[HenryYeomans]

Hey lads, new on here but just started work on my mates sierra and we are looking for more flex/ better ride, just wanted some info on what's involved in a rears up front setup and also what longer leaves people are running in the rear, look forward to hearing from you, cheers

[Moph]

I have a bit of a writeup on my RUF setup in my build thread ... click the link in my sig.

[HenryYeomans]

Thanks mate, how so I find your sig sorry?

[pezz]

Click on the bit in his post, "the tintop"

[HenryYeomans]

Ahh thanks looks great, did it move your diff forwards at all mate?

[Moph]

I tried to keep it in pretty much stock position by moving the rear hanger back slightly. My rear springs measured about 75mm longer eye to eye than the original front springs, so I moved the rear mount back 35mm and lengthened the front shackles by about 40mm. Theoretically the diff should still be centred.

If you don't move the rear hanger back then yes, your diff would move forward quite a long way - about 38mm.

[HenryYeomans]

Ok I imagine if I leave the rear mount standard then I'd be looking at a long shackle

[lbzook]

If you leave the rear mount standard, you'll need to do a chassis extension and move the front mount forward to keep a normal sized shackle, and good shackle angle

[Moph]

Correct. If your rear mount remains in stock position then the full additional eye-to-eye length must be accounted for in the shackle length and shackle angle. That's why people often end up running 2" shackles (+50mm) with RUF and have quite shallow shackle angles. It's far from ideal.

The best solution is to do a chassis extension and use standard shackles as lbzook posted. But if you don't want to do that, moving the rear mount back slightly and running a slightly longer front shackle (mine are +30mm ... just checked) works okay too.

[HenryYeomans]

In the zook at the moment we got 2" extended shackles and there almost vertical haha so need a bit more angle in them

[HenryYeomans]

Wanting to do a shackle reversal aswell that may change things a fair bit

[jdk81]

Extended shackles will be making it worse.

A shackle reversal will be a step backwards too.
It will ride better on road, but you pay for that with heaps of suck offroad.

Lifted leaves, will make it stiffer - worse.

Long soft leaves, with no/minimal lift and stock shackles and shackle angles will be smooth.

A ruf with a stupid long shackle will make it worse to drive.
Drilling the hole at the rear hanger and using a longer shackle, will make it worse to drive.

Jrzook's ruf method works nicely.

Coupled with correct shocks and it will be pleasant to drive.
(if you're on a budget, the commodore shocks in the rear tilted over more will be pretty good)
Front shocks - ome front shocks for their lift are quite nice

Before you do a heap of mods, read and find out what the flavour of the month is.
Some people are always learning and ideas are evolving.
Some people build a sierra like its still 1994