Because I'm considering upgrading my springs, I was very curious about the springs on that truck. I spent some time looking at them from a foot or two away. If you want to believe that they are stock, go ahead. Because I KNOW that they are not stock, I can read between the lines of the marketing spin and spot the weasel words. The Ford marketing guys are very good and writers for popular media are very bad at fact checking. Caveat lector.
I talked to the guys at RA about the stock springs as I was concerned about de-arching mine. Drew told me that I won't hurt the stock springs by running with a 1,000 pound payload, that I have to overload the truck to de-arch the springs. My plan now is to just run it stock until I have a problem and then address it. I've done two and a half weeks off road with 1,000lb and the back end of the truck is still at stock height with no load. And, no, I'm not catching air, nor do I plan to.
