Tucson Shop Locations

Do any local Tuscon people know of a trust worthy place to modify my tacoma? I just moved down here for UofA and want to get some mods done but don't know who to trust! I need to know that I can trust them because I don't know very much about modifing trucks and I'm looking into getting a set of coils and add a leaf. I also want to modify my sound system later down the road and get body armor, front and back bumper.

Much appreciated!
Nathan

 

Honestly, I just moved here as well, so I don't really know of anyone off hand. But there there is a shop here called Desert Rat, that I heard does pretty good. And Welcome BTW. I live on UA campus.

 

installing AALs and shocks are easy. let me know if you need help and want to save money by installing yourself.

 

Yea, myself as well. I have done the basics and saturday I am heading up to north Phoenix to a U-FIX-IT shop which is pretty cool, to do my suspension upgrade. It just sucks having to drive that far. Honestly, we can do your shocks and AAL stuff in the driveway. Especially since its cooling off now.

Welcome to Tucson, I/we are always looking for more people to do meets and just get together and hang. There are a couple events coming up, one down here in Tucson going up the backside of Mt Lemon. Plus I am always down to explore and find new places or re-discover old ones. If your ever bored hit me up and I am down to go explore.

BTW, What are you going to U of A for?

 

Plus, dont buy your suspension from the local shops. You will pay a ton more, get onto the vendor section and get your stuff from them. Great discounts and service. I would recomend AllPro, Down South Motorsports, and Toytec (not a sponsor but still good priced suspension parts).

Also, just a word of advice, stay away from spacer lifts. For the same price you can get better suspension components and will be 100 times happier.

Nathan, come check out my truck, see how it rides/feels, etc. I have most of what you want done already. Come see how mine rides before friday and you can see what the Bilstien 5100's + Eibach springs & TSB rear leaf + Toytec AAL + 5100's feel like. Zombie will tell you, my truck rides really comfortable and I get about 2" of lift all around with no need for upper control arms. I can fit 285/75-16 tires with minimal rubbing after some trimming. After friday I am remove all that stuff and going with high end fox racing suspension, upper control arms, and more so I am not sure how it will sit and ride.

Let me know if you want to get together this week. I am free most evenings.

 

Thanks for all the quick responses! I am glad to see that there are active members in Tucson. I was actually looking into that posting for the trip to Mt. Lemon and was going to see if i could make it but I have been kept pretty busy with school all the raging and.. sometimes studying.

Thanks for advice on getting better deals extremachn and if I do decide to instal it myself Andrew ill def. take you up on that offer! I just get a little skeptical doing something like that, my taco is my baby .

And extremachn, I was actually looking into fox racing suspension, but i was also looking at Kings.

this build is something that I've been looking into a lot. http://www.tacomaworld.com/forum/members/sandman427.html

 

BTW i am studying Pre-Business currently, I'm a freshman, and want to studying business management in Eller College.

What year are you Zombie?

 

Welcome to TW. I live in Tucson and go to the U of A myself. If you need a hand installing the lift, I can help you out. I have helped a few TW members install their lifts.

 

I think between the 3-4 of us there is no need for you to go to a shop. All we need is a place to wrench.

 

x2. And some cold drinks.

 

sounds good to me, i just gotta find what i want and order it online!

 

I just got done replacing my entire suspension today (with help from the Phoenix crew) and was suprised how easy it actually is. UCA's, coils, leafs, shocks, etc. Its just time consuming and best with at least 2 people. Smetimes you have to bend tab A to make bolt B fit into slot C and bolt it all onto D before installed E but all in all its really not that bad, pretty straight forward.

 

Yea man, do it all yourself with help from the AZ crew... you'll get better work and we're more oriented toward working on our vehicles than most shops are anyway.

Come out to some of the meets and you can probably see a lot of the hardware you're looking at... like Chaz said he has the Fox's on (almost identical to my setup minus the rear 2.0's he has are different than my 2.0's). I have the AllPro front/rear bumpers on also if you want to see them in person as well. Look forward to meeting you sometime!

 

Im curious whether or not the all pro front and rear bumpers have a noticeable effect on the gas mileage, because I'm really considering investing in both.

By the way i really like your build, its pretty much identical to what I'm going for, and i noticed that you took off the front mud flaps, do you like it without them? One of my front ones came off while offroading and i have had time to put it back on, but i was thinking about just removing my other front one anyway. What are the pros/cons you've noticed?

 

I just live on campus in one of the dorms, my wife is the one who runs it.

 

Okay here is the Lift that I am currently considering:
Front Shocks:

• FOX Shox 2.5" Remote Reservoir Coil-overs (05+ Tacoma)

Rear Shocks:

• 2.0 Rear Fox Shox

AAL:

• Standard Duty Rear Leaf Springs (Pair) - 3" lift

or

• "Expedition" Heavy Duty Rear Leaf Springs (Pair) - 3" lift

w/ a U-Bolt Kit but idk what i need yet, havn't done enough research and i don't know very much about this stuff.

I have the money to do the lift, but i don't have enough to replace my tires yet and i didn't know if they were too small for this lift but I'm assuming they'll look funny haha.
I don't know the size of my Original tires they are the stock ones that come with the TX Package. I'll have to check next time I get a chance.

Here is what i want to upgrade too:
BF Goodrich Mud Terrain T/A KM2 285/75/R16 will my 16" rims fit in these?

The lift says it can range from 1-3.5" and its adjustable, I want to make it a 3" lift until i get some ALLPRO bumpers then lift it higher depending on how much it weighs it down.

 

Hi all, I live and operate a custom shop in Tucson, AZ called BSG. You can check out the shop site here, http://www.bsgtucsoncustoms.com

Feel free to give me a call with any questions at 520 261 2741

Lots of the stuff on the website is 2wd but we also do lots of offroad stuff and we are all Toyota fans.

 

Hey dude, I like my setup personally so yea those are pretty good parts

The tires will fit on your current rims (presuming the same spec as the standard TRD Off-Road which I think it is). However, you'll need some spidertrax or allpro hub centric spacers to make up the width difference. Or, get proper 4.5" backspaced 16" rims like I did and no spacers are needed.

As for the mud flaps, all mine are off. The front are too low for off-roading and get ripped off anyway... as did my rear with the 285's while on my last run at Chiva Falls... I took the other off before it got ripped off too lol. Personally I love the look without them though eventually I'm sure the 5-0 will flag me for it... eh.

As for gas millage... the bumper itself didn't seem to really do much as I could still get like 17.8 or so average with about 3/4 highway, around 16.8 about 60 city 40 highway. After the lift and heavier KM2's and such I dropped down to like 14.2ish and stopped tracking. Since then I've put the DOM Avid Off-Road sliders (heavy... just the way I ordered them haha) and the rear bumper and such... but I don't monitor the MPG's anymore lol.


If you want to man, I can take you for a ride in my truck sometime so you can get a feel for it... maybe even run out to Butcher Jones in it or something and you can feel it off-road if ya like before dropping coin.

Edit: note I have a really really heavy foot on the gas... so take my millage for a grain of salt because I drive it like I did my G35 lmao

 

Come on down here again Jake and we can run Chiva falls again and Chimney Rock and he can ride both our trucks since they are set up pretty much the same. I just need to get my fan shroud fixed, its flopping around and has been busted by my fan so the engine is running hotter. Not a good thing.

 

Hmm i don't have the dough for the tires yet anyway, especially with new rims. But i can get the lift kit. Im curious whether or not my tires will look goofy with a 3" lift though

I also have a pretty heavy foot but if i don't get the bumpers id like to, at the very least put in some sliders and I'm def. going to get a lift because my clearance has been shitty, my brother's fj goes over rocks so much easier just cause of the shorter wheel base i think and he has stock everything.

But i don't like rocky areas very much anyway i like open dirt, mud, and forest the best.

I noticed a posting about Mt. Lemon this saturday or something but didn't get time to read all 9 pages.

What is the general gist of whats goin down, I'm down to take a day to go romping but don't wanna get into anything thats gonna require high clearance and

Also, whats the terrain going to be like?