A gentle growl of the Safari Snorkel, and a tick of my grandmothers rosary against my rearview mirror is all I hear as I accelerate up the canyon having just spent several hours beating down logging roads... These are the things that have given the Land Cruiser a cult following, the undeniable attention to detail and impeccable reliability gives little room for improvement.
Having driven Elsey through 18 different states, wheeled in brutal environments it was time to upgrade the OME shocks to something that could handle the 7,500lbs of weight, I also like many of you got fed up with the shock bottoming out under full extension (even the most minor of bumps). This led me to Just Differentials for a new solution, I felt very good dealing with these guys and they were very helpful with my inquiries, and for my usage they recommended the Icon 2.5 remote reservoir shocks. Installation proved to be somewhat time consuming (about 3.5 hours). In order to install the front shocks I jacked the vehicle up to the point both front tires were off the ground, secured the vehicle on jack stands, removed tires, removed shocks but did not relieve tension off the torsion bars per the instructions. The lower control arm had to be pried down.. a lot.. in order to fit the new longer travel shock in. To be honest I felt a bit uneasy about full droop binding the new Toyota cv axles I had just installed too, but after a call to Murph at JT he reassured me that with my 1" diff drop there was nothing to worry about and they have not seen any failures due to overextension. I mounted the reservoir in the location the recommended, parallel with the shock.
The rear was a slightly different story.. The spherical ball end proved to be very difficult to line up with the lower shock mount. The directions said to use a terry cloth to clean up the mount as the ball end was tightly machined.. and I mean TIGHT! After wrestling with this for a while I managed to get it on. The next fun step was mounting the reservoir, the directions wanted me to mount it on the outside of my frame. This wont work for most of us as that's right where the slider attaches to the frame! I ended up mounting it just behind the last leg of the slider, this will work for now until I find a new location.
Once installed I took her for a spin. The first thing I noticed after pulling onto a local canyon road was the lack of body roll and new found sportiness, it felt as if I had been driving around for years without a swaybar! I proceeded to and area where I would be able to drive about 70 miles of rough, rocky logging roads in the sierras. I lowered my tire pressure down to 28psi, typically I would go lower but I wanted to feel the shocks work.
The cobbled terrain threw what it could at me as I gently pressed down the accelerator. What would normally be a gut busting, change flying, dog hitting the ceiling bump, turned into a much more controlled comfortable experience (my two dogs will attest to this). I couldn't help myself but to drive an uncomfortable speed over the rough terrain (remember im testing) until I met with the paved road I had began on. At this point I was satisfied with my drive for the day so I hopped out to feel the temperature of the shocks.. Well they were hot! The resi, not so much. This could be due to the u shape bend in the pressure line but im not sure.
Overall im very happy with them so far. Keep in mind these shocks do not turn the hundo into a pre runner, and to be frank their not the first mod you should do. Expensive they are, so if you plan on going this route I would push them towards middle/end of your build. I'll be doing more testing soon as im going to Moab UT in a few weeks for our annual trip!!
I hope this helps you guys out and feel free to ask any questions!
Chad
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