FABTECH 8INCH LIFT

I see your “therapy” to being a nicer person didn’t help much lmao

 

Are you getting that from the manufacturer? The ones with balljoint spacers also tell you they are high quality and durable off road performance suspension systems...

From a certain point of view that's correct, but functionally, that's not exactly true. Especially when you add in all those spacers etc... everything isn't "factory" any more.

 

It's a process...

 

Im pretty sure the fabtech kit comes with ext shocks so that it works with the oem coils and should keep the cv angles like oem. Your CV angles are bad, and the fact you have bilstiens and not the fabtech shocks that ce with the kit says that the old owner wss doing something he should have maybe, or he found ext shocks. But the fact that he said 8” lift might himt he was stacking lifts to achieve more.
Op can you get better pics of the front suspension, preferably with the tire off?
In the rear it looks like you have some kind of after market pack because fabtech gets their lift from blocks and a AAL

 

they are usually accompanied with a new spindle as well. Fabtech is not a low quality company by any means, and I dont see any ball joint spacers in this application.

 

Oh yeah forgot to add this in my other post


Vs

 

I didn't say Fabtech had spacers, only the ones that do have BJ spacers also claim to be "high performance." In other words, you can't always trust what the manufacturer tells you when they're trying to sell you something.

But even those new longer spindles put a LOT of stress on the suspension in completely different orientations than what the factory was designed for.

Fabtech probably is one of the better kits out there, if you absolutely have to get a 6" lift. But IMO, that's not saying much. For that cost, however, you might as well go long travel and get something you can actually beat on. But very few people get bracket lifts for the performance, anyway...

 

but how?

 

First off, there is no "throwing that lift in the trash". The front crossmember has already been cut for the lift... short of a full up SAS or welding on an OEM crossmember, you are stuck with the lift that is on it. MAYBE you could get a 4" pro comp lift (not sure if they still make em) to replace the 6" fabtech lift, but no telling if it'll bolt up... I would venture to say, no.

The whole point of a drop bracket is just that, it's a DROP... BRACKET. It DROPS your suspension, LCAs, diff, CVs, etc, so that you can stuff larger tires in there. Does it affect your suspension geometry? Yes and no. Your diff and CV angles will be at "stock", you will retain "stock" suspension travel, so you don't have to deal with additional diff drops and blown CV boots that come with standard 3" lifts. But your driveshafts will be at different angles and your upper control arms will be spaced further from your lower control arms.

Is a drop bracket all that bad? It depends... you may need a coilover lift to gain you extra clearance of your suspension from rocks n stuff. But you won't be able to to stuff giant tires under there with "stock geometry" (generally speaking) like you could with a drop bracket. Some will say your center of gravity gets all wonky... again it depends on the wheeling you do. If you hate dealing with wonky IFS geometry of a simple coilover lift (which btw makes you lose downtravel) then drop bracket lifts aren't all that bad, plus you retain the factory up/downtravel.

OP, the best you could really do is as suggested previously... either get full length coilover setup (this will remove the spacer between your upper control arm and your factory coilovers, it may also be a custom application so $$$) or just simply try to replace the worn out stock coilovers with new ones. The second choice will obviously be cheaper but there is no telling whether or not it will ride any better. If you go the first route, I would contact either Fabtech directly and see if they already have a solution created, or perhaps someone who can make you a custom set of Bilstein/Fox/King/Etc coilovers. You likely will need to provide them with measurements and weight of the vehicle if you have some custom made. Be prepared to spend a lot of money.

Now if it rides like crap in the rear of the truck, you can do as others suggested and try removing the bottom or second from the bottom leaf from each leaf pack. This will reduce payload capacity but your ride will be improved (again how much... there's no telling).

Generally if you aren't experiencing a "wavy" sensation when going over bumps then your shocks should be okay. If you hit a bump and your truck goes up and down, up and down, a few times then your shocks are toast. They should extend/retract and go right back to where the were after passing the bump. There should be no boat-like rocking sensation occurring. Now if your truck gets squirrely in that it sort of walks around going over washboards and stuff, then your shocks may simply be too stiff and you'll need to get some shocks that have a lower valving ratio.

Good luck OP!

 

This.

This vehicle looks like one of those "custom" jobs because that's not "just" a fabtech kit. The bilstein shocks (i.e not fabtech) , the leafs (at least the orig owner got rid of the crappy leaf blocks) all tell me this was a mix and match type suspension system. If you don't really know what you are doing, you can screw it up FAST.

The orig owner telling you it was an 8" fabtech lift, when they don't even make an 8" lift should tell you something about the knowledge base of the orig owner.

 

My DB lifted truck runs pretty nice actually. Not sure where you get this information...

 

leverage. The upper and lower control arms are now at least 6" farther apart than they used to be.

 

I'm sure it does.

 

Nice looking rig. You don't have to worry about blown CV boots and you retain stock IFS up/downtravel. I have always been on the fence about DB lifts; they have significant strengths that overcome their pitfalls. No sense in bashing something that is essentially an apples/oranges comparison!

PS your light bar in the first pic is a tiddlybit off center

 

Im not sure you understand how any of this works. lol. If you read nothing but the tacomaworld bible, I understand your logic. But a drop bracket lift is a lot better than throwing in some 5100s cranked all the way up on stock UCA/LCAs.

 

i wonder where the op went, he is gunna probably be more confused after reading all of this

 

It depends on what you want to achieve, and your budget of course. 5100's are FAR superior if all you have is a couple hundred bucks and want to lift to fit some bigger tires.

I guess the main reason I'm so anti-bracket lift/6" lift is because I'm more of a function over form guy. You can fit the same size, if not bigger tires with a solid 3" lift and some fender trimming (there's a guy here rolling on 35's and stock height), and you have the added benefit of keeping your center of gravity lower, so you know, you're less likely to roll over on steep terrain.

If you have a few grand to throw at your truck, I'd rather put that money towards good shocks (King, ICON, Fox), rather than just making the truck sit higher.

 

I get your arguments but it doesn't help OP who bought the truck this way. He won't be able to simply "remove" the DB lift.

 

Yeah, damnit, I might have sacred him off with my 'tude.

I apologize for that...