Project Sunburned- My slow build

[young grasshoppa]

I bought this truck almost 3 years ago, and due to work, deployments, other commitments I am finally getting around to do a little bit of work on it. For the last few years it has been a reliable hauler of goods associated with owning a home. My experience with working on vehicles is still limited, in the past it was mainly my Civic or the cars of friends, but now I finally can learn on something a bit older. I am not not sure what my final goal is, I can tell you it will never be a frame off restoration or show truck, but just something to cruise and haul and with the experience I learn along the way, I can apply it to a future build (TBD).
Let's begin with a stock suspension 1972 LWB:

Originally, my plan was to do a 2.5/4" drop and rebuild the front end with the parts that I had sitting in my garage for 7 months.




Resulting in this picture:
I decided it was time for new tires, and wanting to go wider I decided on Corvette style Rallies 15x8 front 245/60 and 15x10 rear 275/60:

This created a bit too much gap in the front for my taste, so another call to ECE (for 1.5" drop springs and 1.5" drop shackles) was made and more time went by. I decided to re-do the brakes while I was in there, so new calipers/discs/pads/bearings were installed:

If you like the rake look, here is a 4/4" drop:

[young grasshoppa]

Here is close up of the notch required for the drop shackles:

The final result 4/5.5" drop on 245/50/15 and 275/60/15:


There were many lessons learned and it took a couple months because of other commitments (and waiting on parts), but the suspension is done for now. Not sure what I will begin to mess with next, my GF wants me to start the attacking the external appearance... The ride is good, I have to remember to slow down over bumps again though. This board was a great help, and I will be turning blue shortly.

[BB72CHEVKT]

Nice job looks good. How about some beauty rings for those nice wheels?

[DZL1]

Nice and keep up the good work!

DZL1.

[eightbanger]

You've done a great job...and like you say it's all good experience, you may find now you've done this work that this will be the truck you end up doing a rebuild on. I always get a kick out of seeing how good our trucks look when they are lowered. Looks great.

[young grasshoppa]

Thanks for the compliments. I have not decided on which rings to purchase yet, I am leaning towards the thinner style, but have seen some vehicles with the thicker and I like those too.

[Sinister]

Nice truck, love the patina.

[lytemup454]

good looking truck. I love the stance! were the shackles the only thing you used in the rear?

[jojo]

sitting pretty now! nice hub caps

[cerjio]

I rally like the Rims on your truck , I thinking about getting some for my 70 , when she is done , although they will be 16x8 with the six lug verison, anyays now i can look at yours and get a idea what its goin to look like. I Took the cab&bed off though an just cleaned everything and repainted , since i had to put new floor pans in it was well worth doing, and not that hard to do!

[young grasshoppa]

I went searched this site so many times looking at different wheels and stances. It was between these and the Truck Rallies. However, if I would have found some 15x8 steelies that week I would have gone with those, with my old caps.
I should have mentioned earlier, the drop was all ECE:
Front--2.5" spindles+1.5" drop springs
Rear--4"drop leafs+1.5" drop shackles

[oldblue1968chevy]

looks GOOD!!!

[ChevLoRay]

Nice.

[tcb-1]

looooove it!!! long and low!

[bgangsta999]

Is this my old truck!? You were stationed at Eglin and I was on Ft. Rucker at the time?

[Olive1970]

Great truck you got there buddy. Smart move on tackling the suspension and other safety issues first, not to mention making it look a heck of a lot better!