Continuous wrote

002 wrote A leveling kit will put terrible angles on the CV's so I personally wouldn't go with that.

Are you talking about raising the front or lowering the rear? I looked on ebay and all I seen was front a front lift kit that lifts 2 - 2.5 inches. I guess that would level the truck. But raising the front seems stupid to me. Especially because as you stated, you would mess with the angles of the cv axles.

What I did to my 2004 ext cab silverado was drop the rear to match the front. It seems much easier than raising the front to match the rear. Personally I like the way the rear drop looks.

I went to my local parts store and found a rear lowering shackle kit and threw it on the truck. The kit allows a 1 or 2 inch drop, I chose the 2 inch drop. The truck sits pretty level, maybe still a little high in the rear, but much better. The box said to install a rear axle wedge to adjust the pinion angle but I never did that.

Here is the latest picture I have of the truck...
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And here is the truck before lowering it...
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You may not be able to tell in the picture, but it is a big difference. You can especially fell it in the rear seat. The seats used to lean whoever would sit in them forward, now it is much more level.

2018 wrote I think I will end up putting a 3" on it. I have no clue what brand, do you suggest any? I was thinking rough country. I will look into those tires you suggested as well. I think I will get brand new 33s and used 35s later down the road. Would that be a good idea?

I found the picture of your truck, and it looks like you got the Z71 package so I assume that you probably like the truck sitting higher? If that is the case then raise it. Personally I like the dropped look.

I like it a little lifted, no offense but I hate lowered trucks. They look ugly, to be honest I hate lowered anything. Where I live if you go out and down the street there are bumps and dips everywhere. You are doomed to break soemthing with a lowered vehicle. I prefer a taller ride height.

-Moonshine wrote [ Register or Signin to view external links. ]

I believe I told you about my truck but I'll go into detail about mine. I got the same truck as you and I have a rough country spacer on the bottom and top of the strut. It might be about a 3in lift with a block in the back to make it level. I have 315/70-17 nitto trail grapplers. The tires still have plenty of tread life left. I believe I have about 30,000 left in them.

I have about 25,000-30,000 miles on the tires and lift and I have no problems at all. I tow all the time. I'm a landscaper and when the 2500hd is being serviced or bed is full of yard debris, then I tow a 20x8.5 cargo trailer. I also pull a dump trailer too.

I do have bad angles but I haven't had a problem yet. I'm going to fix it this year with a differential drop to help with the angles. Usually when someone has wheel bearing problems is when you have negative offset rims. Which will put a lot of wear on bearings.

Just remember you got to pay to play.

I am in love with you truck. That is the vision I get of what I want my truck to look like.. Just with a black and red color combination. I love the mirrors, going to get those in black just have no clue what kind yet. Looking for black rims and might actually get the tires you have if I can find some cheap ones somewhere on the web.

Is that a toolbox I see in your bed?

2018 wrote

Continuous wrote

002 wrote A leveling kit will put terrible angles on the CV's so I personally wouldn't go with that.

Are you talking about raising the front or lowering the rear? I looked on ebay and all I seen was front a front lift kit that lifts 2 - 2.5 inches. I guess that would level the truck. But raising the front seems stupid to me. Especially because as you stated, you would mess with the angles of the cv axles.

What I did to my 2004 ext cab silverado was drop the rear to match the front. It seems much easier than raising the front to match the rear. Personally I like the way the rear drop looks.

I went to my local parts store and found a rear lowering shackle kit and threw it on the truck. The kit allows a 1 or 2 inch drop, I chose the 2 inch drop. The truck sits pretty level, maybe still a little high in the rear, but much better. The box said to install a rear axle wedge to adjust the pinion angle but I never did that.

Here is the latest picture I have of the truck...
[ Register or Signin to view external links. ]

And here is the truck before lowering it...
[ Register or Signin to view external links. ]

You may not be able to tell in the picture, but it is a big difference. You can especially fell it in the rear seat. The seats used to lean whoever would sit in them forward, now it is much more level.

2018 wrote I think I will end up putting a 3" on it. I have no clue what brand, do you suggest any? I was thinking rough country. I will look into those tires you suggested as well. I think I will get brand new 33s and used 35s later down the road. Would that be a good idea?

I found the picture of your truck, and it looks like you got the Z71 package so I assume that you probably like the truck sitting higher? If that is the case then raise it. Personally I like the dropped look.

I like it a little lifted, no offense but I hate lowered trucks. They look ugly, to be honest I hate lowered anything. Where I live if you go out and down the street there are bumps and dips everywhere. You are doomed to break soemthing with a lowered vehicle. I prefer a taller ride height.

-Moonshine wrote [ Register or Signin to view external links. ]

I believe I told you about my truck but I'll go into detail about mine. I got the same truck as you and I have a rough country spacer on the bottom and top of the strut. It might be about a 3in lift with a block in the back to make it level. I have 315/70-17 nitto trail grapplers. The tires still have plenty of tread life left. I believe I have about 30,000 left in them.

I have about 25,000-30,000 miles on the tires and lift and I have no problems at all. I tow all the time. I'm a landscaper and when the 2500hd is being serviced or bed is full of yard debris, then I tow a 20x8.5 cargo trailer. I also pull a dump trailer too.

I do have bad angles but I haven't had a problem yet. I'm going to fix it this year with a differential drop to help with the angles. Usually when someone has wheel bearing problems is when you have negative offset rims. Which will put a lot of wear on bearings.

Just remember you got to pay to play.

I am in love with you truck. That is the vision I get of what I want my truck to look like.. Just with a black and red color combination. I love the mirrors, going to get those in black just have no clue what kind yet. Looking for black rims and might actually get the tires you have if I can find some cheap ones somewhere on the web.

Is that a toolbox I see in your bed?

Thanks and Yes it is a full size kobalt toolbox.

I agree, I don't like lowering of any kind on a truck.

Here is my truck bone stock:


With heavy duty front suspension and stock rear:


With heavy duty front and rear:


The truck sits pretty close to level right now which I don't like, I prefer to have more rake in the rear (rear end sits higher) so when I load the truck it levels out. I think I have about 2.25" of lift in the front and 1.75" in the rear. I'll end up putting an AAL in the rear if it bothers me too bad but for right now I have better places for my money to go. Just for height comparison, my truck sits about as tall as a brand new Superduty so it's not terribly tall but it is significantly taller than stock.

With the independent front suspension like I said I would go with a body lift over a leveling kit because it keeps the suspension stock. Not to mention a leveling kit only levels the front.

As for tires, I wouldn't buy anything new until you know what size you like because tires cost a ton. My stock tire size is about 33 (275/70R18), I chose to stick with the stock tire size so it didn't screw up my speedometer and I didn't have to regear but just that size BFG KO2 ran me $1200. Honestly new tires are just for piece of mind. On my F-150 I never knew what tire I liked or what size I liked so I always bought used. I had 4 different sizes (all matching sets of course) and 7 different tread patterns. I decided to buy new tires for my F-250 because I drive 128 miles every day and I don't have time to swap tires every so often, and I knew what size I wanted and I knew I didn't want a mud tire which brought me to 3 choices, the Toyo A/T II, the BFG KO2, and the Duratrac. Since Les Schwab owns the contract for Toyo and no other place can sell Toyo tires here, I took Toyo's off the list (Les Schwab screwed me over multiple times so I will not go there). The Duratracs were more expensive, had a thinner side wall, and I didn't feel they had as aggressive tread as the BFG for mud and snow.

What is your current tire size?

002 wrote I agree, I don't like lowering of any kind on a truck.

Here is my truck bone stock:

Click to View Content

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With heavy duty front suspension and stock rear:

Click to View Content

[ Register or Signin to view external links. ]

With heavy duty front and rear:

Click to View Content

[ Register or Signin to view external links. ]
[ Register or Signin to view external links. ]

The truck sits pretty close to level right now which I don't like, I prefer to have more rake in the rear (rear end sits higher) so when I load the truck it levels out. I think I have about 2.25" of lift in the front and 1.75" in the rear. I'll end up putting an AAL in the rear if it bothers me too bad but for right now I have better places for my money to go. Just for height comparison, my truck sits about as tall as a brand new Superduty so it's not terribly tall but it is significantly taller than stock.

With the independent front suspension like I said I would go with a body lift over a leveling kit because it keeps the suspension stock. Not to mention a leveling kit only levels the front.

As for tires, I wouldn't buy anything new until you know what size you like because tires cost a ton. My stock tire size is about 33 (275/70R18), I chose to stick with the stock tire size so it didn't screw up my speedometer and I didn't have to regear but just that size BFG KO2 ran me $1200. Honestly new tires are just for piece of mind. On my F-150 I never knew what tire I liked or what size I liked so I always bought used. I had 4 different sizes (all matching sets of course) and 7 different tread patterns. I decided to buy new tires for my F-250 because I drive 128 miles every day and I don't have time to swap tires every so often, and I knew what size I wanted and I knew I didn't want a mud tire which brought me to 3 choices, the Toyo A/T II, the BFG KO2, and the Duratrac. Since Les Schwab owns the contract for Toyo and no other place can sell Toyo tires here, I took Toyo's off the list (Les Schwab screwed me over multiple times so I will not go there). The Duratracs were more expensive, had a thinner side wall, and I didn't feel they had as aggressive tread as the BFG for mud and snow.

What is your current tire size?

They are the stock size for whatever comes with the z71 package. I will check when I go bsck out to my truck later today. I will PM you when I do.

Do you still have the bed cover on as of right now, on your truck? I love the look without it.. Do you reccomend any bed cover. I heard it does better with mpg. So idk if I should get one. I also do not know what I should do first to my truck. Any suggestions?

I do have a canopy on it right now, I think this is my 3rd one lol. I've been finding them so cheap and reselling them to make a big profit.

The canopy does help minorly with MGP (lieometer on the dash shows 16.0 MPG without it and 16.4 - 16.5 with it). The thing is you will spend more on the canopy than it will save you in fuel lol. Either way you're talking about lifting the truck and putting more aggressive tires on the truck, possibly oversize, so don't worry about fuel mileage.

The top things for fuel economy is take out all the extra weight, run stock size or SLIGHTLY undersized highway tires and keep the RPMS under 2500.

002 wrote I do have a canopy on it right now, I think this is my 3rd one lol. I've been finding them so cheap and reselling them to make a big profit.

The canopy does help minorly with MGP (lieometer on the dash shows 16.0 MPG without it and 16.4 - 16.5 with it). The thing is you will spend more on the canopy than it will save you in fuel lol. Either way you're talking about lifting the truck and putting more aggressive tires on the truck, possibly oversize, so don't worry about fuel mileage.

The top things for fuel economy is take out all the extra weight, run stock size or SLIGHTLY undersized highway tires and keep the RPMS under 2500.

ehh im not really worried about MPG I get about 15 right now in the truck.. I plan that will go down when I start adding stuff to it am I wrong?

I am going to end up lifting it about 3 inches I think I have made my mind up about that.. Now I just have to figure out about tires and rims.. xD

2018 wrote

002 wrote I do have a canopy on it right now, I think this is my 3rd one lol. I've been finding them so cheap and reselling them to make a big profit.

The canopy does help minorly with MGP (lieometer on the dash shows 16.0 MPG without it and 16.4 - 16.5 with it). The thing is you will spend more on the canopy than it will save you in fuel lol. Either way you're talking about lifting the truck and putting more aggressive tires on the truck, possibly oversize, so don't worry about fuel mileage.

The top things for fuel economy is take out all the extra weight, run stock size or SLIGHTLY undersized highway tires and keep the RPMS under 2500.

ehh im not really worried about MPG I get about 15 right now in the truck.. I plan that will go down when I start adding stuff to it am I wrong?

I am going to end up lifting it about 3 inches I think I have made my mind up about that.. Now I just have to figure out about tires and rims.. xD

I got an average of 11 mpg pulling a 20x8.5 cargo trailer to the smokey mountains. And about 11 or 12 in the city.