Swapping 3rd gen suspension to 2nd gen

I just kinda wanna cover all my basis.

Im only trying this because the parts were local, the truck had 5k miles on it n the parts all look to be in excellent shape including all the bushings and the bolts are all there for everything.

The suspension came off of a 2017 trd offroad tacoma, he lifted it when it had 5k miles, i do know the guy. He kept the parts dry n in his house. All the part numbers are legible as are thr stock colors, i.e. one of the leafs has yellow writing (i think the other white i can exactly remmeber right at this second.

Anyway my truck is a 2012 4x4 base tacoma with a 140k miles with what i believe to be the stock suspension completely which is absolutely worn out.

So i have all 4 shocks (the fronts "struts" are together obv). I have both rear leafs with the plates and bolts. I also got the uca's. Im unsure if i should use em, but i might as well i guess as i believe they will bolt right up to. N my truck has a decent amount of miles like i said.

I will do some pics before and measurements.

Maybe even a couple little vids of stopping from 20mph hard n 40mph are. N just kinda bouncing the brakes a bit to see how much it bounces, also maybe some take offs from a dead stop just to se ewhat the rear is doing n the diff there. n get a view of it from the inside n outside from each example n put it together in a little 1 or 2 min clip. N compare it after.

My question is, he didn't mark which side goes to what. N i believe the colors have something to do with it obv at the factory i imagine diff colors making it easier to build it. I may even call the dealer n just confirm part numbers to sides for refrence as well.

If anyone can lead me in the best direction there its be greatly appreciated.

Also, is there any issues i shoukd be aware of and these these struts are my only concern as they are mucb beefier than my stock struts, im not going from a sport to offroad its a base 4x4 with pretty significantly smaller struts from what it looks like.

Im still giving it a go regardless i just hope i dont have to cut any of the metal that wraps half away around the strut to get em in lol. I prob will if need be tho.

All said n done i got everything for 200 bucks so thats about as cheap as it gets so im willing to take the risk.

My truck being a 2012 never having completed new rear leafs this set has 1 extra leaf as well. My original leafs both midd spring broke right around the same time at about 120k miles and had them both replaced but just that single band not the sets from a loac spring guy. (The only reason i mentioned that is hopefully that will be way more removable than had it not been touched in 11 years).

Anyway, sorry to rant a little any help would be appreciated.

Also can anyone give me the simplest method of removing the rear leafs, a better side to start or doesnt matter and exactly where u would lift from n how many jacks I'll need if i can get away with 1 jack n stands thats my biggest worry. The shocks im not too concerned about. I pretty much have that sorted minus where they go.

Thankyou.

 

Don’t cut anything on the shock lol. It should be a direct bolt on. This may be relevant to you left vs right question….

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/is-their-a-right-and-left-front-strut.269021/

 

Iirc the coil with 2 same color (usually yellow/yellow) is driver. Coil with 2 different colors is passenger. Accounts from driver side lean.

go watch a couple YouTube videos on Tacoma suspension swap. It’s not too bad if you are swapping the whole leaf pack unless you have bad rust.

 

I think you’re mixing off road and sport. Off road is yellow and blue, sport is all blue. There is definitely a left and right though.

 

This thread might help- https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/review-3rd-gen-suspension-on-2nd-gen.542843/

 

Thanks for the reply.

I was never planning on cutting anything on the shock, im just terrible at explaining s*** lol.

What i meant was, where the strut is, there is a piece of metal basically surrounding that strut from the back side half way (like i said terrible at explaining things) and the original strut which is smaller than this new one, looks to have very little extra space in the cavity it resides. Idk if thats better for u to understand. If u have a tacoma just look at the strut n u'll see what i mean.

Its prob not an issue just something i noticed n thought maybe itd be an issue.

 

I have been n for whatever reason maybe i just haven't found the right video yet, but most seem to not exactly outline what it is im looking for i guess idk.

Like i said the leafs were recently removed to replace a middle spring so they should be relatively easy to get back off. N there isn't a ton of rust for a north east pa truck.

Thanks tho buddy. I appreciate it.

 

Thanks for the link.

I did actually find this in my search n although it does help me, at least with the struts, im still a little lost for the leafs but I'm sure I'll figure it out eventually.

Anyway thanks for the info brother

 

When i do this I will outline in detail (when i figure it out) exactly which leaf is for what n the direction the writing goes from to back n all that just to make it stupid proof for people like me lol.

Im sure if i dig enough there has to be a detailed outline on here, i just havnt found it yet.

 

Pictures work better than words most of the time lol

 

Im not referring to shock color. I’m referring to the painted dots on the coils that mark driver vs passenger

edit; also sometimes both coils have two dots of differing color in which case I have no idea which side is which since Toyota changes up their paint dots year to year and TRD sport vs TRD offroad.

 

Just an update if anyone cares. I did end up putting the suspension parts on there. Front struts, uca's, rear shocks, and leaf springs. I ended buying new sway bar links for like 30 bucks a piece as well, mainly because the on was pretty crappy and so why not replace both. I only did the uca on the driver side, it was such a pia and the passenger side was still in good shape, the bushing on the driver or whatever the thing with the threads on it was so easy to move around it was obv pretty shot. the other side was identical to the new one so i figured why replace it, a worst case scenario the next time i do the struts I'll get it then.

In either case, I have a 2012 base access cab 4x4 and the struts came off of a 2017 trd I believe offroad, the struts, although diff colors obv were identical in size, they were not any longer than the ones that came on my truck and did absolutely nothing to the front in regards to lift, in fact they were the same brand that Hitachi or whatever it says and they were also gas shocks (or at least had the same warning of not taking it apart because there is gas, something to that extent). the rear was lifted, stock for me was 36 inches all around so the rears on mine clearly sagged a little because a stock truck doesnt sit perfectly level, and when i swapped these leafs out the rear is about 36 n 7/8ths so almost an inch.

I did notice that it is so tight now in the rear and the front its really amazing. I never though itd tighten it up this much. I used to just feel a lot of slack and extra crap in the rear upon acceleration that is gone.

The front just feels tight. My gf has a 2020 exact same truck as me except is an sx or something on the side (basically just means it comes with black wheels and maybe some other blacked out stuff idr) and has the 6 cyl mine is the 4 cyl. I also had for a bit a 2017 trd sport in a manual, long story lol. point is this drives very similarly to those trucks more than it does to what it did. It really is such an improvement in ride quality I cant even believe it.

If I was to do it again, id cut the rear shocks off, they were a straight pia, because these parts were 9 years old with a 140k miles on the odometer lol, untouched.

The leafs were the easiest thing for me in this entire job, id recommend 6 ton jacks to hold the rear if ur doing this in ur garage, 3 ton jacks will not cut it, safely anyway (unless you have some super high end ones that much bigger than typical 3 tons).
The rear bolt on both struts were a giant pia, idk the best tool there all i could get on it was a socket to break it, then a ratcheting 14mm.
I took my time so off an on it took me 2 days, i also cut my grass. took my motorcycle for a ride, took breaks because it was literally 90 degrees both days. I also did this job with limited skills and basic tools but a decent collection and an impact wrench. I got it done which is kinda rewarding knowing I didn't let someone charge me 500 bucks easy to do this job (mind you theyd of easily done it in a few hours but still). I learned a lot about my truck and how it operates. Id literally feel competent if I ever wanna lift a truck, or help a friend save a ton of money (bolt on stuff only) I can easily do it def to my truck anyway.

I love the way this truck drives and handles now, it was getting so sloppy and def in need of replacing everything I replaced. Esp the leafs, my old leafs that come on this model were def beat, they were also one leaf less than what I replaced them with which is what added the inch. My only regret and dont feel like doing it yet, is leveling the front to the rear.

I love this truck and hope to keep it for another 140k miles lol. Even though everyone at work/friends are consistently asking me when I'm getting a new truck.

Off topic but i get on average 22 mpg for a 9 year old truck imo thats pretty good. I track it religiously because i drive a decent distance to work, so maybe I'll upload that one day. I've done some testing with it too, like running 90 non ethanol for a month, running 87 for a month, running 89 for a month and running 93 for a month all of which did have slightly diff results. I have the exact same drive and it is a good drive with many steep inclines so Ive felt these tests are pretty good. I know everyone is retarded and claims all vehicles are mapped for a specific octane and everyone forgets your vehicle is the calculator that figures out the optimal air to fuel mixture, for me the proof is that my truck di get much better gas mileage on 93, however not enough to justify the price diff of almost 65-85 cents a gallon dep what station it is.

 

this is about the best pic I have atm of the 3rd gen suspension but there were no problems at all.



This was what I used to get the rear shocks off, the top thing you'd usually latch onto was so crusty I had to do it this way, note to self just cut it off next time lol. idky i didn't. You can also see how crusty that 9 year old suspension from north east pa is. These leafs that came stock on here originally broke, one about 120k the other about 2k miles after I had only the broken leaf replaced by a local guy and since then the leafs started rusting pretty good, however before that they looked better way less rust before I had that replaced. Now they look brand new again. I'll add a better pic in the future.




this is the new front suspension from the 3rd gen, everything is exactly the same as a stock Tacoma just pretty blue. I'm assuming the shocks and springs ae set up a little diff as the truck feels totally diff now in a good way.

 

Nice job. When I swapped mines out I noticed a big difference in ride quality too. It was my first time lifting a truck and it took me the whole day. Just by looking at your pictures looks like you have the Hitachi ones from a trd sport.