2004 Taco Owner, First Timer

What's up y'all!

My name's Zack and I wanted to introduce myself before I started posting hundreds of threads whose questions have been answered (Kidding, kidding). I just picked up a 2004 Base Tacoma, non-prerunner as my daily and to haul my dirtbike, mountain bike, and occasional harley service trip (Its natural state). It's a plain jane, no frills, no power nothing Tacoma (Honestly, its kind of endearing). No ABS, no side airbags, nothing at all.

As of now, my focus is to gut the interior, dynamat the cab, swap my 60/40 bucket for some 2nd gen 4runner seats, spray-on bedliner, new front rotors/pads, and replace the front struts/rear shocks, and probably put a mild audio system in there. The previous knucklehead owner put some Firestone ride rite air bag system on the back for heavier loads, but i think he did that because the shocks are blown as shit. They don't seem to be leaking oil however, could they still be blown?

My question for you guys is this:

What shocks will bring the rear back to the comfiest ride possible? Is it worth it for a base truck to get the Bilstein 5100's or just stick with OEM ones from Camelback Toyota?

The ride rides really rough; could it be cause by the air bags? I know you have to dump the bump stops for the rear end to fit the bags in there, so I was wondering if all of the bumps i feel is the axle hitting something other than the stop.

And of course, I had to get some pics for ya!!

 

Welcome!

 

Hi Scott, thanks for replying!

A resounding ZERO psi when I bought it but I bumped it up to 40 when I took her out this morning, I might try bumping it up to 60-70 psi, but at 40 there was literally no difference. Kinda frustrating.

I'm not a fan of the bags and I personally don't have anything that weighs enough for them to be warranted; I think I'll pull them off this weekend and replace with bump stops. Fortunately it looks like the half assed engineer I bought this from didn't cut into the frame, strictly bolt on as far as I can see.

 

Welcome to TW!

 

Howdy

 

Welcome to TW!!

 

Welcome aboard. You forgot the pics of the rest of the truck

 

Hey Y'all,

So having a preeeeety shitty day right now. Went to go detail the wheels and tires and found a rust spot on each side of the frame rails north of the sway bar. Come to find out, this spot weld has cracked and is has play on what looks to be the front bumper support. For reference, this is on exactly both sides and is cracked in the exact same location.

I've attached some pictures for reference, but just wanted to know if this is something that can be fixed with a weld or am i turbo-fucked right now

 

This leaf looks out of place, possibly an add a leaf to lift the rear. That would also cause a stiff ride.

 

Eatsleeptacos, i think that's a great catch. I'll take a picture today, but it looks like my truck sits higher than most of the others base sr5s, so I'll try to confirm how many leafs were stock in the pack. Anybody know where I'd start looking for that info?

 

Im not sure where you could find that info for sure, but on my base sr5, Im fairly certain I only had two leaves and one overload, although it could've been three like yours and one overload. There is for an add-a-leaf there though. That wouldn't help a bumpy ride.

 

Here's a quick pic of the stance, the more I look at it, the more I think there has to be an extra leaf in there:

Side Note: I ordered a set of Bilsteins after reading rave reviews on the site, can't wait to see how it handles after I'm done undoing the hack job from the last guy

 

Welcome