Anyone ran a tender spring?

My 1st gen has ADS coilovers with clickers & stiff 700lb springs (no extra weight up front). I tell people my ride gets real nice the faster I go. I'd like it to be nice all the time. Was looking at Eibach's offerings for another project and tender springs caught my eye.

Has anyone done this on a lifted taco, and more specifically, what ratio or tender spring rate did you go with?

 

Tender springs are more so for applications that go into negative preload at full extension. What length are your current coils and how much preload are on your coils now at full extension?

 

I think you're referring to helper springs. Tenders are supposed to reduce effective spring rate until they bind, so soft for the road, hard once you hit something.

I'd have to go measure to answer your questions, I let ADS set everything up on these, but the preload collar is only about 3/4-1" from the top

 

I don't know anyone personally running tender/helper springs. However, I would think coil selection and shim stack tuning would be the better option albeit more tedious. 700# is pretty overkill. I've got a 2nd gen with full skids, bumpers, winch (way heavier than yours) and I'm only running 500# coils. Also, coil preload is measured at the coil and not by amount of threads showing on the collar. For example say you have a 14" coil. With the coil installed at full droop the coil measures 13" meaning you have 1" of preload.

 

There isn't enough space to run a tender spring and dual rate hardware on OEM coilovers. Dual rate springs are only able to be used on 10" and up stroke shocks.

Go down to a 600 lbs spring and get the coilovers tuned, it will perform like you want.

 

I figured that's what you meant with preload, I'd have to measure.

This doesn't sound correct...
sure, it's possible the primary coil is too tall and would practically render the tender of little use but then the solution would be shortening the primary. I can't fathom a reason there'd be a shock length restriction...


ya I wish I'd gotten a lower rate spring, but either way I'd be buying new hardware at this point so I'd be up for trying the tender in conjunction unless it was unilaterally established to be a bad idea for some reason. Again, my real question is where to start with the rate for a practical ride experience

 

There isn't enough shock body space for the spring adjuster, coil divider and 2 coil springs. The tender spring your wanting to go with is such a low rate that it will never be used. They are there for 12-18" travel shocks to keep tension on the springs at full droop in a triple rate setup, not to support any actual vehicle weight. Dual rate is an awesome tuning tool but your stock width ET shocks do not have enough space to run it.

A 14x600 coil spring will swap onto your shocks without any other hardware to purchase, go to SDHQ and get 2 -3x14x600 Eibach's and swap them on. It will ride 100x better than the 700's.

https://sdhqoffroad.com/products/14-eibach-coilover-spring?variant=13617520541731

 

I just noticed Eibach only offers a 50lb/in in 3"ID with a block load of only 175lbs anyway, so I'd be going into plain dual springs terminology-wise.
What's the front of the truck weigh? Like 2000lbs? Divide by 2, 4 inch height on secondary spring, let's aim for 50% compression stationary.. SR/(700lb/in+SR)=1000lb/2in => 762lb/in spring, at 365lb/in for ~1inch of travel after accounting for coil size..? Eibach catalog maxes at 650lb/in for 4x3" springs w/2.32" travel so doing it backwards => 337lb/in for 1-(650/(650+750)) = 52% of compressive load => 1000lbs*52%@650lb/in ~ 0.74" compression, leaving 1.58" of travel on it. 48% goes to 700lb/in spring ~ also 0.74"; the only thing done adversely is add 4.0-2.32"= 1.68" of preload (2nd spring 'blocked'), which I can partially mitigate by moving my collar up all the way (again roughly an inch), or leaving me with ~0.75" of extra preload + the collar, so ~1.0".... that's my understanding of the math anyway

https://eibach.com/race-spring-search?diameter=3.00"+I.D.&length=4.00"&rate=&type=

https://eibach.com/product/SPACER300

 

Don't forget the coil spring divider.

https://agm-products.com/products/suspension-sliders

Give it a shot and let us know how it goes.

 

We have a tech article dedicated to tender coils that may help answer some questions. For a mid travel, even LT front kit on a Tacoma, Tender coils wont be necessary if set up properly.
https://accutuneoffroad.com/when-are-tender-coils-ok-to-use/

 

It would seem your definition of tender spring coincides more with Eibach's definition of a helper spring. https://eibach.com/products/helper-tender-springs

In lieu of variable rate springs readily available for Tacos, I'm simply after that "luxury" feel on the road with full capability off-road the second I hit more than patched up asphalt... If possible, ya know

 

I’d never heard the term “tender spring”. Thank you for teaching me something today.

 

You are correct, tender/helper spring are same thing. If you are after luxury feel, then I would focus more on getting the shocks tuned professionally. Majority of the ride quality you are experiencing comes from the internal valving. I'm not too savvy with 1st gens, but 3rd gens we are very limited on spring rate options, however the tuning options are almost endless for these aftermarket & tunable shocks. This where we spend the majority of our time when tuning Fox/King shocks. Modifying pistons, valving etc. Don't get me wrong, having the correct spring is a must, but I would focus more of the attention on valving. Hopefully ADS can be helpful in this department and get you dialed in the way you would like.