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When Diesel hides in the blanket you know it's at least 40 outside

The ball joints in te 00-02 fit in the axle yokes and not the knuckle. They also don line up with each other. http://www.cumminsforum.com/forum/98-5-02-non-powertrain/475650-interesting-info-about-00-02-ball-joints.html This explains better than I can. I am definitely not a front end expert. I can however take it all apart and put it back together. I seem to get different opinions of what constitutes worn out joints also. Some say no verical movement and some up to 1/4" vertical is OK. Most of what i have read agrees that any horizontal move is bad. So maybe mine are not as worn as I first thought.

All in good time. It's made by Move. I cut their company logo out of the middle... Airflow is more important to me. All in good time. $650 without any lights. You better have a pretty big brake.... Lots of progress.... I final welded all of the sections together and ground the front smooth. There are full beads on every section front and back. I made sure to do an inch or so at a time to prevent warping. That took forever..... I used some very thick expanded metal to keep large debris out of the "vent" in the middle. It's held in place by bolts, and I'll probably throw some pieces of strap on the bolts to keep it from vibrating. I wanted to make it removable just in case I decide to change it someday. URL=http://s103.photobucket.com/user/TFaoro/media/IMG_20151226_175736074_zps41zfzezt.jpg.html] I then welded in the bottom plate for the light bar. This makes it so you can't see down into the condenser and frame mounts. Came out pretty slick IMO. Then onto the fog lights. Those were 2 piece mounts that were welded together then to the bumper, making everything smooth in the front of course. I then mounted it up to the truck for side bracing and grille guard. Tacked the bar on to get measurements for cutting. It's sitting way too high in these pictures. Here's the bar cut to to math the curvature of the bumper and down a bit. I took off about 2 inches. It's welded right on top of the frame mount braces, so it should b e plenty strong. I then worked on the side braces. I was able to use the stock braces and just weld a stud to outside part of the bumper. You can also see the LED mounts in these pictures. Last couple pictures. I just have to weld in the light bar mount, finish welding the grill guard, and do some final cleaning. It'll then be sent to my paint guy for priming, then Rhino lining. Note the bar looks smaller when the truck is on the ground and not at head height.

@AH64ID I'm actually wanting to go a little higher in the front via a pair of 2.5" - 3" lift springs later on. As is the truck rides better than it did before the spacers were installed since installing the 5100's, I absolutely LOVE these shocks. My control arm bushings are in pretty rough shape and need to be replaced so I might as well build a new set of arms while I'm doing it, right? Lol. Honestly I just enjoy doing things like this so I don't mind building longer arms. I already pulled the AAL's, cut them down, and I'm using them as 1/2" lift zero rates. The truck sits almost level right now and rides MUCH better in the rear, even with wore out shocks. Thanks for the info on the 3rd gen leaf springs. I'm still not sure if I'm going to do it anytime soon, it will depend on if I can find some good springs in the local salvage yards for a good price. I'm excited to see what I'm going to come up with myself! Lol.

Just throwing this out there... I went from a 2" spring spacer to a 1" spring spacer and my ride quality was night and day. I was floored at how much of a change 1" made in the ride based on control arm angle. Dropping to 1" would also allow you to remove the AAL, which I have had nothing but horrible luck with and always advise against. I am quite excited to see what you come up with thou!! Just wanted to throw the under $200 option out there. I also run MaxxLinks and found no change to ride quality with them over the OEM 3rd gen models. Speaking of 3rd/4th gen's if you do the swap to the 3rd gen rear leaves there are 2 basic spring packs offered. There is a 4/1 spring pack found on 03-13 2500's (also 03-09 3500 SRW 3500's) and the 3/1 pack found on DRW's and 10+ 3500 SRW's. There is also a 2 leaf upper overload that was found on 03-09 3500 SRW's and all DRW's. The 3/1 spring pack is only rated 7% stiffer than the 4/1 spring pack. I have driven both and the 3/1 is slightly stiffer but only if you are really paying attention. You will love the 5100's. I grew up running Rancho and now wouldn't touch them. They are overpriced short-lived junk.

Looks good man.

Nice work / nice shop too. Thanks for the pics.