The Getaway...Crom's build and adventures

Mike is an amazing person! He is on here!

 

Since you can never grease too many things in a suspension, I bought some greasable bolts for my leaf spring install in a week or so. I found them here http://offroaddesign.com/catalog/bushingassemblies.htm for $6.50 ea. (scroll down.) They are grade 8, and they come with locking nuts. I have seen on TW, but haven't confirmed that poly bushings don't need to be, or shouldn't be, compressed as mush as rubber bushings when you tighten the bolts. The idea with these is that since the bolts have locking nuts, they don't need to be torqued as much. Saw a post where somebody went with 20lbs. If your shackle to body bolts are OE, it would not at all surprise me if they were torqued differently by the factory. One tighter than the other.

 

I've had my truck springs off the truck twice, so if torque is wrong it's my fault. @GHOST SHIP 's suggestion is really excellent, because all I have to do is repeat my test on pass side with shackle bolt loosened up and I'll know right away if it's the spring pack or bushing binding. I'm glad he commented.

Regarding torque, It doesn't matter if it's a rubber or poly bushing when torqueing the fastener. The same value should be applied. The reason is the tension is applied to the ends of the center steel sleeve, and not the bushing face. The poly will compress slightly, but it's expected and built into the design.

Also, reading the manufacturer instructions from aftermarket parts suppliers will confirm this. My Camburg UCAs, Whiteline LCA bushings, Energy Suspension body bushings etc. They all say to use factory torque values when using their products.

Regarding the greasable bolt. It's good, and thank you for the link, good price for the product. If I had a choice, I'll take a greasable shackle over the greasable bolt every day of the week. This is because the grease fitting on shackle will deposit grease between the two poly bushings in the center of the shackle, and lube between the outside of sleeve and inner bushings. Keep pumping grease, and it will flow out to bushing face and lube there too. It does it all.

With the greaseable bolt, grease is deposited between bolt and inside of the sleeve, kind of a trap, i suppose it can flow out to bushing face, but I don't see a way for it to lube between outside sleeve and inner bushing. And that's where a lot of wear occurs for rear poly leaf bushings.

Anyway, hope this helps. Good topic to discuss!

 

Whew! Finally made it through all 179 PAGES of kickassery!!! Needless to say, I've learned an incredible amount about our trucks and I plan on implementing as much as possible, as soon as possible. @Crom, anticipate an inbound PM in the next few days with a long list of questions.

Now, I hope I can give back and help Crom do his Crom-ly things. Check out these HD replacement shackles from 4xinnovations. http://www.4xinnovations.com/05-15-Tacoma-HD-Replacement-Shackle_p_148.html
I'd say they are the exact incarnation of what you want to do with the used set of shackles you've been messing with. Food for thought.

 

Wow! Congrats! . Glad you found it useful.

I'll take a look at the shackle, wish they had a photo of grease fitting location, and list bushing diameter. I'll investigate it. Thanks.

If your questions are build, camping, land use related, please feel free to put them here in the thread. It gives others a chance to answer, comment, share experience, and spurs more interesting discussion.

 

Confirmed.

The rubber shackle bushing was robbing me of 1.25" of shock travel on passenger side.

I drooped out the suspension, confirmed shackle angle of 16°. Then hit the 19mm shackle nut with impact. I watched as shackle rotated forward to 30°, suspension and wheel traveled down 1.25". Shock boot pulled away from shock body.



I measured the shock to be extremely close to it's maximum extended length. I wondered if it was limiting the spring, so I went ahead and pulled the shock and used my body weight to apply downward pressure on wheel and bounced it a few times. The shackle would rotate forward and then return back to 30 degrees. There was no change in the spring profile, so it appears that the shock is extremely well matched to spring pack travel, although it is at the extreme end.

Since the shock was out I measured carefully from the frame shock bucket to the shock Mount bolt hole on the axle tube, it is exactly 28 inches on my truck.

@scocar



My parking brake cable needs some help, very tight!!!!

 

Nice

 

Glad you got that figured out! Sometimes it's the simple things that make a big difference. Are you still planning on overhauling the shackles still or keeping what you have?

 

Thanks! That was 30 minutes well spent.

On Monday I'll pay a visit to machine shop for drill and tap quote for the two '05 stock shackles. I've already taken care of the stock rubber bushing and have two sets of ES poly in hand. I'll keep my 09s for spares I think.

Once that's handled, just need an hour to put them in.

 

28" I wonder what springs OME built the BP-51s to go with.. I measured my shocks Extended 25.75", from

 

I've discussed this before in another thread. My conclusion was that all OME branded shocks limit Dakar spring travel by two or three inches.

I don't remember what thread I posted this photo in but I used it to illustrate how Bilstein/ RCD is measuring shock profiles vs the OME. Bilstein measures from lower bushing washer to center shock eye.

I've learned recently that KING measures from the frame to shock eye.

So when comparing King, to Billstein there is about a one-inch differential. Super important if your shopping for shocks.

I do not remember how ARB / ome measures.

 

I want to say that OME measures to the top of the bolt, I seem to remember their measurment at 27.xx inches. I measured to where the frame is, just between the bushings (knowing that the bushings compress).

 

Glad you got that sorted out Nick.
Guess I'll be pulling into the driveway tomorrow and as long as the weather cooperates and doing mine as well. I suppose my ape-like strength is better suited for demolition than working on suspension parts.

 

Tomorrow is supposed to be epic rain storm. We got hammered Friday. I came home from work and dug a 40' long trench do divert standing water from my backyard to front yard where it could run out to street. So fun!

 

No kidding. Just checked.


Guess I'm getting wet.

 

I think the aftermarket companies all say to use the factory torque specs because they are good values for a conventional nut and bolt, and because they don't want to be on the hook if something goes sideways. I think the OE spring bolts had conventional nuts, but I'm not sure as mine have been replaced. I can't see why they would need to put 90 pounds of pressure on the sleeve. Reading your posts about the LCA bushings, someone mentioned how the OE bushing restricted travel when torqued. I wonder if the same thing happens in the rear spring with OE bushings, or even poly bushings.

Agree with you, it would be nice to have greasable shackles. My thought on the greasable bolts was that they should keep the bolt from seizing in the sleeve. And they are cheap. I just had to cut out my lower shock bolts because they seized. I grew up in MN, where everything rusts, so I'm scarred.

 

After I bought my 2015 new, I was holding out to see what developed with the BP-51 rear travel. Once Wheeler's got a set, I asked Yota Dan to provide an extension measurement, and it was pathetic, no better than nitrochargers, and leaving a lot on a table WRT Dakar available droop. At that point I started investigating other options. I believe the numbers Dan provided are posted the the BP-51 anticipatory fapping thread.

 

Once I saw the price of the bp-51 kit I ordered the Bilstein 6112/5160 with Dakar's and camburg UCAs

 

Well yeah, the lack of travel, plus the exhorbitance of a bypass system and its associated price tag just became a big WTF fail in my book. A hot gold-digging chick who doesn't put out. Who needs it.

 

OK, I dug it up.

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/ome-bp-51-suspension-coming-in-2015.344508/page-11#post-12405004

05+ Tacoma Rear Shock BP51, 14.76" coll - 23.62" ext

Note that according to the spec posted on the King site (simply used for reference), this increases compression a bit but REDUCES droop from Toyota OEM STOCK SPEC! For use with their own fucking springs! Fuck me with a wallaby, mate!

OEM 2nd gen Tacoma:
24.29
15.81