Chevy & GMC Vans

i am finally ordering my lift kit... .my van is a late 95 i am doing 4 inches on it. i just cannot make up my mind if i wanna do the add a leaf or the full spring. the van is a daily driver. i will not be useing it for off road at all i have a truck on 44s for that. i am leaning towards the add a leaf. what yer thoughts???

I would think if cost is not a major problem go with the spring packs, they are made to be what they are. The add a leaf only adds more arch to your current springs. 4 inches is alot to ask of a single add a leaf in my opinion. I built custom spring relocation mounts to move my stock springs down 4 inches front of spring and rear using stock shackles. I will be adding two leafs from an s10 spring pack removing my middle leaf.

The AAL adds lift by adding in extra weight capacity. That combined with the extended shackle will net a good 4". Does the new leaf pack require the extended shackle? If it doesn't, I would go the new leaf pack route. If it requires the shackle I would just go with the AAL and plan a 2 - 4 degree shim for the pinion angle.

I talked to Dan at Overland when I was weighing my options before I chose to make new mounts, he said that the 4 inch HD spring packs are 4 inches by themselves using stock shackles. If you use his shackles you could get 1-2 more inches with them.

LiftedAWDAstro wrote:The AAL adds lift by adding in extra weight capacity. That combined with the extended shackle will net a good 4". Does the new leaf pack require the extended shackle? If it doesn't, I would go the new leaf pack route. If it requires the shackle I would just go with the AAL and plan a 2 - 4 degree shim for the pinion angle.

As Lifted said, Dan told me the same thing about the AAL and the extended shackles, roughly 4-5 inches depending on the condition of your stock springs. I forgot the extended shackle in my earlier post. I didn't want to use the shackle for the reasons of having to shim the axle.

When i did my 95, I did the 3" shackles and 2" lift blocks. The main reason was due to the 3" HD front coil springs (RWD) I got from dan along with the 2" body lift netted me almost 6" of lift in the front . The rear actually sat a little lower due to the condition of the saggy rear springs, I also had major spring wrap due ot he blocks and weak leaves. I then used a leaf spring from the front of an old K5 as an AAL which gave me the extra lift back and more towing capacity on the rear.
I say all that.... in retrospect, I would have gone with Dan's shackles and AAl cause I'm cheap and they work for a DD vs needing a good spring pack for offroad. I had the blocks and leaves so I went that way. If money is not an issue, go with new springs.