OME BP-51 Install Report and Height Adjustment

Not from those areas. I have seen the shaft seals leak on the original version but Arb says they have fixed the problem with the seals.

 

Hmmm... I would like to install and use them, I'm just hesitant to open a can of worms.

 

I’m certain mine did not have residual oil like your pics.

 

Also if you get this package with your kit.
Check the contents. I was shorted 1 of 2 bolt sleeve. (It was no fault of headstrong ) I didn’t realize until half way thru the install. Luckily the truck is a toy. Anyway Marie @HeadStrong Off-Road took care of it, ARB sent a whole new kit.

 

And I surmise you haven't had any leakage problems.

BTW: your truck look great!

 

After I got that penicillin shot the leakage went away jk.
No I haven’t had any problems. Thanks for the compliment.

 

@pocketsmcaaron Have you seen any more leakage since cleaning the oil off? I am curious if the ARB tech was correct regarding the oil being residual from manufacturing.

 

I have not seen any signs of oil so far (1k+ miles) after following the ARB Tech’s instructions.

 

I spoke with Erik and he wanted me to send him the invoices of where I bought both the front and rear BP's, he sent me labels to send the BP's back, then he issued me a check overnight for the amount I paid for both invoices.

 

Anyone with 10mm with no added weight (no bull bar, no winch, no extra battery) to front, what’s your lift height?
I’m currently set at 15mm (1500 Miles so far) and am hovering around 2 3/4” -3” driver’s side and 3” + passenger. Looks great, but am concerned about cv boot rub...

 

I'm at 5mm with nothing up front... 2 drivers side and 2.25 passengers... For what it's worth...

I'd guess 10 would be somewhere in between

 

After the lift does the abs get triggered when cornering on the highway or down tight fire roads?

 

Hi All! I too have just gotten the bp-51s. I was planning to install them myself, but got busy and had a trip coming up, and the place I was going to bring for alignment knew of the shocks, and quoted me 10 hours to install, so I went ahead. They called the next day to say they were, in fact, familiar with the basic OME lift but not the bp-51s. I probably should have pulled the truck then, but I had given them the PDF, and the phone number to ARB which is closeby to Seattle here.

I have no weight in front other then a stock bumper, so I asked them to set the pre-load to 10mm for now, and I'll adjust it as I get more stuff up front, but not too much plan for that at the moment. Their tech said he thought I should leave it at 20mm to keep the truck level, I have the "light duty" dakar leaf back in the back. They said if I didn't like the ride and wanted to adjust, they'd do it for free. So i took the truck on my trip, and of course the front is topping out, a loud bang whenever I'd hit a particularly deep thing as the front drooped off the drop. The Compression and Rebound were at factory settings, so I adjusted them down to 2 for Compression and 6 in front and 8 in back for Rebound, this improved things a bit but got even better once I brought the compression up to 4.

it was pouring rain the day I was able to go out to a long forest road and work on the settings, so after getting thoroughly dirty after 3 adjustments, I called it a day.

I dropped the truck back at the shop this morning to have them set the pre-load to 10mm. I once again gave them the PDF and once again probably should have been crystal... crystal clear and met with the tech. I guess we can never assume the "experts" are that.

I got a call about 30 minutes after dropping the truck asking if I had the second spanner wrench that came with the truck, the tech was having trouble adjusting the pre-load with just the one spanner wrench... I said, you just need to use a metal punch or a screwdriver to rotate the top collet after releasing the spring compression and unlocking the lock screw, it shouldn't be too difficult. They said they'd make it work, and then I started to panic. Once I finished up on another call I gave them a ring back, to reiterate the spring needs to be off the truck and compressed to take the load off. They then admitted that the tech was trying to cheat it by doing the adjustment on the lift. I told them ARB is out in Auburn and they can call them, they just did call them as the tech was arguing with the shop manager that the spanner wrench is for the top collar, so they called ARB to settle the dispute, and apparently now an "authority has spoken".

I pray to god the tech did not try and force the thing with it on the truck, as neither of the lock bolts were accessible so he'd just be wrenching against the locked collar, and hopefully not bending or stripping anything, if it didn't move then hopefully no damage was done. Annoying as I could easily do this myself if I had a spring compressor ( tried two different threaded tools and neither fit on the spring )

So please learn from me, if you bring this system to any shop, even if they claim to know how badass it is, to go over some of these finer details and insist they call ARB before doing any work, especially on the front pre-load, as many of these guys are used to the other systems you can adjust right on the truck.

Will report back when I get the truck back this afternoon.

 

Well, it’s not good. I went to pickup the car and looked at the drivers side, the holes on the preload adjustment ring were a bit marred and messed up but not completely destroyed, that put my mind at ease and I went in to get my keys. I told the manager, Jeremy at Pacific Rim Auto in Seattle that it looked like someone was trying to force it, even though he had said they had ceased when they realized they needed 2 spanner wrenches to adjust the preload... oh lordy... I told him it looked like someone had taken a sledgehammer to the adjustment ring, and he said that it's aluminum, it's soft, and the thing was stuck. Mind you these bp's had about 200 miles on them, and were clean as a whistle.

I drove the car home, pretty pissed, but I can't really freak out over a bit of marring around one hole, and then I went to the passenger side with the flashlight, and had a look. Oh god, this was obviously the side the tech started on, trying to adjust the damn thing in place with the spanner wrench, on a lift, without loosening the collar on the preload, One hole looks like they put a metal punch into it and hit it back and forth with a 12 pound hammer, probably 5 mm blown out of either side of it, another hole looks like they stuffed a flathead into it and then it came free and scraped up the surroundings.. so I was getting more annoyed here, and then I looked at the body of the shock, and freaked out. It looks like they had taken the spanner wrench and were trying to grip the body of the shock and force it one way while whacking at the collar with a sledhammer or maybe femur of some recent dinosaur kill. I am attaching some photos below.

I emailed the shop the photos of the damage and offered to resolve it by them crediting me the labor paid to them equal to the cost of a new set of front coil overs, We'll see how they respond tomorrow. I am livid for a few reasons, one that it seems like the person was angry, and just trying to destroy this thing, it's a brand new kit, and the truck has 2500 miles on it. The aim of getting this was to have it on for the life of the truck, and have it be serviceable, now they look, out of the gate, like they've been attacked by a wolverine. Secondly, I doubt I could bring these into ARB for any sort of warranty issue and have them say.. wow, well looks like installation wasn't a contributing factor to this problem, we have your back!.

I had put one of the spanner wrenches in my tool box at home and left one in the truck, the tech at the shop was using it to try and adjust the pre-load, and when he bent this one, they called to see if I could bring the second as "two tools are needed to make the adjustement" LOL

Here are some photos below.

 

Sorry this happened to you, this is one of the primary reasons I dont allow shops to touch my truck. At least if I mess it up its on me. Lifts are not that difficult. Hope you get this resolved peacefully and dont have to employ lawyers and the such.

 

Looks like a red headed step child fell out the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down.
That shop should be embarrassed.

 

Lesson learned, I was planning to do this myself as there is a local place you can rent a lift and they have a full set of tools, but I didn't have the time to get there before leaving on a trip to the southwest, so I but the bullet and dropped it off. Have done all the work otherwise on the truck myself, Funny enough I ordered a spring compressor that should be here tomorrow that people have reported works with the BP-51 narrow space, and I'll be able to make the adjustments easily myself from here on out! Hoping they reply in kind to my calm concise email.

 

Which spring compressor did you go with ?

 

when I was calling around to shops I told these guys I had gotten the OME BP_51s and they replied that was an awesome choice and what they hoped everyone put in their trucks to lift, and then proceeded to act like they'd never seen it before.

 

$55 Shankly Spring Compressor Tool - Heavy Duty Build, Ultra-Rugged Coil Spring Compressor Tool or Strut Spring Compressor Strong and Durable ATV Spring Compressor Tool

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01M0UT55Y/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

someone in another thread said it was working for them, fromt the photos it looks like there is quite a narrow nose on it