Chevy & GMC Vans

So I finally got around to lifting my van..bought a pair of s-10 springs for the rear for $200 after shipping, 2 inch body spacers from summit racing for $36 and body bolts from fastenal for $30. from the center of each fender the original ride height was about 27.5 inches at each wheel after the lift I'm at about 34.5 inches at the center top of each wheel well...this includes the lift from the new 30x9.5 tires too. Also did the ball joint relocation, which sucked haha. Anyways here is a before and after pic. the install was pretty straight forward and i followed the instructions of a few other other members in their write ups so i didnt want to be redundant. i still need to do shocks but thats for another day i think.

Nice work!

Looks great! Your van has a real HI-TOP! Be careful in parking garages!

Looks real sweet with the lift!

These vans always look better with a little lift...thanks for sharing the pic

Your van looks good with the lift and the Hi top. Did you need to do any trimming to get the tires to clear ??

I have the same springs ordered and have to decide on the tire size and make soon.

yeah i did have to do a little trimming up front...it wasnt much though. i used a $10 die grinder from harbor freight and a cut off wheel to just follow the wheel well line down the bumper a little. the tires are firestone destination AT 30x9.5/15 so they are actually only 29.5 inches tall. i was able to get over two inches of lift with the stock torsion bar keys and the adjusting bolts are not even bottomed out.

one other this, sled, you will probably want to do the ball joint relocation at the same time. i was not able to get the front end into alignment with the torsion bars cranked until i relocated the ball joints. i figured since they were the stock BJs at 150k miles I might as well just put in new moogs and they came with the bolts allowing for the relocation. the real pain was punching out the rivets that mounted the joints from the factory. i had to take the whole control arm off so i could beat it on my work bench haha.

finally, you will also find it much easier to loosen the rear shackles when putting on the s-10 springs

Looks Great!

Thanks for the heads up on the ball joint relocation. I have the springs, bolts will be in Friday, and the spacers will be easy to get.
I've been busy and won't get a chance to really get into the job for a few weeks, so the parts will be ready by then.

29.5" tires seem like they fit with min. trimming. Now to figure out which tire....... #-o

Very cool. gotta love a lifted high top

eatyourlungs wrote:yeah i did have to do a little trimming up front...it wasnt much though. i used a $10 die grinder from harbor freight and a cut off wheel to just follow the wheel well line down the bumper a little. the tires are firestone destination AT 30x9.5/15 so they are actually only 29.5 inches tall. i was able to get over two inches of lift with the stock torsion bar keys and the adjusting bolts are not even bottomed out.

one other this, sled, you will probably want to do the ball joint relocation at the same time. i was not able to get the front end into alignment with the torsion bars cranked until i relocated the ball joints. i figured since they were the stock BJs at 150k miles I might as well just put in new moogs and they came with the bolts allowing for the relocation. the real pain was punching out the rivets that mounted the joints from the factory. i had to take the whole control arm off so i could beat it on my work bench haha.

finally, you will also find it much easier to loosen the rear shackles when putting on the s-10 springs

The factory lower bj's are in a pocket did you relocate below that with a spacer in there or how did you do it?

I second that BJ relocation. It worked well but holy hell batman....2 of the rivets were a bear!!! I broke 12 drill bits and spent 2 hours on two of them. The other two were much easier.....not totally sure why some are easy and others are hard.

Van looks good!! Interior shots to inspire us all?

Ryan

fsnrod wrote:The factory lower bj's are in a pocket did you relocate below that with a spacer in there or how did you do it?

you only do the uppers, not the lowers.
Basically, you remove both of the uppers, and reinstall them to the bottom side of the arm, instead of the top side.
I need to do mine soon!