easily by many differen't shops....just gotta ask around.

[Stuka]

The reversed u-bolt setup (bolt ends facing down, with plate under axle) is stronger. Which s why it was used that way on the 1.25T but not the 3/4's. You see that setup a lot a in heavier duty trucks.

[tuck]

indeed, it's a 1 ton thing