Front diff drop

I’m planning on installing a front differential drop kit with my new lift and it looks fairly easy. However I just wanted to make sure that it’s the same procedure for a manual Tacoma. I can’t find any video of people installing a diff drop on a manual Tacoma and was wondering if anyone on here has experience with this.

 

By Manual you mean Transmission or Locking Hubs ?

Having done Automatic to manual swaps The front driver shafts are the same

 

Waste of time and money, people still rip axle boots with it. Just do the bootslide mod instead.

 

I have a manual transmission

 

Kinda depends on the lift. If you have more than 2-2.5" lift, I'd definitely consider one. Less than that and I probably wouldn't bother.

I'm of the mind that it's a cheap and easy thing to install that makes the CV angles *better*. I put one on with ~2" lift because I have mid-travel shocks so I wanted to minimize CV angle at the increased droop.

One drawback is it will push your diff down so it will contact the skid plate unless you put in some spacers. Some kits come with spacers. I was making a custom skid plate so I didn't bother with one of those kits.

The other option is high angle CVs which are quite a bit more expensive.

 

Take a few minutes to watch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47aat1tc6zw

 

For a street driven truck a diff drop can extend the life of the boots.

That’s pretty much the only benefit.

 

False. There's no benefit.

 

If the pleats touch they wear. A 1/2” drop can be enough to separate the pleats at ride height.

That being said I have 5 various 1st gen Toyotas and I do not run a diff drop on any of them.

 

I've seen MANY diff drops on mall crawlers that still rip boots. It's 100% a waste of time and money.

Bootslide mod > extended travel axles > driving with ripped boots for 3 years > diff drop

 

I have run a diff drop on my truck (WAYYYY BACK in the day when you had to make your own cause there wasn't an off the shelf solution) for 30k ish, and then got a Demello skid plate which doesn't work with a diff drop. Since then (100k+ miles) I have only blown through OEM boots once. Running around 3" of lift.

IMO the diff drop is unnecessary.

I will also add, that I regularly rinsed the truck and suspension components after wheeling trips to remove the dirt/sand/etc...

 

Without getting on a soapbox too much as some have done here, the only time a diff drop is appropriate is to lower the diff enough to stop the ribs from rubbing. That's it.

The real fix of course is to run a little less lift in the first place so you don't have as much axle angle. This is the only true way to prevent your cv boots from tearing. Diff drops and boot slide mods only mask the problem and are very poor solutions.