LCA Bushings: OEM, Energy Suspension, Whiteline

I just did energy suspension upper and lower about 3 weeks ago and so far I love them. I used an oxy/acetylene rose bud to separate/burn out the old rubber and maybe took 2 minute per bushing. After completing the drivers side the passenger side went fairly quickly.

 

Tim how does that truck ride with those rear axle wrap bars? What brand are they?

 

I don't know exactly what you talking about. Are you talking about the rear control arms? This is not my truck. It belongs to this guy Fred who I met on toyota-4runner.org. If you can tell me the playtime in the video you saw the parts in question, I'll know what you're talking about and I could shoot a message to Fred and ask him about them.

 

I got a suggestion to copy these updates into a separate post so they don't get lost in the OP. Thanks @quetzal.

Update: April 30, 2016

A note about squeaking and poly bushings...When I first installed the Whitelines they squeaked like crazy. I think I was going crazy and I never even got it offroad.

Anyway I went back in and completely tore everything down. Total Chaos UCA bushings, Whiteline LCA bushings, AND Energy Suspension steering rack bushings. I cleaned all the bushings, bolts, contact surfaces of grease, grit, paint, and then instead of using Redline, I greased everything heavily with SuperLube. That stuff is completely synthetic and free of petroleum based additives. It is a food grade grease and playsnice with the polyurethane. For two months now I have 0.000 squeaks. Zero. I am using it on everything now except CV boots.



Update: April 2017

I've had the Whitelines on for about a year and a half and wanted to add an update.

1. On the positive side, the Whitelines are still squeak free after doing the careful cleaning and greasing I described last year.

2. On the downside, the Whitelines do not have the grooves on the bearing face that the OEM bushings have. These grooves allow the bushing to bite into the metal on the frame under proper alignment bolt torque. The Whitelines have thick smooth aluminum washers which are prone to slipping under heavy load and throwing alignment. I just had this happen to me yesterday when I was changing out tires. When I dropped the jack on the front end the suspension droop caused the tires to land on the outside shoulders which put the LCA into compression and caused one of the back LCA cam bolts to bang to the limit. It took me a bit to figure out what had happened. I'm limping on a manual alignment til I get it re-aligned. I have been using a higher torque then OEM (more than 100 ft-lbs) to prevent this from happening but the potential still exists. I have been thinking of a way to roughen the face of the washers and improve the grip but no great ideas yet.

 

@Squeaky Penguin Have you had any trouble keeping your alignment with your white lines as described above?

 

No, and that includes lots of wheeling.

 

I have run the whitelines for about a year now myself. They are great, no alignment slippage or squeaks or any problems of any nature. Taken a few good hits while fully loaded out in the field. No complaints here. I do not crawl, but rather haul gear for field work, usually loaded up right to GVW. I lubed the bushings up real good before putting them together. Hope this helps anyone on the fence about them.

 

Can you post me a link to this establishment??? Did a search but only San Diego Truck Springs and they did not seem to have LCAs.
Thanks!!!

 

http://sdtruckshop.com/ Call them and/or email. They currently have 2nd Tacoma LCAs in stock.

 

I have always burned them out, then using a hacksaw sliced the metal sleeve, usually I have to get a chisel in there though as my goal is to not eff up the control arm.

Seeing some of these other methods though is interesting as perhaps something may work better.

 

Maybe Op put too much grease on them, some excess cover some of the washer's surface? I'm debating on either ES or Whiteline and Whiteline might be my go to because i just don't feel like breathing in any toxics.

 

Anyone know of a place to order the whitelines without it being weeks before they ship? Amazon says they are unavailable, anyone have an idea of when they will be back in stock?

 

Try this company to buy the bushings: http://www.suspension.com/w53377a

They say it's for the 3rd Gen 4runners but the 1st Gen Tacomas have the same front end so it should work.

 

Yeah I saw that, shays 4-8 weeks for shipping though...

 

Bummer. I'd contact the company and ask if that's really an accurate shipping time or can you get them much sooner.

 

Timmy,

What ball joint separator did you use to break apart that LBJ? Shown @11:20 -

I used an autozone one and it was crap. The one you used there seemed to work very well.

 

That looks just like the one I got at HF. Mine works fine

 

I did put alot of grease on the bushings and washers but mostly I think my issue was the torque spec. The rear cam nuts are blocked by the steering rack and I'm guessing the shop didn't torque them. If the other guys here have subjected the Whitelines to hard wheeling then I'm sure they are fine.

 

np, will be looking into this soon.

 

Hey Ramon, that puller came from a kit I bought from OTC via Amazon. I've gotten tons of use out this kit. Well worth the expense.

Here's a link:

$131 OTC 6295 Front End Service Set for Pitman Arms, Ball Joints, and Tie Rods

https://www.amazon.com/OTC-6295-Fro...qid=1502495780&sr=8-6&keywords=otc+puller+set