Help!! My tires rub my fender! 285/75/16 on an 02 Tacoma

Try and tweak your alignment a little bit move the caster as far forward as you can while still maintaining good cross caster and camber should give you some more wiggle room

 

thanks for appreciating muh junk

yeah had 285's... now have 295's

the 285's will require irreversable modification to the firewall
and fender(s) interior/liner (especially the front wheel well trailing edges
and possibly the forward side of the rear fenders)
pinch weld flattening alone... won't be enough for wheelin'
but you could maybe get by on the street.
seems kinda silly to me tho'

see... the deal is...
that in order to put larger tires on,
the tire/wheel combo need clear the fender's interior,
while allowing for the factory range of suspension motion (travel),
and be able to steer fully L/R to lock while articulating.

kinda sucks, even on the street,
if your tire stuffs into the fender well
and gets locked 'da fark up

Now if you installed stilts... and they didn't compress/rebound
then you'd have no worries

A suspension lift by itself will not be enough to completely clear 285's.
at least not if the suspension geometry/travel is correctly maintained.
The 4WD Tacoma should not have the suspension lifted in excess of 2.5"

so it's either a 1" body lift or tub the cab's foot well area

I utilize a 1" body lift in addition to a 2 1/2" suspension lift.
just barely cleared the 285's at full compression, max L/R steer. lock
I have 16 X 8 - 4" BS'd wheels (muh 295's would work better with 3.75")

295's are my latest challenge
tubb'ing may be the only real solution

 

1 inch body lift? Where'd you find a 1 inch?

 

yes

 

http://www.4crawler.com/4x4/ForSale/BodyLiftKit.shtml

 

You don't have a 3" lift


You can fit these easy with a tiny bit of cutting and trimming. I'm gonna have to agree you bought stuff without doing proper research. You can't run a 33" tire without cutting a bit of something.

35s require cutting the full fire wall and reweld ing it. You do not have to do that. Just cut the pinch weld off and then a bit if fend and then beat on the rear with a hammer.

It'll be fine.

If you don't want to cut a small bit of metal off the truck...get smaller tires.

 

Cut small amounts work your way up until it stops rubbing. Start with the pinch weld and cut out the liners with a knife or basic snips just lock to lock first and work your way up. The beauty with bigger tires too is that they eventually make room for themselves.

 

I gotta start somewhere. You are right. I am just gonna trim as I go.

 

Just curious, where did you get your information that the Tacoma should not be lifted in excess of 2.5"? Is this true even if I have the 1" differential drop kit?

 

the 2.5" lift limit isn't "law" or anything, it is just a target range before you start encountering issues with CV angles, alignments, balljoints.

The diff drop is debated as to whether it really even helps. I won't go into that here.

FWIW, I have slightly over 2.5" of lift on my truck in the front with the 882 OME coils and a 10mm trim packer. I too have a diff drop. Maybe I've been lucky but I haven't had and issues. But I have a similar size tire to you and I rub even after some trimming. I'll be doing more soon.

 

What do you mean by "simliar tire size"? Your tires looks huge compared to mine. Can you be more specific because I am only rubbing about 0.250-0.500" radially which indicates to me that I am going to probably have to increase my vertical distance by .350-.707" to get the clearance I need.

If your tire is bigger in diameter than mine, the amount by which I need to lift my vehicle can be pretty significant because I really can only lift me vechicle up by another 0.5" with the coil spacer.

Did you do any fender mods?

Thanks

 

Your are about a 33x11 tire his are 33x12.5

The extra width makes it rub a bit more.

But just start cutting. Took me 4 times

 

Our tires are the same diameter for all intents and purposes. Some slight width difference.

Bottom line is you're going to either need more lift, or a decent amount of cutting. And address the rub only for driving on the street is only going to get you halfway there. Once you get it offroad and flex it out with the wheels turned you're going to be rubbing even more.

Your best plan of attack would be to get the front of the truck on jack stands, pull the coilover, put the tire back on the truck and use a jack to fully stuff each side of the front suspension. Turn the wheel to full lock and see where it rubs at full lock and full stuff. That's where you need to cut and keep cutting or punding with a hammer until the tire doesn't hit any more.


.....or get smaller tires.

 

Thanks for the input! That is exactly what I needed to know. I am going with that plan!

 

Would you mind posting some pics of the fender mods you did to fit your 285s on there?

Your truck is in my Top 3 favs on here!

 

Well, yer mostly right

it is purdy much set in stone, if considering the factory susp. geometry.
Max susp. lift is dictated by the setting of the alignment specifications
when the oem UCA/BJ assemblies are utilized there are limits.

but there are exceptions to many rules...

if one wished to increase their susp. lift to say 2.75"
they would need utilize aft.mkt. upper control arms W uni-b's
The aft. mkt. UCA's compensate for more lift
while still being able to maintain the proper alignment specifications.

I would never exceed 2.75" even with aft.mkt. UCA's W uni-b's. (JMO)
A good thought here is to have at least a 60/40 travel range with your CO

Not saying you can't go higher...
but the factory suspension geometry and components might complain

* diff drop kits are a waste of money and do little to nothing.
they might even do more harm then good

-----------------

I was in jury duty all day...
so that's muh excuse for everything

 

Hate to disagree with you Dell but I know for a fact that my truck is somewhere in the 2.75" -3" lift range in the front and I'm still using the factory UCA's. Upper balljoints have been fine for 3+ years. It also is aligned to proper specs.

Maybe I have an oddball truck but it is what it is.

 

it's alright if you feel the need to disagree.

Did you install your suspension when your truck was brand new
with zero miles on it ?

If I remember correctly...
I commented once on your lift...
referencing that I thought your lower control arms
were somewhat elevated (increased angle).
so the thought in my mind was that you have less then a 60/40 travel...
and that you may have less down travel (droop) because of that.

But you assured me I was wrong then too.

it's cool... I really don't care what others do.
I'm just trying to advise folk against pushing things
to a point of causing other issues.

I have a 13 year old tacoma that's been wheel'd hard...
and still sports all the original components/hardware...
'cept the lousy rack... which needs replacing more then I like

My additional lift is primarily the reason why the rack fails prematurely.
I'm averaging a rack replacement every 3 years or so,
and that's with only 2.0 - 2.5" of susp. lift.

durability and consumable life use is a key consideration in muh book
I'll suppose not everyone cares to think that way.

I have to make muh junk survive the final years of muh life.
so I don't need to aggravate matters anymore then need be.

 

IMO, the real message here is that there are consequences to lifting and running larger that stock tires.

This is a bit misleading. Yes, It is possible to get it aligned to "factory specification" but you have to remember those specs were written for a stock height truck.

After adding 2.5" of lift it will be possible to align it "good enough" to where you will not see unusual tire wear, specifically, good Toe and Camber settings, assuming upper and lower control arm bushings, ball joints and tie rod ends are not worn out.

However, running the Caster setting within the factory spec on a lifted truck leaves a lot to be desired. Unless you don't care or don't notice the steering issues that come up from a lack of caster.

The consequence of adding lift is the loss of Caster adjustment for the wheel alignment. The solution to this is aftermarket UCAs that add about 2 degrees of caster. The consequence of this is that adding caster puts the front wheel closer to the pinch weld area forcing even more clearancing.