Why do you have to be parellel to the driveshaft? The driveshaft telescopes behind the carrier bearing. From a geometry standpoint the shorter the bars the worse it will bind as you compress the rear springs, I would think the longer the better. As the rear axle travels up the bars are trying to push it further to the back of the truck, the shorter the bars the more this would happen.
I've been planning on making some for a while but have never got around to it. I saw a design once that kept the bars from interfering with articulation. It was a triangular seup as previously mentioned, two bars going into one at the front, the bars when to the top and bottom of the axle in the back and came together to one heim joint in the front, however that heim joint was bolted to a lever that could swing forward and backward like a shackle on a leaf spring(but mounted upside down on the side of the frame) meaning that as the rear springs were loaded it would just swing forward a bit but when you stomped it the front of the bar could not move up and down so no axle wrap. I think all the bending of bars is due to too much binding. Does this sound right or am I off base here? Sounds like a problem from my statics class lol.
I realy don't know what I'm talking about as I have never done it but that is how it looks to me.
My question is how do you guys weld brackets to the axle? Do you drain the diff oil? I would think you could start a fire.
-Rob