2007 Escalade RC 3.5" lift kit

[crownvic31]

Hello all

I recently received my RC 3.5 Lift kit. I will be installing this soon once I gather parts for the autoride sensor and new alignment parts. Looking at all the parts, the rear spring cup is taller then the front strut spacer. Is this normal? I dont want my escalade looking lower in the front. I want a even look.


I am currently running front Arnott struts and a 2" level kit that sits under the struts and have the the front autoride bypassed with the rears active. Right now my truck is running leveled with 24" snowflakes and 295/40-24 tires.

1st pic is a few months ago with the factory grille.
2nd pic is how she sits now with the mesh grille.

I am attempting to fit 35" tires. Will be a tight fit but I will make it work after the lift install. Tires that am I running now are 33.3" tall and I just had to cut alittle on the front inner bumper.

 

[Trey Hardy]

I would get extended control arms or you won’t be able to align it good you’ll have to trim for the 35s but nothing major but also might need a .25” wheel spacers up front to clear the control arms as the tires may rub I would put any higher then a 1” puck in the back it should sit pretty close to level or get some moog hd springs cheap and don’t use the spacer puck that’s what I did

 

[Trey Hardy]

Sweet looking Escalade btw I want those mirrors lol
If you need em I got a set of rough country uca I’ll let you get pretty cheap I would replace the ball joints just for a peace of mind before using them though I upgraded to fabtech uniballs and they ride so much better imo

 

[crownvic31]

Thanks for the offer on the upper control arms but I bought the 3.5" RC lift kit which comes with control arms.

 

[crownvic31]

Finally installed the RC 3.5" lift kit. Everything went well. Only thing is that the front sits 1" lower then the back. I did adjust the ride height for the rears but its not lowering enough to level to the front.

Am i able to use one of those level spacers that sit under the strut maybe a 1" level spacer?
Would this be ok to use inconjunction with the 3.5" upper strut cup? Will it affect my 4x4 or cv axles?

 

[crownvic31]

Looks leveled in this pic but trust me, its not.

 

[Trey Hardy]

Finally installed the RC 3.5" lift kit. Everything went well. Only thing is that the front sits 1" lower then the back. I did adjust the ride height for the rears but its not lowering enough to level to the front.

Am i able to use one of those level spacers that sit under the strut maybe a 1" level spacer?
Would this be ok to use inconjunction with the 3.5" upper strut cup? Will it affect my 4x4 or cv axles?

You might could stretch it another .5-1” but your angles won’t be the best without a crossmember drop probably eat up ball joints and cv axles at that point but I’ve seen crowd run up to 4-5” worth of leveling kits all day as long as it stays on road you’ll be fine if you actually plan on off roading at all again probably be breaking stuff the biggest I ever went with leveling kits was maybe 4” maybe 5” if I was trying to clear some big tires for a show like in the pic here and it was only for a couple days rode like shit and was for the show I lowered it the next day cause my angles were so bad I had to take the cv axles out

 

[Trey Hardy]

Side note though if you got a differential drop you may be fine as far as cv axles but ball joint angles will still be iffy mainly lowers since you have the extended a arms

 

[crownvic31]

The 3.5 rc lift kit did come with a differential drop kit which i did install. I thought the rc upper control arm takes care of the ball joint issue?

 

[crownvic31]

Also
I am not off roading so that is one thing dont need to worry about

 

[Dustin Jackson]

@crownvic31 It looks good to me. The problem with this generation is that the window lines are parallels to the ground at factory stance so when you "level" the front up you get the illusion that the Tahoe is squatted because the window lines will now be tilted towards the rear. At least that's how I see it, I think factory rake looks great but that's just me.

You should be fine to add more lift to the front to achieve your preferred stance.

 

[Trey Hardy]

Also
I am not off roading so that is one thing dont need to worry about

The 3.5 rc lift kit did come with a differential drop kit which i did install. I thought the rc upper control arm takes care of the ball joint issue?

It does correct it but can only be stretched to a certain extent so a good example is my silverados lift is a 7.5” rc in reality it’s their 5” kit stretched to 7.5” so you already got 2.5” extra stretch already I would stack a 1.5” leveling kit so I wouldn’t scrub full lock and I would just barly be able to get it aligned halfway decent if I ran the 2” my alignment would actually max out and be off by a hair camber wise so they leaned in
Without a crossmember drop for your lower control arms or longer steering knuckles for the a arms you can only stretch but so far and still be safe. I wouldn’t put yours no higher then 4-4.5”

 

[crownvic31]

Great
I just ordered a 1/2" lower strut spacer which will provide up to a 1" lift. If this works then I will throw on my 35" tires, trim what has to be trimmed and then do alignment.

 

[crownvic31]

I remember when I 1st got the truck in may of last year I had to replace the front struts. The truck was sitting slightly even. It was hard to notice a rake. After replacing the front struts with the Arnot and bypassing the front leveling sensors with the supplied hardware from Arnot, the truck then sat lower in the front. I counted the turns on the factory springs and it had 7 turns while Arnot has 6.

I believe that the even stance would had been acheived if the factory struts were there.

 

[Trey Hardy]

Yea struts will change everything I went from blown out stocks with the Tahoe nose diving hard to new Monroe’s which picked it up some then bilstein lift struts which were the same as the leveling kit without the leveling kit to icon coil overs now and every single set has made the truck sit different height wise

 

[crownvic31]

Will dealer do a wheel alignment on my 3.5" lifted escalade and 35" tires on 24" rims?

 

[Dustin Jackson]

@crownvic31 Possibly but they are usually not motivated to do the extra work to make the alignment good. When I lifted my Tahoe the chevy dealer refused to align it.

 

[crownvic31]

Just a quick update
Escalade is aligned and ready to drive. Hit a few hiccups before the alignment that had to be taken care of. I started another post for that.

35" tires are looking and riding good. Here is a pic but i will get better pics in a few days.

 

[Lifted496]

Just a quick update
Escalade is aligned and ready to drive. Hit a few hiccups before the alignment that had to be taken care of. I started another post for that.

35" tires are looking and riding good. Here is a pic but i will get better pics in a few days.

Awesome the RC 3.5 lift for my 12 Denali just came in on Saturday! Which 1/2 spacer did you buy? MotoFab? I want the front to sit right like yours!

 

[crownvic31]

Do you have the factory oem front struts? If you do, you might be fine with out the 1/2" spacer. When i bought my escalade, it had oem front struts. Reason why i replaced them was because about a month later they started leaking. I didnt want to spend the money at the time so i went the bypass route and got arnotts. Right after the install i noticed that they kept the oem ride height. After a week or 2 of driving, the front started looking lower and lower. I ended up buying a rc 2" leveling kit for under the strut and that brought it up alittle over stock height.

I did notice that the oem front springs have 7 turns and the arnott have 6.

Right now after the rc 3.5 lift and the 1/2" spacer, the front still sits 1" lower then the back at 40" and the rears are at 41".

And to answer your question, yes i bought the 1/2" spacer front from motofab.

Not sure if you have the autoride but if you dont, might be easier to get the look your looking for. I think if i replace the rears with none autoride, my rear will drop another 1" and level out.