Thebrokenpony
New member
Hello my name is STEVE and I am a newbie on this forum. I was referred here by a tech-support person at Currie Enterprises. He said the folks on this site are always glad to help and provide more professional answers as compared to other forum he has been on. So here goes my question.
A couple of years ago I bought a 2007 Dodge ram 1500. It is a 4 x 4 with the 5.7 L hemi and an auto trans. I did not realize too an extent I was making a mistake when I bought this truck. What I was trying to do in purchasing this truck was to have an all around rig that I could use as a daily driver, towing vehicle, hauling vehicle, trail rig. Hunting truck, and an off-road expedition vehicle. Here is where the problem comes in with the suspension and differentials in specific. I found only a handful of kits to lift this vehicle, and most of them use blocks over the rear leaf springs and pucks above the front coil overs to lift the truck. I purchased a rough country 6 inch lift kit for the truck that uses this method to lift the vehicle. I was going to purchase a set of fox coil overs for the front and lifted leaf springs for the rear of the truck to avoid using the blocks and pUcks from the kit. This is how BDS does it on their kit. I figured that I had it all figured out and was going to save a bunch of money over the BDS kit. What I didn't take into account were the differentials. I have an 8 inch front differential and a 9 1/4 inch rear differential. I was wanting to put air lockers both front and rear to increase the off road capability of this vehicle. What I found was no one makes any locking differentials for either of these two differentials I am looking for advice on what to do. Do I buy a independent suspension 9 inch Center from Currie enterprises or do I do a solid axle swap in the front and use a different lift kit than the one I bought. Does anybody know of an independent front differential that I can use on the truck? Then we move to the rear of the truck. Due to the fact that no one makes a locking differential for my rear end I need to swap it for a different one. I want to have a full floating rear end that I can have an Air locker on. I also in doing this would like to keep my ABS brakes and disc brakes. Does any body know what axle or should choose to do this? I guess what I'm looking for is advice on what to do with the front differential, the rear differential, and the suspension. I am on a little bit of a budget so I can't afford to spend thousands of dollars, but I do have some money to spend to make this happen. Selling the truck is not an option. I have a kid in college and when I'm trying to sell the truck in the past all I get is lowball offers so I've decided I'm just going to keep the truck and modify it to make it work. That being said I'm not willing to give up on making it as capable of an off-road vehicle as possible. For this reason one where another I need to figure out how to solve my differential and suspension problems. Once I've got this dialed in then I'm going to go down the road of figuring out how to add items to the vehicle to turn it into an expedition vehicle. I don't want to add these items though until I can make it a capable off road vehicle because I am afraid that I will just be throwing good money after bad if I can't figure out these other two issues. Any help you can provide me would be greatly appreciated! Thanks! Steve
A couple of years ago I bought a 2007 Dodge ram 1500. It is a 4 x 4 with the 5.7 L hemi and an auto trans. I did not realize too an extent I was making a mistake when I bought this truck. What I was trying to do in purchasing this truck was to have an all around rig that I could use as a daily driver, towing vehicle, hauling vehicle, trail rig. Hunting truck, and an off-road expedition vehicle. Here is where the problem comes in with the suspension and differentials in specific. I found only a handful of kits to lift this vehicle, and most of them use blocks over the rear leaf springs and pucks above the front coil overs to lift the truck. I purchased a rough country 6 inch lift kit for the truck that uses this method to lift the vehicle. I was going to purchase a set of fox coil overs for the front and lifted leaf springs for the rear of the truck to avoid using the blocks and pUcks from the kit. This is how BDS does it on their kit. I figured that I had it all figured out and was going to save a bunch of money over the BDS kit. What I didn't take into account were the differentials. I have an 8 inch front differential and a 9 1/4 inch rear differential. I was wanting to put air lockers both front and rear to increase the off road capability of this vehicle. What I found was no one makes any locking differentials for either of these two differentials I am looking for advice on what to do. Do I buy a independent suspension 9 inch Center from Currie enterprises or do I do a solid axle swap in the front and use a different lift kit than the one I bought. Does anybody know of an independent front differential that I can use on the truck? Then we move to the rear of the truck. Due to the fact that no one makes a locking differential for my rear end I need to swap it for a different one. I want to have a full floating rear end that I can have an Air locker on. I also in doing this would like to keep my ABS brakes and disc brakes. Does any body know what axle or should choose to do this? I guess what I'm looking for is advice on what to do with the front differential, the rear differential, and the suspension. I am on a little bit of a budget so I can't afford to spend thousands of dollars, but I do have some money to spend to make this happen. Selling the truck is not an option. I have a kid in college and when I'm trying to sell the truck in the past all I get is lowball offers so I've decided I'm just going to keep the truck and modify it to make it work. That being said I'm not willing to give up on making it as capable of an off-road vehicle as possible. For this reason one where another I need to figure out how to solve my differential and suspension problems. Once I've got this dialed in then I'm going to go down the road of figuring out how to add items to the vehicle to turn it into an expedition vehicle. I don't want to add these items though until I can make it a capable off road vehicle because I am afraid that I will just be throwing good money after bad if I can't figure out these other two issues. Any help you can provide me would be greatly appreciated! Thanks! Steve
