[cornerstone]

I had the entire beautiful day to work on the truck. Now that the motor is in the correct spot I yanked the 2" lowering blocks out and made a mark at 2 degrees using the digital level on my iPhone. With a 40 grit flap disc on the trusty DeWalt grinder, it made short work removing the aluminum no longer needed. Once most of the material was taken off I stuck some 80 grit sandpaper to a nice flat steel surface and sanded them by hand to their final dimensions. After they were reinstalled both important angles were at 4 degrees. Parallelism finally achieved. Pointing the rear diff down another 2 degrees gave the driveshaft another 3/8" clearance in the hoop, but still would make contact if the truck was aired out. At this point I thought I might as well alter the crossmember to get full travel. I got the top of the hoop cut off and cleaned up just as it was getting dark and dinner was on the table. Tomorrow afternoon I'll be ready to weld in 1.25" tall 1/4" bar stock to raise the hoop and eliminate the possibility of metal on metal contact. Feels like I've finally got some resolution to a lingering problem. We shall see... I still have axle bump stops I need to install.