shackles

I am pretty sure I'm going to do the "poor man's lift" with shackles. I have read that shackles make it a little more stiff and the ride quality goes down a little bit. I was wondering if I bought a new set of shocks, if it would help. Also how noticeable is the ride difference, thanks.

All the shackles do is hang your X from a slightly higher point...so the ride itself stays about the same, but you are riding at a longer part of the shock tube valving wise, and you have raised your center of gravity a bit...so the truck's sway on cornering, etc, is increased somewhat....so the ride pretty much just changes baesed upon the shock's valving/response at that end of its tube - vs -the stock height tube section....for the OEM's...I think its pretty close.

Overall, not much difference...AAL's on the other hand tend to stiffen thing up a bit, as you are changing the spring itself to make it pick the X up, instead of just hanging the same spring from a higher point.

One thing the shackles do for you is increase the wheel travel, and that ends up shock limited...so shocks that can extend farther let you take advantage of the extra droop, and put the valving response curve back in the shock's sweet spot.

Also - The stock shocks suck.

I replaced mine with the Bilstein 5100 extended, 20% stiffer, and the truck rides and handles better now than it did before the lift.

I don't have the stock shocks but I didn't notice a difference in the ride after installing the shackles and cranking the torsion bars.

Cranking the t-bars makes the front end slightly stiffer, shackles makes the rear end slightly tippy.
The front stays about the same as you are increasing preload, and reducing leaning ability before hitting the stops. The shackles do nothing to the preload, and increase both up & down travel, increasing leaning ability.

Can some better Shocks cure this and provide a better ride with the Shackles installed and cranked-up the T-Bars, say like some Bilsteins...

Yes, well they did for me anyways, the ride was very bouncy and stiff, now it is much better with new shocks.

Thanks for the info...my ride is a little rough right now...probaly get me some Bilsteins sometime...