Can someone help me understand if the drivers side strut assembly on my truck is assembled and/or installed correctly?

About a year ago I purchased and had a local shop install a ReadyLift 3.5" leveling kit. Almost immediately after install I was getting a crunching/squeaking/rubbing sound coming from the drivers side suspension and I went back to the shop to report a problem. Now fast forward almost a year later and I am still having the same behavior sound and of course the shop cannot identify the issue, I have been to the shop 4 times post install with no resolution. The last trip to the shop resulted in a diagnosis of failed UCA ball joints and a warranty replacement of the UCA ball joints, at a cost of $260 to me. There was no change in the ride and sound coming from my truck.It is my belief, and I have shared this with the shop owner and manager, that the drivers side strut assembly has been assembled and installed incorrectly. You can clearly see that the rubber top shock boot (probably not the right term for this thing) and the lower shock plate (again probably not the right term for this thing) are facing the same direction on both sides, meaning that the angle of the lower plate is angled the same. Now basic geometry tells me that these should be facing in opposite directions given that they are on opposite sides of the truck and the angle of the struts are exactly opposed.

I have attached pictures, appropriately labeled Drivers Side & Passenger Side, so you can see the angle of the lower shock plate (probably not the right term for this thing) and upper shock boot (again probably not the right term for this thing). Also a set of pictures showing that the distance between the spring and frame on the drivers side is much much closer (actually touching the frame) than on the passenger side. These pictures were taken with the truck on jack stands and tires off of the ground.

Thank you in advance for any help you may be able to provide.



Driver top

Driver Spring

Driver bottom


Passenger Top

Passenger Spring

Passenger Bottom

 

It looks like it’s rubbing the frame and the UCA? What’s the 3.5 lift consist of? Just a spacer?

you should get no noises after a lift or a level

 

Sweet Jesus, is the truck up in the air right now? Looks like everything’s touching.

 

Ignore my other question, saw where you said the trucks on stands tires off the ground.

the ready lift 3.5 looks like a spacer and a new UCA.

my original point stands, a properly installed kit shouldn’t make any weird noises…your UCA looks like it touches the springs, knuckle looks like it touches, and the spring looks like it’s slapping the frame…I’d get a competent shop to fix it

 

If the spring perch on the driver's side shows the assembly is 180 off, I would assume the top hats could be installed incorrectly as well. There's pics in the reviews on Readylift's website in the comments of the UCA hitting the spring hard at full droop so that seems standard, sadly.

 

Ooof…what about the spring and the frame?

OP, did the “crunching/squeaking/rubbing ” ever stop at all, sounds like you said it didn’t after a year and 4 trips, and now you’ve replaced UCA ball joints?

 

I dunno, never had the top hats installed wrong so I can’t speak for that. It’s gotta directly effect the spring though.

 

spring is definitely slapping the frame, you can see from one of the pics where there is about 4-5MM of space on the passenger side and zero space on the drivers side.

 

WVMoose -- the noise has never stopped, I pointed out the top hat misalignment to the shop and got some bull**** answer from an incompetent wrench.

Thankfully it's been covid and I'm not commuting somewhere to work everyday for the past year, but now I'm worried that other damage has been done to the wheel bearing or other suspension components.

The ReadyLift kit does include UCA and two spacers, one inside the top hat and one on top of the top hat. I'm worried that the entire strut assembly is not put together correctly.

 

Are these the struts that have the adjustable lower spring perch? I'm assuming with 3.5 inch of lift is the one that has the spring spacer and top spacer. Did they install the struts at the lowest spring perch to compensate for those parts? If not you have as much as 4 inches of lift and that will not work with stock geometry.