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Found my hd hood on car-parts.com. used uship.com to ship from MI to TX for $160. Perfect color matched factory hood. Just a few pinhole chips from its previous life lol but paint is glossy after a claybar..this was a Hella gamble that paid off..Man! That sux!! Good luck with that.
There's an HD Hood on Craig's in NY. Has some damage and he wants $300 for it. I live in NJ, and no offense to my NY brothers but I refuse to drive in NY! So that's a no go for me. I've seen a brand new after market HD Hood sells for $334 without shipping.
Alright, so for the past two days my steering rack went from this:
View attachment 68556
To This:
View attachment 68561
The Part List:
- Rare Parts HD pitman arm
- Rare Parts HD Tie Rods (with my Polyurathane dust boots)
- Rare Parts HD Idler arm bracket
- Moog idler arm
- Moog centerlink
- Cognito pitman/idler arm support kit
The Trial: Took me a while to break off the old idler arm with an air hammer and pickle fork and one try to remove the "dreaded" pitman arm. I did have to remove all three steering gearbox bolts to get the perfect angle to remove the pitman arm, but I was ready to remove the whole gearbox out of the truck, so I was smitten. I was glad I spent the extra money on a new centerlink because I could not break the pitman and idler from the centerlink and tried everything aside from heat.
The Tribulations:
1. I couldn't use the cognito brace on the idler side, it would practically sit on the sway bar. I might attempt it again down the road. I was on a time crunch and it was too rainy for me to sit around and screw with it all day.
2. I had to remove my KYB steering stabilizer because the bracket hits the cognito brace. Not too upset at it, I wanted to create my own with a stiffer valved bilstein or fox shock that'll use different brackets due to different strokes.
3. The newfound responsive steering heightened the feeling of how ****** my shocks are. Now I'm looking at bilstein's since I get a good discount through my work.
The Results: In short, night and day difference! No more play, way more responsive, Still wish it felt heavier though, but that'll come with a better valved gearbox. Went around 75 on the way home from the alignment shop in torrential downpour and it tracked straight. The real test will be my route to work. Theres one section on the freeway that always gets squirrely, especially when theres standing water.
Found my hd hood on car-parts.com. used uship.com to ship from MI to TX for $160. Perfect color matched factory hood. Just a few pinhole chips from its previous life lol but paint is glossy after a claybar..this was a Hella gamble that paid off.. View attachment 69148
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Thank you. All the rare parts stuff and the cognito support brackets I got on eBay, the moog stuff I got on rockauto using the discount we get on the forum, and the poly tierod covers I got on AmazonWow, good work. Where did you buy them?
Found my hd hood on car-parts.com. used uship.com to ship from MI to TX for $160. Perfect color matched factory hood. Just a few pinhole chips from its previous life lol but paint is glossy after a claybar..this was a Hella gamble that paid off.. View attachment 69148
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G900A using Tapatalk
Hood isn't color matched!Found my hd hood on car-parts.com. used uship.com to ship from MI to TX for $160. Perfect color matched factory hood. Just a few pinhole chips from its previous life lol but paint is glossy after a claybar..this was a Hella gamble that paid off.. View attachment 69148
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G900A using Tapatalk
Haha, ok u got me..its my factory paint code and it ain't certifit flat black lol. Too bad it rains every time I wash it. [emoji23]Hood isn't color matched!