I don't see the need to go low pro. Unless my runner is different than all others, there's a ton of room with stock lower bump stops. They are only a 1" tall anyway. You might as well remove them if your going to go low pro. I don't do hard core rock crawlin with my 4Runner. If your rock crawlin you never hit a stop hard anyway like you do when your on the road or desert runnin. If your looking for that much travel, there are other suspensions that would be better (than stock IFS).

 

The majority of people here that have oversized tires, would probably rub or hit if they had all there wieght on the front wheels and were turned all the way. I figure it's safer to have a stop than ruin something. I have rails, quads and crawlers for the hardcore stuff.

 

I want to do this as well. The one concern I have is as follows. When a wheel is unloaded, it droops and because there is less weight on a wheel, it looses traction easier, thus not much torque can be transmitted via the CV. If you moved your bumpstops upwards, and the CVs were at an angle upwards, obvious more torque can be applied to the wheel and more torsional stress wil be placed on the CV. Thus i think it is reasonable to assume that the CV would break at a lesser angle in the upwards direction because of the increased torsional stress.

What are your thoughts?

 

James, can you post your measurement from the lip of the rim to the edge of the fender? That picture looks very clear to me at least you have a lot of lift cranked in. You certainly have far more than I do and I'm at 1-1.5" lift level.

Frank

 

Don't sweat the upwards angle of the CV at compression it is minor. Also, unless you have a locker, the CV's are seeing as much stress as the wheel with the least traction can apply.

For trail wheeling, up travel is as important as down travel so cranking excessive lift decreases capability.

Frank

 

If you aren't wheeling hard you can crank in all the lift you want and be fine.

In fact, if someone wants to cosmetically improve their truck and handle larger tires, your set up is a good inexpensive way to do that.

Frank

 

I had 14" from the lip of my wheel to the fender well before my lift. Now with ome TB and BJ spacers I'm at 15.75".

Before


Lifted


I think it was the angle the picture was taken looking up. Here's one from a more level angle.

 

That's a nice truck. You're a little on the high side. Stock is 13.5-14". But as mentioned it's no sweat unless you are really pushing it on the trail.

I never thought about it until now but those larger bump stops are a good idea for some people. Do you have a part number or description? For anyone who posts up that they want to fit a given tire size and doesn't care if they lose up travel, they can use those larger bump stops as opposed to body lifting and trimming.

Frank

 

I replaced the lower bump stops up front with Energy Suspensions 9.9101 2.125" tall bump stop to limit upward travel. Don't forget, there is a set on the front and rear of the lower control arms.

Don't forget on IFS that there is only 3.75" of travel on a stock shock, taking into consideration of the angle of of mount only gives you 4.6" of actual suspension travel before the shock is colapsed or extended (unless you have redone where your shocks mount). If you sit in the middle, you only have a little over 2" either way, so everyone out there that thinks they have alot of travel in there front end, needs to take a geometry class (even with BJ spacers).

 

Well, I will have to tub out the fender, and won't be going up to an angle that is as high as the droop is low, (if that makes sense). I agree, its a possibility, but with a 15 minute trail change time on my CV axles, its not a really big issue for me.

 

Frank, FSR stands for forestry service road mainly a gravel road that was once used for logging they do not reqire 4wd at all. The part of the front end that is failing is the idler arms. I went though I belive 8 last year (April to October) I was out on the trail every weekend. I do not have a front locker and would hate to think the headache that would be. The truck had 14" pre install and after had 17"(with 2" BL added at the same time) so 15" overall with out the BL. I uncranked the t bars 2 weeks after installing the BJ spacers.

I have 33x12.5R15 tires my friend is running 32x11.5's As I said I uncranked the t bars 2 weeks after installing the BJ spacers and killing the first braind new Idler.

Jeremy

 

AHA!!!

See, I was pretty sure it wasn't my ARB killing those damn things, but rather the geometry. I knew it.

I think my locker killed the rest of my steering, but the idlers seem to fail at an unreasonable rate. Also, my problems virtually went away after lowering back to stock. Even in the rocks.

 

Are you guys bending the idler braces as well?

Frank

 

The arms bend with the brace.

 

Do you think the idler arms bend on the compression or on the extension?

 

Compression.

 

If they bend on the compression, how does the BJ spacer cause the idler arm to fail?

 

Because putting on a BJ spacer jacks the front end of the truck up. Therefore, in order to align the front tires, the Tierods have to be adjusted farther apart, as in, longer.

Then, when the A-arm is compressed, the knuckle moves up, and so does the Tie rod. But, because it is longer now, it actually PUSHES against the centerlink. Since the Idler seems to be the weak link, it usually bends before anything else, but not always. I've had both the centerlink and the tierods fail before.

 

If the a-arm compresses far enough, you won't bend but usually it still has the tie rod angling down. The lengthening of the tie rods is very slight, about .2-.25" and isn't really a significant factor here.

Sounds like I need to design a strong idler truss and some beefy center links.

Frank

 

I agree its not much, but disagree that its not significant. I'm happy to entertain other ideas on why my idler bent all the time with the lift, but once un-cranked, it's only bent once. I haven't changed anything other than un-cranking the tbars and shortening the tierods.

I don't have numbers, but i think that it is an arc thing. I think at stock height the steering stuff arcs with the a-arms, but cranked up, it doesn't and hence the pushing.

Anyway, I'm just going by my own experience and "sitting in garage looking at truck" thinking. I'm more than happy to change my opinion if someone has a better explanation.