I found a good part of my lean.

blubuckaroo · May 24, 2011

Today when I pulled up behind our Bronco with the Camaro, I could see the main culprit of the Bronco's lean problem. The body mounts are crushed on the driver side. Look at the distance between the bumper and the tailgate. Almost 3/4" difference. I would have never seen it without looking up at it. I have a 1" BL sitting in the garage. Been too busy to put it in. I guess 34 years of abuse is about all you could ask anyway.

Tito · May 24, 2011

Better than your hips sagging like mine requiring spacers to get the tailgate to work :-X

Steve83 · May 24, 2011

Remember that a body lift rests on the stock body mounts, so it won't fix the lean. You'll need to replace the body mounts in addition to the lift. Energy Polyurethane will never sag, but it can be a little noisier if you run a full top & no carpet.

broncnaz · May 24, 2011

A few of the 1in body lifts dont use stock bushings. they are one basically a self contained bushing/body lift.

joshd1971bronco · May 25, 2011

Concur with broncnaz. My WH 1" body lift is all one aftermarket bushing - no stock bushing needed.

Tito · May 25, 2011

Thats what he's got, the WH kit, he's trying to work up the nerve to do the 3550 swap!

blubuckaroo · May 25, 2011

Tito said:
Thats what he's got, the WH kit, he's trying to work up the nerve to do the 3550 swap!

I like to think of it as not enough time. Until I get up enough courage.

airbur · May 25, 2011

I replaced all my body mounts with the WH 1" body lift kit. It didn't do one thing for my lean...actually made it worse because it sits up higher now and looks like it's leaning more

broncnaz · May 25, 2011

Many times the crossmembers where the body mounts reside are bent and so the lean remains unless you fix the crossmembers. Or add shims where needed.

surfer-b · May 26, 2011

I have had 2 Broncos that had lean from the factory, the reason I know this is because once I got to looking into the problem I found factory shims under the front, bed and back body mounts on the driver side to compensate for the mount under the front floor pan. When the frame horn was mounted, for the body mount, it was too high and instead of fixing it the way it should have been they just added shims under all the other mounts on that side so the doors and seams would line up. The result was a Bronco that had more space from body to bumper on driver side than on the pass.

airbur · May 26, 2011

surfer-b said:
I have had 2 Broncos that had lean from the factory, the reason I know this is because once I got to looking into the problem I found factory shims under the front, bed and back body mounts on the driver side to compensate for the mount under the front floor pan. When the frame horn was mounted, for the body mount, it was too high and instead of fixing it the way it should have been they just added shims under all the other mounts on that side so the doors and seams would line up. The result was a Bronco that had more space from body to bumper on driver side than on the pass.

Mine had shims also on 3 or 4 of the body mounts but I don't believe that had anything to do with the lean. Ford used those shims to correct panel alignment like with the doors etc from what I understand.

How do you know that the frame horn was mounted incorrectly?

ksbronco75 · May 26, 2011

glad to know im not the only one who's leanin like a cholo

marty · May 26, 2011

just keep in mind also the mounts might be bad yes but the perches that the mounts sit on could also be rotted out and the mount will start to fall through causing the body to sag too.

surfer-b · May 26, 2011

How do you know that the frame horn was mounted incorrectly?

Because of the number of shims under the other body mounts. They had close to 7/8" of shims on all but the front floor pan mount, just on one side. I know they used a small amount of shims to line everything, I have found them when changing body bushings, I do that, but not close to 1" of shims. Also I have only had 2 that were that way, the others have only had 1 or 2 shims to align everything, the shims are only about 1/16" thick.

Steve83 · May 26, 2011

The frame perch for the body mount under the footwell has a lip that rests on top of the frame rail & is riveted down, so there's no way it can be installed too high or low.

.

I'd guess all those shims were due to problems with the body - not the frame. Do you have pics of those mounts?

surfer-b · May 26, 2011

I'd guess all those shims were due to problems with the body - not the frame. Do you have pics of those mounts?

No, but I took some measurments on concrete floor and sure enough the driver horn was higher than the pass, close to 1". My guess is that frame was dropped after the horn was installed and bent up, instead of sending it back and redoing it they just ran it through and used the shims. I have no idea, thats just my thought, it may have just been a defective horn, I don't know but whatever the case may be it was higher than the other and required shims to make it work. When I installed new bushings I cut the front floor pan bushing down so the body would sit level with the bumpers and just used a shim here and there to line everything up.

I found a good part of my lean.

blubuckaroo

Grease Monkey

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