suspension?!!!

i have a 2000 tacoma prerunnerand i need suspension suggestions! i’m kinda new to the tacoma thing but i really need new suspension front and rear, bushings, coils etc.

my intentions for my truck is to do some small off-roading, nothing crazy lol i want something that will absorb good when i go off-road and give a good ride on the street

thanks for any suggestions!

 

All depends on your budget. If you don't want to spend a lot, the Bilstien 5100s are by far the best bang for your buck for a suspension upgrade. The fronts are evne adjustable you you can give it a bit of a lift (and match the rear with an add-a-leaf or shackle). A set of 4 5100s is like $350

The downside to the "budget" shocks is compromise. They are valved more for offroad, however their on road ride at least for me was a huge upgrade over my factory TRD shocks.

If you want the best of both worlds (on and off road) and have a money tree in your yard, go for King or Fox coilovers. They have linear dampening which means it gets stiffer as the shock starts to bottom out.

My Kings are buttery smooth on the road, and they off road they are just, yeah, well, they're really nice... But that's a lot of money to throw at "nothing crazy" off roading...

 

Slight highjack here.
Would this be a good starting point for looking into buying Kings?

https://www.filthymotorsports.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=KING-25001-151T

So about $3,860.00 to get into something nice? Man, Deavers are expensive. Could you skip the $875 Deavers and get a 1.5" AAL? That saves quite a bit of money.

 

thanks man, the info helps! will look into them

 

Omg Kings ... if you have the budget go that route you wont be disappointed

 

Go with Kings and be done with it

 

I have the extended travel Kings, essentially the ones from this link (from a different vendor). I did total chaos UCAs and the Kings first, and left my rear the same old crappy OEM leafs, 5100s, and a lift shackle.

Going with nice stuff like that you either have to sell blood and ... nvm... or go at it in pieces like I did. Next will be Deavers, and depending on how clapped out my 5100s are, may go Kings if I can, or just another set of 5100s (the wheeling I've done with this current set up the 5100s aren't a *terrible* match for the Kings in front. It is still totally driveable...)

So yeah, nice stuff costs a lot. Just be honest with yourself as to (most importantly) your budget, but also think about if you really "need" that nice of suspension. I bet 90% of the people you see on the street rolling with King or Fox etc... don't really "need" them, and I bet 50% wouldn't even notice if you switched their shocks out for Monroes and painted them blue, lol...


Here's an explanation I wrote up about why I did what I did, and what I would recommend to others in a similar situation:

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads...-2004-4x4-doublecab-trd.622208/#post-21220173

 

Try switching me to Monroe’s lol, I would notice 100 feet away, and the ride over the first bump would taddle on ya man!, cmon... If you can’t tell that you have those on you should sell them. We’re you the chap I had to pull out from under my wheelwell in Valencia? JK I know it wasn’t you but someone was making out with my front shocks, lol, weirdos.

 

Well obviously you'd have to paint the Monroes to LOOK like Kings... I'm just saying that seems like many people with nice shocks have them because of the brolander factor (instagram clicks), and likely wouldn't notice (let alone take advantage of) the performance. You can usually tell by the armor-all tires and the hi-lift on the RTT rack with stock bumpers and no skids.

They were doing WHAT to your shocks? lol

 

Some squid was damn near making out with my front suspension, his face was an inch away from the shock(half his body was in my wheelwell), as I was walking way out in the parking lot... The guy was probably a tweaker he looked beat, and his T4R was beat as hell too. I tapped him on his shoulder and he got to speaking like Bill Cosby, this is concerning because later I felt the shock on drivers side sloppy, was missing nitrogen about 50 LBS! A member on here helped me check and refill it and it hasn’t happened since so it’s not leaking. This dude was probably screwing my valve cap back on my shock, I wish I had some James Bond type shit under there because I was only away from my truck 10 minutes. Damned if you parked close, (shopping carts), damned if you park far away, (thieves). If we weren’t in an age of cameras and camera phones I would have kicked him in his nuts from behind so damn hard, lmfao. I would have been polite and showed him the suspension if he didn’t help himself, and look and act tweakish.

 

Who's worried about shopping carts in a trail rig? The only thing they could hit is tire or slider.

 

The other thing you gotta factor is rebuilding race shocks, if you aint about that life then kings aren't for you

 

Me, I don’t run sliders and had a shopping cart smash my door in at a Stater Bros, the one day I parked closer. A little ding I get it but full on door damage like a car hit me where someone left their cart, no good. Even in a trail rig.

 

For some guys. It’s nice to be only 80 miles from King and have friends there that rebuild em for cost. Only needed 1 rebuild in eight years and it was when I got them, the front had a leak on one side from King and they were more than happy to fix it free. Never had an issue only changed to stiffer springs.. Btw it’s less to rebuild than even buy 5100’s, so there’s that. Buy once Cry once. Plus if you stop bye there you can get a ton of King stickers for free usually.

 

I guess if you live down the street from them that makes things easier, half the shops here don't even know what kings are.

 

Dang that sucks

 

Fox recommends servicing every 10,000 for street only use (1,000 for mix street/off road, 500 for race) and a total rebuild every 50k (10k mixed use, 1k for race). King says every other year for mixed use.

Prices I've seen are ~ $100 a shock for a rebuild for us normal folks who don't have a friend that works at King.

So, in the 6 years I had my 5100s (as a daily driver/weekend offroader), I would have needed 3 sets of rebuilds @ ~$200 each time. Since a pair of 5100s cost ~$170, I could buy a pair of 5100s every other year and still spend less than just the maintenance that Kings require, let alone the cost of the shocks themselves.

I can stretch out the rebuild intervals on my Kings, but that's only because it isn't my daily driver anymore.

 

I got you but I don’t drink the coolaid lol, I really don’t buy into a rebuild unless I feel something is off or have a blown seal. I’ve gotten my certs for rebuilding WP long travel for KTM and went to the race tech classes to learn the dark arts, the thing is nowadays we all use synthetic oils now and they rarely break down. I could see service on Kings on a long travel as it cycles further but like you stated which is correct most cannot get to the level of needing Kings because they won’t flex and articulate them to use them fully, but in that case where you barely off-road once a month they could easily go 5+years without any fiddling. Yes these aren’t for the faint hearted because a spring swap alone is very hard without using the Branick spring compression machine that I have and just springs being swapped bye someone else could potentially cost big. I feel if you have the money and want them they are great but are more of a lifetime part if treated properly than a Bilstien or oh Gawd Monroe.

 

Look into Bilstein 6112 they are a 2.6 body shock and are super adjustible and ride super smooth.