Safe, cheap way to put donor truck on blocks

[svdsinner]

I'm rebuilding a '01 Ram 2500 Diesel, and have a '98 Ram 2500 donor truck with a blown hemi engine. The donor truck is on grass, and I want to put it up on concrete blocks (or similar) so that I can pull all 4 wheels. The donor truck, when stripped is just going to get hauled away on a flat-bed, so it will never need to move from it's spot until then, but it is plausible that I will need to strip other parts from under the truck.

My initial attempt went terribly because 1) there aren't any really good flat spots on the axles that sit on the blocks well 2) Because of the height of the suspension, when I would jack a corner up, the truck would rotate enough to really mess up the angle of the other corners to either knock the truck of the existing blocks, or crush the concrete blocks when the weight hit at a weird angle. 3) Since this isn't on a concrete pad, the blocks settle a bit when I put the weight of the truck on them.

Has anyone done this successfully? My only thoughts to try next would be to make some axle cradles out of 2x4's or 2x6 that would cradle the axles while creating a base that will fit nicely onto the concrete blocks. That would prevent the blocks from breaking, but I don't know if they would help/hurt stability.

 

[PolarisCobra]

Concrete blocks should never be used that way. The don't have the strength to support the truck, as you are learning. I would buy some jack stands (Harbor Freight is fine), some planks cut to length under them to spread the load. Will cost a bit more, but you won't get crushed.

 

[svdsinner]

I'm not worried about being crushed. I always use jack stands anytime I'm under a vehicle. But I don't want to have my $200 set of jack stands unable to be used for other projects for half a year while I'm stopping it. I just want a cheap way to keep the bottom bits of the truck from being ruined by being directly on the ground. Rednecks have been doing it for years. I just want to figure out their secret.

 

[chri5k]

An 8 foot railroad tie cut into four 2 ft sections. Won't crush like cinder blocks.