2005 - 2023 Archive Garage Premium Shackle Flip Lift Kit

I would be more worried about the leaves spreading out. Although with the rear clamp on that should not be much of an issue.

 

I only see this becoming an issue upon heavy deceleration when axle wrap pulls the front of the leaf downward. Perhaps tapping the bracket on the inside and threading a bolt just long enough from the outside? Eliminates the bolt head on the inside...

 

I'm talking about under full droop the stress will be more on the top leaf instead of the whole pack...if you take the bolt out and Jack the truck up you can see

 

What "stress"? Just the unsprung weight making the leaf arch. Less stressful than holding the weight of the truck up.

 

When the axle hangs, it pulls just the main leaf all the way down to the ubolts near center bolt, it easily bends the main leaf and can fatigue and break. I'm with @Sub-Zero that it's not ideal, the clips are installed for a reason.

 

Thanks for posting this Robert, I think the shorty Dakars coupled with extra travel from your relocation caused shackle to swing too far forward.
I can email a paper template you can use to mark your brackets and drill extra holes to move brackets forward if you want to do that.

 

This

 

the weight of the axle, wheel, drive shaft, and the rest of the leaf pack that is no longer helping

 

What does the rest of the pack help with? To keep the main leaf from probably being only slightly more arched than it is when unladen?
Of course I am making the assumption that we are talking about low speed cycling of the rear suspension. If the leaves were allowed to splay out at full droop during high speed stuff that would undoubtedly end in some catastrophic spring failure as the pack would rapidly compress.

 

Of course the easy fix for rubbing is to remove the bolt entirely and bend the tops of the clamp around the spring. The Dakars are the first leaves I have ever had that used bolts. A 1/4" or 3/8" spacer clamped to the top of the spring would allow the clamp to be hammered over and still leave some slop, as the bolt allows some also.

 

If you unbolt those brackets and Jack the truck up from the frame you will see how much more the top leaf will arch. I don't think they are designed for repeated stresses like that, I was thinking about doing that for the added droop but thought better of it since the top leaf is the only leaf that wraps the spring eyes

 

When flexing, the wheel/spring supporting most of the weight is pulling by the axle the opposite leaf spring down, it's considerably more than just weight of tire and 1/2 the axle

A solution I'd recommend is buying a ~3.5" button head socket screw, with a low profile and no sharp points

Eric

 

I wasnt sure if that was the case or not

 

My Dakars have a military wrap.

 

When did they start doing that?

 

You made me go out and check my springs!!. The front eye only is wrapped, so not a true military wrap.

 

I don't much about truck suspension, but as far as what I've worked on, deaver, atlas, all pro, as well as a few others all use bolts

 

All my previous trucks did not have bolts. Nor did my CJ. I broke my leaves on my Ford dually than I can count, until I had custom springs made and made traction bars. I have a hate/hate relationship with leaves spanning almost three decades.

 

Oem springs are different than aftermarket leaf packs. The spring clamps are used to fine tune the springs on aftermarket packs. Just like most aftermarket parts the tools used to build and design the parts are on a much smaller scale than oem manufactures. Toyota is gonna make far more springs then a small spring shop in Santa Fe Springs, so their method of manufacturing will be better adapted to making multiple different sets of springs for different vehicles, not a million springs for a single vehicle. I don't see the leaf spring clamps being a poor design. It's just an issue that comes about from using a leaf spring in a configuration that it was not initially designed to be used in.

As far as your leaf spring issues go it just sounds like bad luck and possibly asking for oem leaf springs to do something they weren't designed for in the case of your dually. I've worked on a lot of other people's leaf spring trucks over the years and really only seen a handfull of broken leaves all of which were from heavily used desert trucks. In which the leaf springs should be considered a consumable

 

I just got a set of the new EL096R Dakars and they have gone to something similar to this, the bracket is tapped on one side and bolt inserted from the other. Unfortunately since they are not built for L or R side the bolt head will be sticking out on one side. I will have to check to see if the head will protrude in toward the gas tank but I think this may be the tapped side with the bolt only screwing in to the edge of the bracket so it is flat.

Edit: Looking at a picture I have it looks like the bolt heads will face outboard on the driver side on the new ones so there is nothing but the bracket itself that would rub.