MasterASETech:
WOW
Man you must be an angry person to come on here and bash people that are just trying to help. It doesnt matter if someone is a die hard Ford TTB fan or not they SUCK! ANYONE that thinks the TTB is a good setup, obviously has very little automotive experience. The Ford TTB is AT BEST a huge pain in the ass.  
I have lifted nearly 200 trucks and SUVs and the TTB is BY FAR the worst I ever dealt with. I personally own a 95 F150 with a 6 inch lift. I have had more problems with my own truck than ANY non TTB
vehicle I have ever lifted. I have the extended radius arms that are supposed to help, but they dont.

The alignment CONSTANTLY changes causing weird problems, like tourque steer, bump steer, and wander. Every other day I get some new noise or see tire wear that shouldnt be happening. I have a BRAND NEW SNAP ON ALIGNMENT RACK but its no so much the alignment as it is the poor engineered suspension. So regardless of your experience or the quality of your alignment rack, these front ends are a nightmare after being lifted PERIOD!
I have a shop to run as I own a repair shop in Denver, and I dont have much more time for this so here it goes....
First off, I am an ASE MASTER CERTIFIED MECHANIC with over 18 years of professional experience.
With that said, lets see who the idiot really is...

First the Baja trucks dont run on the street and its much easier to run off road with bad alignment and not see driveability problems. Baja trucks are not even aligned like street driven vehicles. Just ask a Baja driver and they will tell you that those truck handle like crap on pavement. Hell you could probably do a Google search to find proof of that. Just like race cars on a track have different alignment than daily street drivers.

I would love to see a Baja truck handle on city streets LOL....NOT GOING TO HAPPEN! Just like a car setup for roundy rounds, it will not drive good on the street...its just setup different.

Second the alignment DOES change with every bump you hit. The best you can hope for is to set the aligment right and have a pretty good handling vehicle on SMOOTH FLAT ROADS!  
I could spend an hour going thru all the specifics about why and how it does this, but someone already did that. It was the post you were bashing...this person is actually right on, so I dont need to say it again.

I plan to either do a straight axle swap or sell this nightmare. I love my truck and I am a die hard Ford fan, but I personally hate the ford TTB setup. I think Ford did it just to be different than chevy and Dodge.
I think it was a mistake and the design is flawed, how else can you explain why the TTB setup has far more problems than any other design Ford ever used, lifted or not. Even the solid axle with radius arms style is 1000times better and less problematic, EVEN AFTER A LIFT IS INSTALLED.

I can tell you that if you plan to keep the TTB and lift your truck, BUY THE GOOD RANCHO SETUP WITH EXTENDED RADIUS ARMS! ALL OTHER KITS ARE JUNK  ESPECIALLY ROUGH COUNTRY.

Good luck to everyone, and you have a nice board here!
Thanks


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Problem is, the person above was doing little to help. The information he posted about not being able to correct the alignment on a small 2" lift is incorrect (the two posts directly above yours just further confirms this). Then he just turned the discussion into a big huge hate-fest with his opinions about the suspension rather than just simply trying to answer the OP's question.


So you say your truck is lifted 6"?

Has it occurred to you the jacked up angle on your steering linkage could be a cause for your nightmares?
This wouldn't be Ford's or the TTB's fault, you lifted it and didn't correct the steering properly. Radius arms do nothing at all to help with that (so who's the idiot here?).

Now granted...
Almost every aftermarket TTB suspension lift kit out there is a failure in engineering here. Few, if any have a drop pitman arm that matches the lift's height (especially those over 4"), but it really shouldn't be that hard to figure out that the steering linkage being all out of kilter is going to dramatically magnify the handling and tire wear issues you mention. There is only ONE pitman arm available out there that fully corrects for a 6" lift on a fullsize TTB Ford (Skyjacker's pt#FA600). For whatever unknown reason, it is not included with any kits of that height, you have to purchase it seperately.

I would also agree that a TTB is much less forgiving of a poorly engineered suspension kit than most straight axle setups, and is why so many people have these problems with it (which goes right along with your statement about so many kits being junk). Another issue is flimsy axle brackets that bend and/or crack, this won't allow an alignment to hold either. It is certainly possible however to easily be rid of these problems on a TTB, it just takes a little understanding of what the hell is going on under there  (nowhere did I ever say TTB was the greatest thing around either, but I would much rather have it instead of an A-arm style IFS that has so many small parts that tend to break easily while offroad.)

The last thing I need to mention, ASE master certification is completely meaningless if what I've seen coming out of such shops around me is of any indication. Numerous times I've had friends with TTB vehicles come to me because "master certified mechanics" botched the alignment job on it. Each time it was either because they used the wrong size eccentric bushings, didn't notice that the vehicle needed spring shims (common on heavier Supercab trucks), or they were just lazy and didn't even bother to do anything at all to it (sometimes blaming other problems like a worn steering gear or poor linkage geometry on the suspension itself). Each time I've been able to have the truck back to tracking perfectly straight ahead down the road with no more odd tire wear like the day it left the factory with nothing more than just using the proper parts on it.


I make no claims to be anything special, I'm just a guy who got fed up long ago with the draining of my wallet because of incompetence, and have taken it upon myself to learn a little about things and then do the work myself. I was quite amazed at the differences I found between what's commonly said about this stuff and reality. So I'm just here to pass along what I've come to find out about it.


You have a good day.  

I had a 96 F150, I lifted it 6 inch and later had a few small problems. About 1000 miles after the lift I had camber problems. Took it to an old timer mechanic (they are the true master mechanics) and he did a proper alignment with 35 year old alignment tools, no machine. He installed a 7 and 4 degree camber nut, one on each side. That problem solved. Straight as an arrow for 20,000 miles. Then I hit a deer and bent the frame where the radius arms brackets are. I took it back to him and not only did he straiten it, he boxed the frame to add more support and strength. After that, he did another alignment and it drove strait with NO tire wear at all for the next 5 years. I wheeled it pretty hard, hard enough to have it in "Petersen's Worst Stucks", the very first time they had it. It is in the April 2004 issue page 34, the one with the bulldozer pulling me out since a dozen trucks and two winches couldn't even budge me. I put over 70,000 on it before I sold it. So, if you do a lift on your truck, go ahead and box the frame about a foot on both sides of the RA bracket and they do make parts to adjust the camber. The camber adjusters were somewhere around $15 each. I hope this helps you.