2016 SR 2.7L 4x4 5 Spd "LT" Build

9/22/18 Did my own Cab Mount chop using BAMF plates.
Also flattened the pinch weld and used a heat gun to remold the fender liner.

 

9/22/18 New tires. 255/85R16 Cooper ST Maxx.
Also painted the trd wheel rings black.

265/75r16 vs 255/85r16

 

exciting stuff going down this weekend!

4.88 gears and an ARB locker. 3rd members built by @ECGS

 

Awesome build! Lots of nice goodies on your truck. A lot of great SR builds, found this one through another one

 

Thanks! Its really starting to come along. Gears and locker going in tomorow. After that I think I am going to try and home fab some bumpers.

 

Regeared to 4.88 and an ARB locker. Used a built 3rd member and front dif from east coast gear supply and installed them myself.

 

For anyone interested in a regear with a 2.7L engine and a 5 Spd (R165F) transmission:

Driving this truck with 33" E rated tires was awful. It was slow, difficult to get moving, and always lugging anytime i was below 2.5K RPM.
I would not recommend it without a regear.

This truck in particular comes with 3.909 gears. This is in my opinion the reason the truck feel so gutless with the larger tires.

The options for lowers gears are 4.30 (Factory Toyota gears from 2.7L automatics and V6 Manuals), 4.88 and 5.29 from Nitro.

I decided to go with 4.88. The reason for this is that I wanted an increase in power/torque (mechanical advantage) and still wanted to maintain reasonable drive-ability at high way speeds. 5.29 would have highway RPM's in 5th gear too high, and 4.30 would basically just barely be enough to offset the increased tire diameter of a 33" tire.

To see what kind of RPM's I would be turning at certain speeds and help me make a decision on the gear ratio, I made the following spreadsheet:


The rear 3rd member and front dif were purchased from east coast gear supply. There is tons of information on how to swap the new parts in and take the old ones out. This can be done in a weekend, you will need help getting the difs back in, they are heavy. The rear end took about 2 -2.5 hours start to finish, other than waiting for the RTV to dry (24 hours before I could fill it with fluid). The front end takes significantly longer. Nothing is overly complicated or difficult, it is just a large amount of labor and takes time to make sure everything is done correctly.

 

Did the pay off my truck mod today. Hit 40,000 miles yesterday. Truck will be three years old on Wednesday.

 

The Paid Off Mod is the best one!

 

Nice build +1 for fellow sr

 

How’s it going with the 4.88’s and 33’s?

 

Love it. Makes a huge difference, especially in the dirt.

 

Baja Kits LT kit on order.

Bought two used CV's to build LT axles without having my truck down.

It is extremely hard to get the outer CV separated from the shaft. Tried the Pipe method. Didn't get it.

 

Read the TC axle building instructions. I used to use the pipe method, then I switched to doing it the tc way. It sucks but so far after a dozen axles it’s worked 100% of the time with no broken parts.

 

Thanks for the advice, I have read the TC instructions and will likely have to do it that way. Other option is just asking Baja Kits if they can do it. I am waiting to get the kit and make sure the axles come with new C clips.

 

Option B sounds like the best one. I hate doing axles

 

Yeah I am thinking the same thing.

 

I purchased two new cv boot kits for the extended axles i am building. The boot kit came with three C clips. The one on the left looks like the one that I took off to get the inner cv off the shaft. Does one of the others look like the clip that holds the outer cv to the shaft?

 

It does look like those, but your replacement axles should already have them installed on it. It could also be the clip that holds the cv in the diff

 

Cool. Thanks for the help. You are right. The one on top looks like the clip that retains the cv in the dif.