I Beam ?

[Abby Normal]

Where Y'at Guys, I tried to change my Strut bushings today & got more proof that a hayes shop manual is CR*P! I busted my big butt trying to get that bolt out of the end of the I beam, under the spring. Turns out I didn't have a 1 1/8" box end wrench to get that Monster bolt loose.
Here my questtion. Can I drop the I beam from the small end & replace it without a Front end alinement?
My neighbor(Homer Simpson) told me at the shop he used to work at they put a come-a-long on the beam to pull it to the front of the truck. I don't have a tree or post close enough to use a come-a-long, but it looks like pulling the bolt from the small end & dropping the I beam will work too.
Let me hear from ya. I'd like to see who has the ezest way to do this.
Now where's that asprin?

 

[POWERSTROKE]

Lightning Struck & I put all new bushings in His L at X-mas. Leave the spring & shock attached. The shock holds the spring in the spring mounts. We ground the heads off the rivets & replaced them with 1/2" x 1-1/2" Grd #8 bolts. the holes were about 12 MM so they had to be drilled out just a but. We pulled the bolt out of the pivot and pried the I-beam down with a bar to get the bushing out. We pushed the bushing back into place with a bottle jack under the I-beam. To get the pivot bushings out of the I-Beam I used a drill and a 3/16" or 1/4" dia. drill bit and drilled a TON of holes thru it. "IF" the bit catches and starts to walk around the steel sleeve around the rubber protion of the bushing... let it keep going. After the bit makes about 3-4 rounds around the bushing it'll fall right out! With air tools, impacts, etc. We replaced all the bushings incl. both sway bar bushings in about 8 hours. About a "1 Case of Beer" sized job! for 2 people.

 

[Abby Normal]

Where Y'at PStroke, That sounds about as hard as that cr#ppy shop manual. What I was thinking of is unbolting the bottom of the shock & clip on top of the spring. Then lower the big end of the I Beam on a jack stand, put a jack under the small end & unbolt it there. That would drop the Whole I Beam allowing me to move it forward to replace the stut bushings. I think it would take about 1 hr per side working by myownself. I'm just not sure if you can drop the I beam without needing a frontend alinement after. I should probably get one anyway.

 

[POWERSTROKE]

You'd probably have to pull the brake calipers off the front spindles to move the axle far enough forward. Not a bad job, takes at most 5 minutes. I didn't like the idea of fighting with the shock bolts (factory shocks 8 yrs old & 90K miles) and messing with the coil spring. While your under there make sure the pivot bracket for the driver's side axle is bolted up solid. Curt's was loose.. REAL Loose!