After hammering my truck, I knew next upgrade was a fresh set of shocks and an alignment. In the front I cut off 1 3/4 coils and trimmed the bumpstop mounts off. In the rear I removed 5 of the 8 leaf springs. The result, when hitting a bump, was a bottom out bonk followed by a "daaaaammit". I always thought that I was hitting my lower control arm on the top coil cup, but I was wrong.
Before I took the front shocks out, I made a sharpie mark where the shocks fit within each other at ride height. When I removed them I compressed them to the ride height to see how much travel I had. I had 1/4" left of compression travel! The shock was the thing bottoming out!!
From eye to eye on the shocks at ride height was almost 10". So the search started for a shock compression length of around 8 1/2" or so. I did manage to find a shock that fit the bill. It is a Monroe RV Gas Magnum shock, part #555002. (compressed length 8.6" , extended length 12.7")
Compared shocks fully extended:
I used a off the shelf KYB Excel G on the rear, which was very straight forward.
