wi_taco 2015 TRD OffRoad build "The Gray Ghost"

Some miscellaneous odds and ends to keep this rolling along:

Ordered new LCAs Thursday last week before the Memorial Day weekend and they showed up on Tuesday. Never even got a tracking number. Bizarre but crazy fast, I've never got something that quickly through any Simplepart dealers online. Weather looks good for the weekend and I have another alignment scheduled with my preferred shop on Monday. Time to get right and dial this in. [Part numbers: Left =

$348 48069-04040 Suspension Arm Sub Assembly

48069-04040. Right =

$363 48068-04040 Suspension Arm Sub Assembly

48068-04040]



Here's the one new eccentric assembly for the passenger side forward-most location that I need to cut out. Why do the online shippers always have to put a sticker on bolts and sleeves exactly in the worst possible place? So dumb. [Part numbers: Bolt = 90119-A0166, Eccentric Sleeve = 48409-60020, Eccentric Nut =

$29 48452-35020 Suspension Adjust Cam

48452-35020; Full list/diagram here]



I noticed my adjuster bolt also has red threadlocker already pre-applied but much of it has melted & run off down the bolt only on one side. The opposite face of this bolt is completely clean. Going to clean it up and reapply my own. Interestingly I didn't really see any red locker on the OEM bolts from my 2015 so either it all wore off or they only started adding this later on. Could explain why some people swear by torquing them over the 100 ft/lb spec to keep the alignment true. Hmm...



Bought another fuel filler cap (77300-07010) because they originally sent me the wrong part a few months back and I didn't catch it. This is such a small nit-picky thing but I want it to be correct damnit! Now I can sleep soundly tonight.



Side-by-side comparison of the correct "E10" cap on the left and the incorrect "E85" cap on the right. Both are the same size and fit perfectly. I just absolutely want that to be correct. Nobody drives my truck but me, however heaven forbid I let my family use it one time and I bet they would put in the wrong fuel. I ain't taking no chances!



Another very small, stupid, and mostly insignificant thing. I lost one of the plastic rear bumper bolt covers (

$11 51999-04030 Receiver Hitch Cap

51999-04030) a few months back. I was getting sick of looking at this every time I go into the bed. Expensive stupid piece of plastic but again it will help me sleep soundly for whatever that's worth.



New cap installed. Looks silly being all new and shiny, I need to get it sun faded ASAP. I also need to order an aftermarket bumper whenever all this other stuff stops breaking unexpectedly (shoot for what those LCAs cost I could've bought one).



Was crawling around under the rear end to inspect the recent lift install. New Deaver springs are immediately showing surface rust between the leaves. Kicking myself because I knew I should have broken them down and gave them a better paint job but didn't have time. Not a big deal, once I get the lift setup dialed in I'm dousing them in Woolwax which should solve that for a good long while.



One major issue that I wanted to inspect was the rear shock lower eyelets. On install at full axle droop I was running into problems with that large part of the eyelet hitting the shock mount. Here is the rear passenger side at ride height - no problems but it's close and gets worse at full droop.



Here is the rear driver side at ride height - no problems but it's VERY close and from previous photos confirmed it touches at full droop.



Here's the rear shock shaft showing a small wear pattern for travel. I've babied it since installation because of my LCA problems but even still everything is so stiff right now it doesn't move much. That clean area is probably 3 inches tall. I'm realizing now that my Archive yellow bump stops will probably never engage (I chose them because originally I was going to do a midtravel relocation) so I might need to flex things out and re-measure for different bumps. Hooray more money to spend!



Another oddity is this bag of bolts and spacers that came with the Fox suspension upgrades. Not sure what all of this is for...skid plate spacing? Optional stuff for people with KDSS? Going to send to the vendor for more answers. Not a big deal just weird and not really any mention of this in the install guide but that is a Fox document so who knows. (Update from the future: yes these are extra pieces for different vehicles, just set aside and don't use them. I put them back in the Fox box and now stored in my garage rafters.)



More new fun stuff to come after I'm done tweaking the suspension to get everything happy again. Need to get exhaust re-route squared away too so I can install the skid plates for +500 Broverlander points. Too many projects, not enough time.

 

06/04/22: Here's the first halfway decent post-lift photo to show lift height from the side. Best I got because it seems zero parking lots are level in my area. So here's what it looks like at the pizza place before I start tearing it apart again to install new LCAs and adjust spring preload.



Before adjusting I took measurements the best way I know how: laser level on a jack stand and a tape measure. This is harder to photograph one-handed than it appears. Front left = 23.75", front right = 24", Rear left and right = 24.75". Front has less than 2.5" droop from ride height. No bueno. (Stock heights are approximately front = +/-20.5" and rear = 22" so this is over 3" up front and near 3" out back, yikes!)



Predictably at this amount of lift the CV boot angles are not looking happy. Ball joints and tie rod ends were also weeping some grease.



Inner boots look very stressed. I need to help them to be happy again.



Mounted up the Branick 7400 spring compressor. Forgot this thing weighs 100 lbs. Glad I don't have to do that again. Tested out using the prior Bilstein 6112 assemblies and it works pretty darn good.



Pulled the Fox shocks and measured - something I should have done first like a smart person. No surprise the 14" springs are preloaded to 11" giving too much lift and leading to less than ideal ride quality. All previous things I read said they are usually set by default around 2" lift from Fox. That's on me and I should have checked this before installation.



Decided to splurge on the Fox preload wrench when I bought everything. My bank account may be crying but I feel like a real OG.



Decided to adjust springs at driver = 12" and passenger 12.25" as it seems driver needs a touch more to avoid the Taco Lean. Later after driving around the block a couple times I pulled the driver assembly again and adjusted up another 1/16" to 1/8" to even it out.



Coilover assembly in the Branick compressor. It is 100% true you cannot tell lift height by exposed threads. Driver side definitely has more threads on the body, they are not the same from what I was seeing. By the end of Saturday night I had the shock heights pretty well set for now.



Sunday morning and time to pull the UCAs and wrap this up. Diablo demon carbide blade again made short work of this job. Didn't even need to finish cutting that left side before the inner sleeve freed up and dropped out.



LCA came out easily after cutting the frozen sleeve/bushing. Fairly quick and easy to leave everything else assembled. Not completely necessary but I jammed a piece of 2x4 between the spring and UCA to give it some support.



My frozen LCA bushing was torched by the alignment shop and the paint was looking kind of rough. Hit the area with a wire brush and threw a quick spray of black paint for protection. I'll cover it all in Woolwax later to stop rust.



Not many pictures of the work because it's boring but here is everything assembled again including new tie rod ends (45046-09340) that I bought a while back. So as of 111k miles nearly everything on the front end is new.



So as I was finishing up the work, my parents arrived in town from New Mexico. My dad decided to stop by and check out progress with my grandpa. It was good catching up and bs'ing but cost me a couple hours. I wrapped things up around 2am and had to drop off for alignment before 8am. The problem is that I usually bring my bicycle along for this and the weather was looking angry. So I dropped it off at about 2:30am and took a very solemn morning ride home.



Edit 7/15/22: Forgot to add an "after" photo of my CV angles from when I adjusted the new Fox coilovers down. Looking much more healthy now. I still need to go re-measure the hub to fender - it seems to have drooped some from break-in but could just be an optical illusion.

 

06/06/22: Alignment #2 completed after the recent changes and UCA fixes. This was done at my preferred shop and I completely trust the guy, he does great work. I asked for 3-3.5* caster, 0 camber, and 0.03 toe (Edit: Also it's my fault but I should have asked for 0.03 toe each side, not total; still works fine but next time an extra tenth will do better). He got it extremely close and it drives great again. The only thing I don't know is what position the SPC balljoints are set at now but it doesn't matter (I think it's position E but not completely sure).

 

For piece of mind, I ran my 3in lift with the boots looking like your's for 10yrs before a failure.

 

Good to know thanks! These do seem more durable than others I've seen in the past (looking at you, my old Chevy Blazer/S10) but now that I turned the preload back down CV boots are much happier so hopefully I don't have to worry about it. I just should have measured the preload like a smart person would have before throwing them in. Time crunches suck.

 

06/08/22: Thus far I've had 3 x 70 lb sandbags in the bed to help break in the leaf springs. It doesn't seem to have made any difference in height or ride quality. Deaver stage 2s are stout. Removing now for the upcoming TacomaWorld weekend trip. More on that soon.



New sway bar bushings going in (48815-AD030). Old ones don't look too bad but I had these and the rest of my front end is new so might as well get everything done at once.



Sway bar reinstalled on the Fox relocation brackets. Also since I had it up on stands I measured the shock droop and after the preload adjustments I have well over 3" again. CV angles are much happier too. More details on measurements later.



I also made some paint marks on the eccentrics so in case they move I can put back into alignment and dabbed some torque seal on the bolts for another layer of visual indication.



Not pictured here is me doing a front diff oil change. It wasn't due but ever since I put in the ECGS bearing it was making a little noise around 40mph. No change after the fluid swap, I'm guessing it's a harmonic vibration versus wear but sample sent to Blackstone anyways for confirmation. Now that the maintenance is done I installed the RCI engine skid. Holy crap these things are beefy. Should protect everything for this weekend's adventures.



RCI transmission skid also installed, unfortunately I couldn't get a very good photo right now, don't have time to jack it up. You can kind of make out the catalytic converter guards tucked up there and hopefully should protect against tweaker thefts.



Last small task is modifying an OEM 4Runner jack (09111-35150) to work with Safe Jack aftermarket accessories (not my original idea, see here and here for more). Pretty simple really, just need to drill out the spot welds on the top pad...



I drilled more than necessary but couldn't tell until I had it off. Took some prying and convincing but popped off without much trouble.



Safe Jack 3 piece starter set fits perfectly. I was trying to avoid buying these and wanted to fab my own but ran into time constraints. Definitely good quality pieces and should be able to lift the truck now that I have it lifted with more travel.



Wrapped all this up the night before heading to northern Wisconsin for a TacomaWorld gathering on the Pipeline. Photos coming up next.

 

You know the OEM jack has a screw top like the old bottle jacks and that those safe jacks things should slide rite over the screw top,

mind you not the safest but it works in a pinch.

 

OEM Tacoma jack has a larger bore that doesn't fit the Safe Jack parts. 4Runner jack is smaller and has higher weight capacity (slightly) and fits Safe Jack bore perfectly.

 

Ok, just the last time I had mine out the screw top looked real small.


bye the way truck is looking good

 

Thanks man appreciate it! Trust me if I could have got the OE jack to work I wouldn't have wasted money buying a 4Runner one. They are close but no cigar. Surprisingly Toyota makes an astonishingly large number of jack variants.

 

Photos from last weekend's WI Pipeline trip. Duplicated over on the Wisconsin event page here. Proof that I don't only crawl to the mall! I'm too lazy to add details now, will probably edit this later and fill in details.



























Only shot I could get everyone in the same frame. Quality of the iPhone 13 Pro is okay-ish but clear difference to "real" camera.

Left to right (correct me where I'm wrong): @Camerasandcoffee , @Thatbassguy , @WiscoPat , @jstemp , @Taco-Grinder , @OldSchlPunk , @wi_taco , @pearing







Bonus: This is not the turtle we saw on the road, it's another turtle I found later. Turtles are cool though so whatevs.



Edit #2: Forgot about the tick I pulled when I got home. Little bastard just took a little bite but hadn't started drinking my blood yet. Gave him the Han Solo treatment in some packing tape.

 

Bringing over some additional photos courtesy of @Camerasandcoffee from the Wisconsin event thread here. Thanks for sharing, these are great and the first action shots I have!

Climbing up "Bro Rock", indisputable proof that I can make it past the mall parking lot. Suck on that, Jeeps!











Overhead drone shots of the group:

 

Good points about the jack. I was wondering if the stock jack was still useable with the lift. I like the safe jack solution especially if needed off road.
Being up one tire size the stock jack works fine on the axle. With the lift no way it will lift the front from the frame. The RCI skid can handle the weight. I lifted next to one of the mounting points.

 

Good to know thanks!

 

06/21/22: Front diff gear oil change at 111,676 which is just over 10k miles since last change. Why? Well, since installing the ECGS bushing I've had a harmonic "hum" around 40mph. Also part of the original needle bearing race broke off while removing, and while I think I got it all out I wanted a sanity check. There was quite a bit of "schmoo" on the magnetic drain plug but no more than I would expect to see. Looks like I should be OK for now but going to keep an eye on this.

 

07/08/22: Prior to the June trip I was trying to consider any weak points to avoid failures on the trail. One of the obvious liabilities is the OEM towing harness bracket. Ordered the Diaz Fabrication T.H.R.B. to get around this for now until I decide on a full plate aftermarket bumper. Unfortunately there was a delay in shipping so I didn't get it until after the trip but I'm installing it now for the future.



OEM towing adapter shown for reference later if I need to switch it back. It hangs slightly lower than the hitch receiver. Granted this is my daily so I'm a wimp offroad and not likely to hit anything this high but hey you never know.



Installation only takes a couple minutes. The stock bolts are replaced with button head hex bolts. Since only two bolts hold it to the receiver and because the bolts are smaller I used blue thread locker to keep it from falling off.



Slightly closer view showing clearance to the spare tire. Definitely going to have some things to figure out when I upgrade to 33's.



View from the back after installation. Much cleaner and more compact. I haven't towed anything yet and no immediate plans to, so for now just having it out of the way (but still accessible) is all I need.

 

Didn't realize you had a build thread. Awesome work!

Where did you get the spring compressor? I've been contemplating getting one.I have heavier coils that I would like to put in at some point.

 

Hey thanks man! Spring compressor was a Facebook marketplace find. Between FB and Craigslist they pop up sometimes but usually move fast. Definitely a luxury item but it has already saved my bacon doing work late on a Sunday night so for me it’s worth it.

 

Thats got to be the best way Ive ever seen to get a true height measurement with the laser level

About to do a similar front end refresh on mine with weekend

 

Ha thanks, necessity is the mother of invention. Took me longer than I'd like to admit to figure out using the laser even though it was almost jumping in my face from the workbench.

Good luck with your upgrades!