Ol' Bumpy needs a new name.

[RusM]

Hello, my name is Rus and I have a Toyota problem. :elkgrin: So you may have read one of my threads on here or other message boards asking people about suspension, I may have even asked you some questions. Thank you for any help or feedback you gave me! After much deliberation and talking to lots of people on the interwebs and in the real world I decided to lift my truck. Furthermore, I decided against going with the high dollar coilover/custom rear shock and went with a budget Old Man Emu 882/5mm trim packer/90004/FZJ-80 fronts in the rear/60027. I purchased all the OME stuff from Kurt at Cruiser Outfitters and the '80 springs from a guy off mud. I was a little bit concerned at first as I could have gotten the stuff a little cheaper elsewhere, yet in the end the customer service and individual attention and tech advice I got from Kurt would have been a bargain at twice the price. Originally I was planning to do this the night before a wheeling trip, I am really glad I didn't!
First step: collect underwear.

Step Two: .... .........

Something that may be apparent to everyone else yet took me two hours to figure out. You must press down on the upper control arm to get the lower shock mounting bolt out.
:Wow1:

 

[RusM]

So once I figured out the pressing down on the upper control arm part I had the stock coilovers out and discovered that the stud was corroded to nothing and I couldn't get a grip on anything. It squirted out of the vice even!

So once I figured out that the top plates weren't going to come off in a conventional manner, out came the sawzall!

Problem solved!

When I put the 882's on the Autozone spring compressors they started to become angry way before they were anywhere close to where they needed to be to get the top plates on. So I made a few phone calls and found a local shop just down the road that said they could get to them sometime this morning. I jammed down there and got there just as most of the guys were starting work. I talked to a couple of guys that were standing around and they weren't too sure if they could even compress the springs. The manager came in the shop and took over, he had the springs together in about twenty minutes, even with getting a piece of plywood to put between himself and the huge spring compressor! Best $28.95 I have ever spent!

 

[RusM]

I read on one write up about using the jack to compress the upper control arm. It worked really great!

The lower shock mount didn't quite line up, but a big wrench and the 3/8" extension from my toolbox fixed it up.

This pic turned out kind of blurry, but you can see the new lower shock mount bolt, nut, and washer. It was a bear to get it all lined up, and resulted in a few smashed fingers.

All done!

Forgot to take before measurements, but after ended up at 39" ground to middle of fender on both sides.

Step Three: Profit!

Didn't take as many pics as I was starting to get pressed for time and wanted to get done before dark.

This little guy really helped a couple of times.

A couple of things, the rear shocks are a ***** to access! I think I still need to try and get a torque on the upper shock nut as I really wasn't able to get any loc-tite on bolt. To get the stock shocks off I used a set of pipe wrenches on the body of the shock and got a wrench on the top. I had to use the autozone spring compressors on the '80 springs to get them in, it worked out really well. Surprisingly the rear was much easier on my truck than the front. It looks like the rear brake line is long enough and would not break as it is, but I am going to add another stock line to it to be sure. I am also probably going to get the panhard bar mount on the axle extended.

Whoa! Gained 4.5" in the back! Maybe a little more in the front, need to get that winch on to get it settled down a little.

So far, the ride is awesome! I took it for a test run and saw what looked like a small bump into a dirt road. I smashed it at about 20mph and the truck soaked it up like a champ, coming back through the other way I saw that the bump was way deeper than I had originally thought it was!
Going in to get an alignment tomorrow and after that I will take it out for a forest road test run. :victory:

 

[cruiseroutfit]

 

[RusM]

Thanks again for all you help Kurt! You are on my list of highly recommended shops/vendors! I am extremely pleased with all of the OME stuff that I got from you and your tech advice made the install far less difficult than it could have been.

You know how I was telling you that one of the FZJ-80 springs was double purple/green/white? If you look at the driver's side spring in this picture it looks green, especially when you compare it with the passenger which is light blue.

 

[RusM]

Well it has been established that a man cannot lift his truck and then not get bigger tires soon thereafter! Still chasing a few little issues with the lift, did some flex testing and now I need to take my gas tank skid off and clearance it to avoid it being hit by the driveshaft. I also need to get a new zerk for the slip yoke. Projects for this weekend; diff drop; extend rear brake line; clearance gas tank skid; pull out mangled zerk and replace with a set screw.

 

[cruiseroutfit]

Looking really good!

Your right, that does have a green looking paint band. I'll add it to my database and I'm sure we'll eventually have one here to measure out.

 

[CYi5]

How do you like the OME Nitro Sport rear shocks?

 

[maclean216]

Do you have any plans on extending the bumpstops?

 

[RusM]

How do you like the OME Nitro Sport rear shocks?

So far they are riding great. I really should get a rear bumper on, as the spring/shock combo rides a lot better with more weight on the back. I knew this going in and just need to figure out who I want to do the bumper. The caveat to this would be that I have no frame of reference as this is my firts lifted truck. With an empty gas tank and no weight in the truck it rides similarly to my parents 1 ton Dodge, but better than my '91 3/4 Dodge.

Do you have any plans on extending the bumpstops?

No, that's not on the list! I do have plans to copy CYi5's plan and get a couple scrap pieces of 2x2 and the Daystar KU09014BK rear bumpstop's and just replace mine as on the '97 they are longer than on the later models.

 

[RusM]

This aggression will not stand, man. So I went up to visit OCD Fab on Thursday and Gabe fixed up my gas tank with a sheet of scrap he had. He also did some bodywork on the factory gas tank skid and cut and welded together a more tougher skid plate! Hopefully it holds up better than the factory tinfoil did.

Then there was this issue.

This was the solution.

The old zerk came out easily once I figured out which side of the EZ-out to use. I put the little set screw in the hole the zerk came out of, but it seemed a little loose and didn't really tighten down effectively. So out came the loctite and I recessed it into the hole just a bit.
Next I decided to put in a diff drop, it went in really easily and the spacers that came with my skids were unnecessary. I got new bolts for the skids as some of the bottom ones were kind of chewed up. A couple of the bolts don't seem to want to snug up though, not too sure why that is.
Then I noticed that my front swaybar had puked out its' rubber bushing. So I decided to remove it completely while I was under the truck. I was kind of concerned about the death roll that is reported to happen immediately after the swaybar is removed on several other forums. It is not an issue. In fact, the truck rides so much better with the swaybar removed that I could really care less if it did anything offroad! I still need to find time to get some spraypaint on various parts and put some grip tape on top of the sliders so I don;t wreck myself anymore when they are wet.

 

[RusM]

No rain so I decided to take off the rear bumper to make way for the new one WesFab is making for me.

Removal process.

All done!

 

[RusM]

I've got a ************ new bumper!

Thanks to Wes, Phil and Brandon for building me a sweet new bumper!