Ironman Foam Cell Pro install

[natvet]

This was my install of front struts/lift with ironman performance foam cell pro kit #TOY063BKP

Measurements from center of hub to center of fender lip

Prior to lift PS 21.5” after 24”

DS 20.75 after 24”

I followed @arich plan on removing the struts from the bottom:



I've briefly mentioned this in other threads but I've never done a write up. I recently had to change one strut and I was able to do it without breaking the steering tie rod or UCA ball joint. It was the fastest I've ever changed a strut. I got the idea when I swapped out my LCAs. Here are two pictures with what to loosen. I don't have time to give you the long story but if you remove the two bolts from the bottom of the steering spindle, remove the swaybar bolt from the LCA, Support the steering spindle and brakes, loosen the LCA bolts and allow it to swing out of the way and the struts can go in and out from below.
I've you're doing this as part of a full install and have the change to UCAs then you'll have to break the ball joint but that's not too hard. Breaking the steering is a beeech. (don't hit the brake guard.
Does all this make sense? Ant

(obviously you'll need an alignment immediately)

Steps and problems

1. Loosen KDSS valves just under 3 turns

2. Jack up front end, place jack stands.

3. Remove wheel

4. Remove sway bar bolt to LCA.

5. Remove 2 bolts from lower ball joint attachment to steering spindle 22mm needed.

6. Mark alignment plates on LCA mounts and loosen LCA mount bolts 24mm needed. Problem…. Loosen the front LCA bolt and the inner rear LCA nut. The front inner and rear outer bolt are not meant to be loosened. Trust me …..I tried.

7. Remove lower shock mount bolt. Here is where I messed up. I removed the lower shock mount bolt prior to the lower ball joint attachment bolts and stripped the shock mount bolt trying to back it out. On the other side , I removed lower ball joint attachments and loosened the LCA bolts prior to removing the lower shock bolt. By doing this the shock pushed the LCA down out of the way and allowed easy removal of the lower shock bolt. I used a jack under the LCA to prevent it from swinging down while removing the lower ball joint attachment bolts.

8. Push the LCA out of the way and remove 4 nuts on the top of the shock tower. NOTE.. DS shock tower has a small wire-loom bracket that must be removed (10 or 12mm bolt) from the front area of the tower to allow access to the inner forward shock top nut.

9. Wiggle the strut down and out.

10. Beverage or 6

My kit came with the struts and coils separated so I had to separate the OEM struts from the coils to utilize the top portion of the strut. I was able to use strut spring compressors I rented from autozone to remove the OEM coils. These compressors will not fit the Ironman coils….not even close. I had to take the struts and coils to a shop to have them put together.

The preload for the ironman struts is set by measuring from the center of the lower shock mounting hole to the bottom of the strut coil. The base measurement (to allow for 50mm of lift) is 220mm. I set the locking rings and spring perch at 220mm prior to taking them to the shop to have them assembled.

Assembly

Basically the reverse of the above. Notes and problems

1. Do not tighten the LCA mount bolts until the truck is sitting with full weight on the tires.

2. When installing the strut into the shock tower loosely place the 4 nuts on top of the shock tower to allow the strut some room to move around. This makes it easier to align the bottom shock mount.

3. I had a really hard time aligning the lower ball joint attachment to the steering spindle ONLY on the DS. I could not raise the strut nor lower the spindle enough to allow the bolts to start threading. SOOOOO I loosened (did not remove just loosened) the castle nut at the attachment of the UCA and steering spindle, separated the joint, and this allowed enough downward movement of the spindle to allow alignment of the lower ball joint attachments to the spindle.

4. I also had a problem aligning the sway bar mounts to the LCA. The easiest solution, thanks to bjowett, is to remove the sway bar attachments to the frame. This give you ample play to align the bolt through the sway bar mount into the LCA. I used my floor jack to raise the sway back into place on the frame and bolt it back up.

5. REMEMBER to tighten the KDSS valves before taking it to the alignment shop.

I hope I didn’t forget anything and hope it helps.
Please make corrections as needed

 

[Atx Cruiser]

Got any pics?? Good work on the install.

I'll add one thing- my Ironman kit came labeled DS and PS on the struts. Neither myself nor the shop I hired to do the install connected the dots that the Ironman product is made in Australia and therefore designed for right side driving vehicles. So DS struts need to be on the passenger side and the PS labeled struts go on the drivers side, if installing on a left side driving vehicle. Hope that makes sense.

 

[malloc]

Seconding the D/S on the right. Mine were wrong and it doesn't ride well with D/S on the left. Truck felt unbalanced and way rougher ride.

 

[natvet]

My front strut coils are labeled NS (near side) and DS (drivers side). I put them as described so DS on the left. It equaled the stance out perfectly but I do not know how it drives yet....at the shop getting aligned.

 

[natvet]

I can take post some pics when I install the wheel spacers.

 

[Atx Cruiser]

Maybe Ironman changed how they label the struts? My cruiser had a bad lean before we realized that the DS and PS needed to be the opposite for a USA spec car. They swapped out the struts and all was well.

Hope yours is correct @natvet

 

[Volunteer]

Any updates on the lift how it worked out and some pics following the install. Doing my research between the ironman PRO or just go OME. I beat the tar out of my OME on my 80 for 10 years and it held up with no issues so there is no guessing there just looking at both options. I had held Icon in high regards until recently some guys here locally has had nothing but problems with them and they said customer service sucked so its no longer a consideration for me. Thanks

 

[ckkone]

I've always had OME and went with Tough Dog this time around, I highly recommend them. I got them from @reevesci on the forum, lots of different options for shock and spring combinations. One nice thing is the front struts come completely assembled with new top hats, so they just bolt on no messing around with spring compressors. The ride is great both on and off road, firmer than OEM but not harsh and still great for daily driving. I have 41mm shocks, heavy front and light rear springs.

Featured Products

 

[Volunteer]

I've always had OME and went with Tough Dog this time around, I highly recommend them. I got them from @reevesci on the forum, lots of different options for shock and spring combinations. One nice thing is the front struts come completely assembled with new top hats, so they just bolt on no messing around with spring compressors. The ride is great both on and off road, firmer than OEM but not harsh and still great for daily driving. I have 41mm shocks, heavy front and light rear springs.

Featured Products

Thanks for the feedback , there is definitely more options now than there was when I was putting my 80 together. There is also the Dobinsons brand as well so basically we have full access to most of the Aussie manufacturers today. OME, Ironman, Tough Dog and Dobinsons I do like that the Tough Dog fronts come assembled with the upper strut mounts very convenient no matter what lift I go with I'll be ordering new ones I'm not fooling with taking the old ones apart I've been there and did that a few times.

 

[TRAIL TAILOR]

Thanks for the feedback , there is definitely more options now than there was when I was putting my 80 together. There is also the Dobinsons brand as well so basically we have full access to most of the Aussie manufacturers today. OME, Ironman, Tough Dog and Dobinsons I do like that the Tough Dog fronts come assembled with the upper strut mounts very convenient no matter what lift I go with I'll be ordering new ones I'm not fooling with taking the old ones apart I've been there and did that a few times.

Good to visit today. All are in stock currently.

Jason

 

[linuxgod]

I have the adjustable 45mm Tough Dog and love it. Just remember that the taller rear spring goes on the side with the gas tank, regardless of what TD says.

 

[Volunteer]

Had a similar situation on my 13 Tacoma you had the taller springs on the DS I actually had to go back and add a spacer to the drivers rear leaf to adjust for the gas tank. I just ordered the TD setup from Jason he's great to deal with very responsive and talks with you through your needs and build to make sure your getting what you want. Really appreciate that. Now tired of looking a tires and tire sizes the last few days but from the info I've gathered the 275/70/18 at a 33.2. on the stock 18inch wheels is about the best option don't mind shedding mudflaps and shaving some inner liner but not ready to chop body mounts and hammer pinch welds just yet I went through all that mess on my 13 Tacoma as well.

 

[pawnthatdude]

I did this the past weekend front and rear. Some notes and struggles:

The @OTRAMM video is the best I could find, even though I found some more difficulties than he encountered:

A 22mm flexihead ratchet wrench is almost required for this job. Well worth the money.

Drivers side/passenger side: I got my struts preassembled, and the boxes were labelled for DS and PS. I installed them as labelled. I did notice that on the spring markings themselves, it was the opposite, the N/S (which apparently means near side, near side to what?!) spring was on the strut they labelled for the driver side, and the D/S spring was on the strut they labelled for the passenger side. One day after the lift, with stock weight, I am within a quarter inch of lean. On the rear, I used the springs as marked: D/S on the driver side, N/S on the passenger side. Currently the rear is equal side to side.

Front struts
Even with the sway bar disconnected and the LCA loosened, it's a tight fit to get the taller new strut in. A long-ish pry bar was helpful to get it seated in the bottom craddle. The droop on the LCA in this position is enough that my CV axles on both sides were binding and it was impossible to reattach the knuckle to the UCA. The solution to unbind them was have a helper spin the opposite wheel and then wiggle the knuckle side to side, with the LCA supported by a floor jack with a little pressure. It does a little pop and then the knuckle moves much more freely and it's easy to get the UCA attached.

Sway bars and KDSS: On the front and rear I had a good battle getting the KDSS playing ball when reattaching the sway bars.

On the rear, you need to use a floor jack to compress the KDSS cylinder while guiding in the sway bar on the passenger side. Helps to have a second person for this.

On the front, no matter what I did I could not reattach the sway bars to the knuckles until I finally disconnected the sway bar from the u-brackets on the frame. Then I connected the sway bar at the knuckles. And then used a floor jack to lift the sway bar back to the frame. Then carefully bolt the brackets back on. The sway bar will be a little off center and it would be very easy to cross thread the mounting bolts.

Rear springs
It was a battle to get the old springs out. Getting the new (super heavy) taller springs in was all out war. For the P/S spring, I disconnected the frame end of the panhard bar. There simply isn't enough axle drop to get the new spring in without that. With the pan-hard bar removed, there is very little holding the axle up, basically just the control arm bushings. I disconnected the axle breather from the frame, it was totally maxed out. The brake lines were really close to being maxed out getting the P/S spring out. To reattach the pan-hard bar, since the axle was now shifted to the passenger side, I used a ratchet strap between the frame and axle panhard mounts to pull the axle over a bit until the panhard bolt could be reinserted. It took quite a bit of force on the ratchet to move it. A bigger ratchet strap would have been good.

Rear shocks
The upper mount for the shock is cruel to access. Getting the washers, bushing, and nut on the top of the new shock required contorting my body in a way that is probably not legal in some states. On the drivers side, the shock (which was like a million pounds) was in my left hand, I had my right hand doing a mega reach around to get to just barely put the hardware on (and I have pretty long arms). Meanwhile my face was pressed against the frame and I was basically straddling the axle underneath the wheel well. It was a sight to see.

To actually tighten the rear shock top nut was challenging since the shock rod will spin. There are 10mm flats on the top of the shock threads, but it's hard to access with two wrenches. I laid below the truck and went from below with a 10mm wrench and a 19mm ratcheting wrench. You have to just feel around to get both wrenches on, and then tighten about 1/8th of a turn at a time.

KDSS lean
My concrete was pretty level. I had the whole truck on jack stands for the job. When the wheels were back on, I lowered it with the KDSS valves open. I went around checking bolts were torqued and then closed the KDSS valves after 20 minutes. I don't have any significant lean.