I recently bought a 1961 stude champ, or 6e7. Despite the truck being in generally poor condition i've been using it as my daily driver. I am a 30 year old carpenter with a short commute. I have so far replaced much of the brake system, fuel system, and the timing gear. The timing gear failure was quite dramatic while crossing the bay bridge, managed to roll past the apex and to safety, a good story for another time. Anyway, I am intent to continue to do my own sort of restoration to the truck over the next year or so while using her. I use the word restoration in the sense that she will be "restored" to or near original reliablity, comfort, and appearance. I am by no means limited to what it originally was and I plan on doing things she wasn't. I apologize in advance if that offends.
So, the suspension question. My springs are basically flat, somewhat rusty, and generally really tired looking. This is an issue because I use my truck to move tools and lumber. A full bed and she squats and is a little unweilding at any speed. I had a spring shop qoute me new leafs and hardware which came to $700 something in parts. I am wondering if there is any reason i cant retrofit a 1/2 or 3/4 ton set of leafs from the junkyard in? It seems to me its just cutting out the old, welding in new mounts, and bolting it all up again, right? I do expect having to run new brake lines, possibly a driveshaft extension, and some steering adaptation. Thoughts, concerns? Ideally i want to be able to make the load bearing, from a spring perspective, greater than stock. I dont mind a conservative lift and it would be great if I could use standard stuff from common junkyard trucks.
Thanks for the great site!
So, the suspension question. My springs are basically flat, somewhat rusty, and generally really tired looking. This is an issue because I use my truck to move tools and lumber. A full bed and she squats and is a little unweilding at any speed. I had a spring shop qoute me new leafs and hardware which came to $700 something in parts. I am wondering if there is any reason i cant retrofit a 1/2 or 3/4 ton set of leafs from the junkyard in? It seems to me its just cutting out the old, welding in new mounts, and bolting it all up again, right? I do expect having to run new brake lines, possibly a driveshaft extension, and some steering adaptation. Thoughts, concerns? Ideally i want to be able to make the load bearing, from a spring perspective, greater than stock. I dont mind a conservative lift and it would be great if I could use standard stuff from common junkyard trucks.
Thanks for the great site!
Comment