Help with suspension to return to stock or close to stock

Hello guys, for some reasons, among them a health issue, I am thinking of removing my lift and putting the truck back to stock or maybe leveling up. My truck is a 2015 Prerunner and the suspension is composed by: MaxTrax Spindles, Bilstein 5100, OME 883, JBA UCAs, OME dakar mediun leaf pack, Bilstein 5125 rear shocks, 2 inch block below the dakars, Spidertrax Wheel spacer in the rear and 285s tires.
I'm thinking of maybe going back to 265 tires, remove the spindles, UCAs and leave the Bilsteins with the OME 883s for now, that would leave me about 1 inch or a little more in the front. But the rear suspension is the one that has me in doubt and that's where my question comes from. Is it possible to remove a couple of leaves from the Dakars to lower it? I understand that the overlord only adds 1/2 inch.
The truck doesn't ride very well. After several tire changes, alignments, road force balance, etc, I still have vibrations and a shimmy in the steering at certain speeds. It is something that I have never been able to correct and my suspicion is the rack and pinion. The bushing may be too soft. So it is possible that by lowering the truck and decreasing the size of the tires, this will improve. What suggestions do you have for the rear?

 

Depending on how much lift the Dakars gave the rear I would look for someone who wants to lift their truck and swap leaf springs with them, plus some money. This will drop you back to stock plus 1" from the blocks in the rear.

As for the shimmy and vibration it is possible it's the steering rack bushing being worn out. You can get poly replacements from Energy Suspension, they are a pain to replace. Also have a look at your tie rod angle compared to the LCA angle in the front. If they are not parallel this can cause bump steer while driving and even small pot holes and uneven road surface can cause the truck to jerk around. I had to do quite a lot to get my tie rods and LCA parallel after lowering my base model 3+ inches but eventually it got there.

 

Sounds like you'd be a perfect contender for some Hammer Hangers in the rear. They really fix a lot of the rear end shimmy these frames have and improve the ride quality quite a bit. IMO leaf springs are adjustable and if you want to remove a leaf, go for it. If the ride quality and payload capacity work for you, I don't see a problem within reason most times to altering a leaf pack.

Up front, with all the mods and the age of the truck, it really can be anything. How old is the suspension setup and what load rating are the tires?

 

This is is how the tie rods look like.
If they were the rack and pinion bushing, do you think lowering it and reducing the size of the tires would improve it?

 

It is not that old. Approximately 20000 miles. The truck has 72000. I used to live in Florida and only drove locally. I rarely took the highway. So, I only drove between 30 mph and 55 mph. But I moved to Texas a few months ago and now it's all spressway.

 

I would recommend 3rd Gen off-road shocks/coils for the front and general spring HD leaf packs for the rear. I currently did all 3rd gen off-road takeoffs front and back and my Tacoma drives great, but if I could do it again I’d go with general springs in the rear.

 

Sounds good! I like the option of the General springs in the rear. They look like good quality! I could leave the bilstein's with the 883's which give me about 1.5 of lift in the front and remove the spindles which are 4 inches. Then I can lower the tires size from 285 to 265. Thanks for input, bro!

 

That tie rod angle is actually really good, it's almost parallel with the LCA. Those spindles were well designed. Maybe just drop back to the 265 tire size to get it completely even, but I'm not sure if that would fix the issue. Try getting under and shifting the rack around where it mounts to the frame to see if the seem loose or not.