Deaver Leaf Springs (J59) & King Shocks (25001-153) Don't work??

My recent suspension setup on my 2001 Tacoma Crew Cab TRD was a full icon suspension setup with piggy back's front and rear with Icon UCA's and the Deaver springs pack (J59 8 Leaf).

I decided to change out and go to a King suspension setup front and rear and placed my order. I was under the assumption that the Kings would work great for my currents needs and that the shocks would work with the Deaver's in the rear. Well, that's not so much the case.

The front coil overs went on without a hitch and work flawlessly. A smoother ride than the Icon's and for these oil field roads, truly do ride better. But that was not so the case with the rear. On the rear shocks, i noticed right off the bat that they were shorter than the Icon's. Got the ole tape measure out and measured them and the shock were 2 1/2" shorter than the Icon's. I was hesitant to put them on, and I should have known better, but I did it anyways. After i got the kings installed, and done my test drive, I noticed immediately that there was an issue. The shocks were topping out. Every time the suspension travelled down, the shocks were the limiting factor and could hear them reach their max amount of travel.

I contacted the company I bought the shocks from and they informed me that I would have to probably run limit straps because the kings would not have enough travel for the deaver springs. Running limit straps is not an acceptable option considering that the Icon shocks never did this. Needless to say I wasn't very happy about the situation considering that I had just spent $800 on a set of a rear shocks that now have 2 miles on them that I can't run unless i put a set of limit straps on the back. This was after I had already contacted them prior to purchasing and told them my current suspension setup and was assured that the King shocks would work and for my current needs would be better than the Icon's.

So my question is, has anyone else ever run into this situation? I am going to contact King on Monday and see about ordering a custom set that are 2 1/2" - 3" longer than their OEM series so that I can actually run the kings on the rear.

 

I'm in an almost identical situation. Was King able to offer a solution? I like having Kings on all 4s, but the limited travel is unbelievable, considering how much the front COs are able to give. I was going to contact King as well and ask about perhaps a longer rod end or something.

 

Omicron,

I contacted King, and the issue is there really are no other options as long as you maintain the OEM mounting points. I ended up contacting Filthy Motorsports. I will tell you now, I WILL be ordering from these guys. Can't remember the guy's name that I spoke to, but after talking with him, I knew right off the bat that I had messed up ordering the King shocks from anyone else. After I told him my situation, he immediately knew what the problem was, as it's a well known problem apparently on these year model tacoma's. Apparently when I ordered from one of the highly talked about vendor's on here, and even explained to them what my current suspension setup was, and EVEN put in the additional comments section on my order as to why I wasn't ordering UCA's or Rear springs because I already had the Deaver spring pack, they still either did not know or didn't care. I'm not sure which.

But after speaking with the guy at Filthy Motorsports, he basically explained it like this. The shock that king sells (the OEM performance series) is the longest shock that king can put in the stock mounting points without giving up on what makes a king shock ride the way it does. He said due to the internal design of the shock, they are unable to put a longer shock there as then you would just be bottoming out due to the increase in the size of the body of the shock. Apparently the reason that Bilstein, Icon and other manufactures that offer a 0-3" lift can get away with a longer shock in the same location is because they don't have the same kind of internals that the king offers. The salesman at Filthy recommended this, the only option is to relocate the mounted points of the shocks, then you can order 10 or even 12" 2 1/2" King shocks and have them valved to meet your requirements.

I'm fixing to order the Shock Relocation kit from BAMF and go that route. I should be able to get at least a 10" shocks under there, and maybe a 12". I'll have to do a little more research on that. But basically you get the kit, measure full droop and full compression on your leafs and then call up Filthy Motorsports, tell them the distances on both and then explain your current needs for suspension and what you want it to do and they take care of the rest.

 

Thanks for the information man, this helps me a lot. Although I may end up ditching the Kings, this helps a lot with understanding the issue and what options we all have. Best of luck to you!

 

So... who was the "highly talked about vendors on here"?

 

Sent you a PM GDT.

Omicron,

No problem man. The guy at FM said he recommended the Bilstein's if you go the lower end route. He said they were about the best bang for the buck and are pretty much as good as you can get before you get into full fledged rebuildable shocks.

I'm going to order the BAMF kit here after the first to get the King setup going. I wanna have full Kings all the way around, and this seems like it's going to be the best route to get it done. It will actually provide more travel in the rear than my current setup does so it might be a WIN/WIN

 

Currently ran into this issue so from what I'm getting out of this I'd go with icon or bilstein if you want to buy a plug and play with the deavers j59? Cause I recently bought the deavers thinking I was going to mount bypass through the bed but then my gf got preggo and it looks like we are buying a new 4Runner soon haha but just looking for the cheapest route to keep my deavers since I just bought them thanks for the help guys!

 

It was probably Ben Brazda you spoke to. I had asked about the same thing you are going thru as I did a lot of research before pulling the trigger. The OEM king rears are really meant for an add a leaf and not much. Didn't like the aspect of that cause an add a leaf would reduce the load capacity and I wanted to run a full leaf pack and he recommended a relocation kit or go with a longer shock for a full leaf.