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Project Cumdumpster

77K views 307 replies 108 participants last post by  p.o.r.n. 
#1 ·
My buddy and I just got done building up his '05 CTD. I put my Scrambler project on hold for a month so we could get this nailed out by Memorial weekend at the dunes, but we got screwed by Deaver and didn't get the rear leafs in time. Anyway, it's together now so here are some pics. I did all the custom design and fab, he did the other stuff like teardown and all that sh1t.

He had a nicely built '01 Sierra but got sick of blowing out the front end, didn't wanna solid axle it no matter how hard I tried to convince him, so he went for the upgrade. His old truck:


He got an '05 Ram 2500 CTD back in August, 5 days later it was up at the dunes for Labor Day weekend. It did great for a stocker but who wants a stock truck? He wanted to be able to haul across the dunes effortlessly at 60+mph and I wanted to make it happen. I talked him into a long travel suspension and 37s but he still wanted bigger. Then I found a great deal on some 40x13.5R20 XTerrains on here and it's been downhill ever since. Here's the specs:

-12" lift, all custom
-40" XTerrains on 20x10 KMC Diesels
-10" Full Throttle Coils, 12" travel Fox remote resi shocks, custom longarms and bracketry by BBA Fabworks
-8" Deaver leafs, 2" extended shackles, 14" travel Fox remote resi shocks, traction bar
-Axle trusses front and rear
-Drop pitman arm and sector shaft brace
-Custom trac bar and brackets
-Clocked t-case, new driveshafts, etc.
-A bunch of other little crap here and there

He's got a massive tuner, FASS, intake, stacks, and some other mods so it turns the 40s really well but it'll still get regeared before too long. It'd still blow most trucks out of the water.

We started on it the first weekend of May, got it on the road last Sunday.

How she sat the first afternoon


Stock coil next to new one and blingin shock


Then I figured I might as well blow a couple holes in the frame and start adding some reinforcement plates




Built up some adjustable UCA brackets out of 3/16" box and 1/4" plate




Then I had a cool picture in my head for the LCAs and tying everything together. Obviously beefiness is priority #1 but I can't just leave it looking plain either. I think the frame brackets turned out :rock:









I figure with an 8000 lb truck coming down on the front end some more reinforcement wouldn't hurt, and it makes it look a lot cleaner





The pics don't do it justice so far but oh well.
 
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#2 ·
Threw a truss on the front end:

I would've liked to make it wider but the little bit of extra strength probably isn't worth the tons of extra work in this application. It should still help strengthen the weak point in the middle a bit.

Might as well throw one of the sexy lady gussets in there


The drivers side was kind of a PITA. Because of the whole welding to cast issue I plated the bumpstop pad with 1/4" plate, welded it on, and drilled and tapped a couple bolts holding the plate to the cast. Then I welded the tube to the plate.....works for me.


Figured with 8k lbs coming down on the front end adding some strength to the knuckles wouldn't be a bad idea either. I plasma'd out some 3/8" plate to brace the inner Cs.




Meanwhile among other things my buddy stripped off the stock mounts and got some paint on the new frame brackets:


This is why it's going up another 4-6" (those are the 41s goin on my Jeep, not on the Ram):
 
#3 ·
Plated control arm mounts and lower shock stud. I might do something to make this double shear, we'll see


I wanted to get rid of the cam bolt adjustment slot so the bushing had a good surface to sit against.


Then decided to go full crossover since the stock setup would've been hating life at that height with those tires. It's all 1.5" .25" wall DOM with 3/4" heims. I would've preferred TREs but there weren't any decent choices for the setup we had to work with and the timeframe we were trying to do it in. Still, for what it is I'm pretty happy how it turned out.
Had to chop off the panhard mount and clearance the coil mount for the new tie rod:


Also had to bend the tie rod to clear the diff cover/ring gear at full lock:

In hindsight I probably could've made the bends further out and not had to clearance the coil buckets as much but this works just fine.

Then it was on to control arms.

Bushing end:


All of em in place:


1.5" .25 wall uppers, 2" .25 wall lowers. I had to put a 10° bend in the uppers to clear the frame as the suspension cycles but I don't foresee any issues from it. I may brace the bends later on if I have any concern.
 
#4 ·
I hate z-bend draglinks but I had to do something along those lines on this thing. The lower bend was necessary to clear the massive coils/buckets and I also used it to minimize the angle on the heim. The upper bend was required so the heim wasn't maxed on such a tall truck. Oh well, the .25 wall tube will do just fine.






I :heart: IROKs (my wheels/tires still)


Frame end panhard bracket built to match draglink angle. I still want to add a longitudinal brace but it's set besides that.


With all the important sh1t in place:


New beefier axle end panhard mount:


With the shiny new 40s on 20s:


Height reference.......I'm 6' tall


She's a wide one too:


For those that care, 41x14.5 IROK compared to 40x13.5 XTerrain with weight on it:


Me truck isn't small by any means (5" lift, 35s) but looks like a baby now:


 
#5 ·
Funky sway bar links I came up with to make everything clear. I might add a diagonal brace later




4" extended and beefed shackles


Truss, trucker chick gussets, etc

Traction bar comes this week

DONE!!




She's a beast


Awwww how cute


Poserific


I know, not the typical rig most of us, myself included, would build. But it's made to be big, look good, and easily blast across the dunes at 60+. It'll do all that and more. Even if you don't like the style hopefully you can appreciate the fab work involved.
 
#21 · (Edited)
Thanks for all the compliments....and yeah, we did put a ton of time into it in the past month. Just as his wife or my girlfriend:tonka:


Yeah it was all done with my Hobart. I wouldn't exactly call a Handler 210 'little' but that's what did the work....I love that welder.

Does that thing spend time in Fenton? It looks real familiar. I think I've seen it on Oak Park. Nice truck and fab btw.
Yep, that's him. The truck just went back to his house in that form on Monday though.
 
#42 · (Edited)
Wow, that's a lot of responses.


Oh, it'll see those speeds plenty at the dunes, and once my Jeep is done it'll be right there with it. He didn't buy long travel remote resi shocks and Deaver leafs for nothing.

nice work, does he have any other plans for it?
Does 1300+ lb-ft of torque count?

Hmmm... I see why your buddy was in a hurry for parts, I would have been too! The Truck looks awesome!
Thanks. We'll have it up there one of these days.

And what was the total cost for materials and labor? or did you charge him for labor?
I think all the parts and materials came down to somewhere in the area of $6-7k not counting wheels and tires. He's my best friend so I wasn't gonna charge much for labor but he ended up paying for half of my plasma cutter and lots of beer.

Very nice work. How much fender trimming would be required to pull the rear block and drop the front 2-3"? The Before pic of the stock suspension and 41's looks meaner to me.
Out back, none. The block is only there because the 10" coils gave 12" of lift and he wanted to level it out. Up front would require quite a bit. As it is I pushed the axle about 1.5" forward to prevent rubbing on the fenders, put the truck much lower and it'd still rub. I like the lower stance too but this is what he wanted.

needs some fiberglass desert racer flared fenders.
He might get some sooner or later. He's also thinking about some Bushwacker pocket flares for it.

Nice looking rig. What kind of joints did you use for the front?
Axle end uses SuicideDoors poly bushings(cheap and 1/4" wall sleeve), frame end lowers are 1.25" shank JJs, uppers are .75" shank Ballistic Fab flex joints.

you guys still all go to that house in pentwater when you come to silver lake? some awesome fab work..now get yours done.
Unfortunately no. They stopped renting it out a while back so we've been staying at ValDu since then.....that place kinda sucks now so I'm not sure what we'll do next.
 
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