Lift the front or drop the rear? WWYD?

Hi all! I bought a 2004 Tacoma a few months ago and it came with extra leaves in the rear (presumably for increased towing capacity?) but the front end was not leveled so the whole thing angles down toward the front. It drives me nuts and now I'm trying to decide if I should take the rear leaves out or lift/level the front end to match? I'm not planning to DIY it and my mechanic said it would probably cost about the same for either option so I'm not sure what the best route is.

For context, I do intend to take it off road in New England quite a bit for accessing remote camping and fishing spots, but it's also my daily driver.

What would you do if this was your truck?

 

I would assess the leaf pack, and see if it requires replacement.

If so, General Springs. If not, remove an overload leaf or two.

I'd also replace the front and rear shocks with Bilstein 4600's, not to mention the front coils. I bet they're long overdo for replacement.

These trucks in stock form are more capable than the people driving it so even your "remote camping" spots won't be trouble for a stock truck.

 

I’d leave it as it is.

 

I would 100% lift the front and leave the rear.

 

Those rear leaf springs do not appear to be stock, if they’re good, leave em, lift the front, but do a proper lift, no lifting spacers. Working on these trucks is pretty easy with common tools.

 

Thanks for the suggestions. I'll check out the condition of the suspension and see what gives, but in general your assessment of the capabilities of these trucks is why I wanted one in the first place.

Assuming I have none, what kind of tools are we talking about, how much money would I expect to drop for them, and how much time to actually do the work?

If it's not obvious already, I'm not wicked mechanically inclined. In general, I'm comfortable with DIY stuff but I've never dipped my toe in the water for truck stuff.


With regard to assessing the condition of the leaf packs, what are some red flags I should be looking for? Or conversely, how would I know if they're good to go?

Thank you kindly for your responses so far.

 

Check for cracked or broken leafs, are they sagging, frown, if none of these they should be good to go.

 

It looks like you've got upgraded springs, so I doubt you have a block lift... but if you do see blocks between the leaf springs and the axle, then the easy choice is to remove those.

Not a Tacoma axle, but close enough.

 

OP post more pics of the rear leaf springs

 

I hope this helps. It's nighttime here and the truck is parked on the street so angles are kinda limited. I can try again tomorrow.

 

Is this an age thing or a wear thing? The truck may be 18 years old but it only has 80k miles on it. It'd be cool if I could get away with just replacing the front shocks and keep the stock coils.

 

Both.

Shocks should be replaced at around the 50k mile mark; they're wear items.

Many people don't replace them for several reasons; they're not physically broken, they believe they're still working as intended (the change happens over time, an owner won't notice it), or they're just too cheap.

Replace them if they're at 50k miles or more.

 

If either the front or rear Suspension was in need of replacing I would address that location.

If the springs were good I would drive as it is.

 

if your gonna offroad it i would suggest you start learning how to fix things on your truck on ur own. I dont wheel with people who dont know how to wrench, imagine breaking down in the middle of nowhere and not knowing what to do. I would lift the front. If it were me I would change my ball joints, uca’s, new coilovers

 

Understood. I'm not opposed, I just have a lot of projects going on right now and learning how to change out all this stuff right now feels overwhelming. Long term goal this year will be to start a setup to start doing basic stuff.

 

If you have something else to drive and can let the Tacoma sit with a place to work on it - good and quite easy pickup to diy everything on. I like how yours looks! Looks like mine!