Bastard DIY leaf pack question

Awright, so I'm planning on assembling leaf packs from an assortment of donors...

a pair of OME JC1A main leafs

my current packs w/3" aal's and broken mains

another pair of stock xj packs

grand waggy rear packs...

The object will be to toss my 3" blocks and still keep my 7-8".
How many leaves are "too many"
Is it better to go less and re-arch?
Will it be a soft or hard ride?
Flex?

It'll be seeing a lot of DD highway & street w/the occasional monthly wheeling

Does anyone have a link to a write-up?

thanks

I wouldn't do more than 7 or 8 leafs, and whatever you do be sure to keep the friction way down. you can use special paint for this, or there are poly liners that go the full length of the leafs.

I would shoot for 7 of the thinnest, most arched leafs, hope for 5 inches or so, then get the extra lift from relocating the rear shackle. search for CRASH's rear shackle setup.

Hmmm.... I might be able to eeek by then, I'm already running 1.5" lift shackles. Worst case scenario, I can hack the blocks down to 1"

I had 9-11 leaves in my old packs, and have 7-8 leaves in my current packs. The Nationals that everyone liked so well had 11 leaves, but they were thinner. You can have many leaves, just make sure the lengths are evenly spaced and the friction is minimized. I've had very good luck with full length liners, that way you don't have to worry about cutting the leaves down and loosing the hole in the end for the plastic friction pad (it's a bitch to drill through spring steel).

If you use the liners and a lot of leaves, I strongly recommend that you get new, larger 9/16" U-bolts.

Friction liners and friction paint... Where to find them? Any good sources?

I found liners at a hot-rod website, do some searching too, people have posted about what kind of special paint

Gil BullyKatz said:

Friction liners and friction paint... Where to find them? Any good sources?

Click to expand...

Probably a better term would be "anti-friction" ... I went to John Deere and picked up some Graphite "Slip" Paint to use on mine. It was ~$5-$6 a can. For liners, I use some strips of .075" polyethylene and cut them to length. I painted them with the Slip Paint too. You would be able to get this through McMaster Carr ... IIRC, you can even buy several grades of Teflon or Nylon through them if you like.

So far, this stuff has held up and works great.

Les

Good post. I need to get rid of my sagging home made dorked up spring packs I got. I would like to make another set. Let me know what you used.

I have always had a 'bastard' setup of some type on the rear of my heeps.
Currently, I use a light duty OME main, an OME aal, and the bottom of a JC1A pack, with an RE shackle. They have developed a hint of wrap as they break in, but I will fix that with the new perches. These packs will droop my OME long travel shocks to their limit, without much trouble. In fact, when on a lift, the heep rises a foot and a half before the wheels leave the ground.
You do your own Frankenstein research Gil, just like everyone else does.

bgcntry72 said:

I have always had a 'bastard' setup of some type on the rear of my heeps.
Currently, I use a light duty OME main, an OME aal, and the bottom of a JC1A pack, with an RE shackle. They have developed a hint of wrap as they break in, but I will fix that with the new perches. These packs will droop my OME long travel shocks to their limit, without much trouble. In fact, when on a lift, the heep rises a foot and a half before the wheels leave the ground.
You do your own Frankenstein research Gil, just like everyone else does.

Click to expand...

just 3 leafs? or do you have other stuff in there too? if it's just 3 then that would explain your axle wrap

Actually 6.
The JC2B main, the JCXL aal, and the bottom 4 leaves of a JC1A pack, or everything but the main leaf.
I am happy as hell with the setup.
Anyone who has seen my rig work will agree.
YMMV.

Gil BullyKatz said:

Friction liners and friction paint... Where to find them? Any good sources?

Click to expand...

Any local spring shop should have, or be able to get, the liners. We have two spring shops here in Bakersfield, and both have the liners. There are two types of liners, with and without an edge. The stuff without an edge will slip out towards the ends if it doesn't catch the spring clamps fairly close to the ends. So, I use the liner with edges on the top and bottom leaves, and the stuff with no edge on the middle leaves. It doesn't hurt to use the stuff with an edge everywhere, you just have to use a chisel or something to cut the edge away for the spring clamps and U-bolts.

I also like the idea of the graphite paint, I'll have to check that out.

Oh, BTW, I counted and my current leaf packs have 8 leaves on the drivers side and 9 leaves on the pass side. I always have an extra leaf on the pass side.......never totally figured out why. These packs are mostly 1/2 ton Chev, with a stock (MJ) main leaf, a leaf or two from the XJ pack, and the bottom leaf is from the XJ. They will bend backwards (negative arch) when fully stuffed, and will droop as far as I want, depending on how much space I leave in the spring clamps. I used to run with the spring clamps open on the top (extended to be long enough), but now I like them closed but with room for the top leaf to move. It wasn't much of a concern with the D44, but now with the D60 there is a lot of weight to pull down on the main leaf, so I want better control of the droop. If you run loose spring clamps, you will likely need a good traction bar to control axle wrap.

A couple weekends ago I did some leaf mixing. I needed to lose a little lift in the back so I could replace my stock shackle with a longer one. I cleaned up each leaf real good and sprayed it with graphite paint. WOW, what a difference. It rides like a dream, but is so soft that I need to get use to driving it. I haven't had a chance to take it offroad yet, but I would bet that it will flex like mad. Probably the best cheapo mod that one could make.

BTW, I picked it up at fleet farm,but and farm type place will have it or can get it. I used spray cans,but next time I will use brush and put er on thick.


-Jerry