Eibach coils with Bilstein 5100's?

Keith, when you use the 5100 front shocks they are designed to be used with your factory coils. A standard wound Eibach coil isn't compatible with the spring seat on the 5100's, only the factory coil fits. We might be able to get a product from ToyTec that uses the Bilstein 5100 strut and they put an adjustable spring seat compatible with the Eibach type coil and they have a couple of different coil rate choices.

This from a vendor in regards to a query about possibility of getting a set of 5100's already set up with the Eibach 16" / 600# coils. So I would not have to try to get access to a spring compressor to put them together. Any advice on a similar setup that anyone has used and is happy with? I installed the hellwig 1500# helper springs on the back today to help with towing stability and heavy loads in the back which kicked up the stern about another 1.5" or so. Now the truck is pretty much visibly not level. Also I want to eliminate body roll in turns. For what I use my truck for I don't need it lifted and don't want to change driveline angles any more than absolutely necessary. I don't think a couple of inches more in the front would hurt too much but I don't want to go any more than that.

Any advice or thoughts on this would be appreciated.

 

Eibach's sit in the strut/shock the same way as the stock coil does. This is what they are designed to do. Since the 5100's are designed to work with the stock spring, they should be fine with the Eibach's.

The Eibach's work well in the stock TRD shocks, I have been running them for about 3 months and couldn't be happier.

 

I have a set of 5100s and Eibachs assembled; they fit fine. I have no idea why they suggest these will work with stock shocks; if you search http://www.fjcruiserforums.com/forums/ you'll find an excellent thread on a test FJ Cruiser that ran these on factory shocks. After a day of extensive wheeling, the springs had busted the shocks.

 

If you're doing serious offroading you should be upgrading your shocks with any new spring. Stiffer springs will put more stress on the re-bound dampening on the shock.Myself, I just hit the odd fireroad for mountian biking or hiking. So the stock shocks have been good and reliable.

 

After doing a lot of research and thinking about this I think I might just wait a while and get some good struts and the TC uca's. If I go into the front end might as well do the uca's at the same time. No problems using the TC uca's with minimal lift?

 

http://www.trdparts4u.com/PD-TTAFCS-7005-S.aspx?MakeID=1

OK here is where the 5100's with 700# Eibach springs already assembled can be had! Just what I was looking for. They are not cheap though.

 

You can run TC UCAs with stock shocks/springs - it will be fine.

To be honest, the 5100s with the Eibach Pro Kit springs is a better deal than that Toytec kit. The only thing you are really gaining is the ability to crank the coils. A 700lb/in coil is pretty heavy duty too; figure a stock TRD has 540lb/in coils and the Eibach Pro Kit is running at 620lb/in. Unless you have a pretty heavy duty bumper, that's going to be too much.

 

Yeah probably right...thinking about those 700# coils and they are too much since I don't have any immediate plans to put any accessories on the front like a winch or bumper etc. Good advice. But I was wondering if the stock coils on 5100's effectively do stiffen up the front due to the stiffer valving? May be the best course to go with stock coils and the 5100's.

 

Well, if you leave the 5100s at the factory height, the ride will be firmer due to the more aggressive valving, but not too much. I ran a set on my 2002 Tacoma for a while and was pretty happy with them. I never used them for lift (went with Icons), but I imagine if you raised the spring perch at all it would stiffen up the ride. The other option is to run an OME setup with the light-duty coils (884 for 2005+ Tacomas). You'll get about an inch of lift and the spring is rated at 590lbs.

You can see the different coil spring ratings for the OMEs here: http://www.tacoma-upgrade.com/2009/...old-man-emu-spring-rates-and-lift-height.html

 

Thanks for the link. Nice to find options to what I had been considering.

 

Well I decided to get the 5100's and re-use the stock coils. If I set the pre-load to under 2" will this require an alignment?

 

Probably a good idea. Firestone does a Lifetime alignment for about 150 bones....Pretty good deal.

 

When I get the new shocks installed, is it necessary to use the sway bar relocators or does it clear OK?