King 2.5 front install notes

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No go with more grinding. I took enough off to punch through on a lower edge. I really can't take more off. With the front and rear cams at neutral to slightly out they clear. In the front I can get to 7, maybe 8 o'clock depending on where the rear is. They are not going to clear the bumpstop at full droop without cutting out a chunk and welding in a patch. Even then I'm not sure the bump itself would fit. I'm officially annoyed.

I feel like clearance got worse after I dropped in the OME UCAs. Probably the stock UCA was limiting some droop. The LCAs are still loose so it is really at full droop.

At this point I think that I'll just get it aligned and see where it is. If I have to pull them back off and weld in a patch I won't be happy, but so be it.
 
Yarrow Babb said:
I’ve got my King 2.5’s sitting in boxes, awaiting my UCA’s from Camburg. I was looking forward to doing this myself, in the driveway. I’m ok mechanically. I just installed a SDHQ hidden winch on my 200, but reading all these posts makes me a little hesitant. Can 1 guy install these by himself in a day or 2? This Kdss thing worries me….should it??
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Using the drop the LCA approach I think I could get it done in two full days pretty easy. The numerous grind, check, grind, check is really time consuming, at least on mine. Note that I have not reinstalled and dealt with the LCA bolts yet (big torque) or reconnected the KDSS.

KDSS - I had the coilovers out of my GX460 with KDSS a number of times. Eventually I fabricated a tool to make alignment/re-connection easier. I'm sure the LC KDSS will be an equal PITA until I work out the tricks.
 
@Moby I don't see how the UCA would impact LCA/shock clearance. All it can do is tilt the knuckle in/out or forward/backward.. shouldn't impact the position of the LCA or coilover.

Not sure why yours needs so much more room, but it could be individual variance. I agree with the strategy of go for an alignment and see what happens. When the truck is at ride height you may have room to weld some metal in there without removing the coilover or loosening the LCA, which will require getting another alignment.


Yarrow Babb said:
I’ve got my King 2.5’s sitting in boxes, awaiting my UCA’s from Camburg. I was looking forward to doing this myself, in the driveway. I’m ok mechanically. I just installed a SDHQ hidden winch on my 200, but reading all these posts makes me a little hesitant. Can 1 guy install these by himself in a day or 2? This Kdss thing worries me….should it??
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Is your rig rusty? If not, KDSS shouldn't be an issue. You can get under there beforehand and see whether the bolts will loosen up.. just do so on level ground and DONT GO MORE THAN THREE TURNS. (seriously.)

Beyond that it's the same as any other truck. Getting the sway bar links back in place is a challenge mostly because the lift lowers the LCA which brings things out of neutral alignment.

And as @Moby said pulling the coilover repeatedly to grind, then reinstall to check clearance.. takes a while. I think I pulled it three times each side.. but really with the LCA cam bolts loose it's just a matter of swinging things in and out and supporting the weight of the coilover as it is put into and removed from it's little space.
 
Finally getting around to updating for something I found odd during the install.

The directions state to cut your front inner fender splash shields pretty aggressively, given how little room is actually needed for the reservoir hoses. I suspect they used the same instructions for those with Comp adjusters as without.

I'm without. And took off valuable plastic that keeps mud from spraying all over the sides of the engine.

Here is a picture of a new splash guard next to my old one that was cut per instructions.

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Cut guard in place, showing how much of a gap there is.

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If you don't have compression adjusters you can easily notch the guard and maintain more of the splash protection.

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Nationwide backorder on the passenger side shield, so I'll do that one when they get some inventory. That side is a mirror image except for the large upward protrusion for the KDSS lines.
 
Nice. I cut as little as I could, but the hose route with the adjusters cutting was needed. Wish I was able to go your route and keep them intact.

How the heck do those white clips work?

I really hope the ride is worth it after grind, grind, grind and grind some more on the passenger side. Same as driver though, no go on the fit with the cams turned in unless I actually cut out the bump stop. Hope to get it on the ground next weekend and get it aligned.
 
Moby said:
How the heck do those white clips work?
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I ordered new ones and used a double-bend o-ring pick to grab the tangs from the inside and pull them in. This breaks the tangs but the new clips are very cheap. These are in my "keep a few on the shelf" parts list, along with a handful of the lower black plastic ones that get fouled up by sand.

If you really need to keep from destroying them find a piece of hose or something that just fits over the diameter and slip it on from the engine side.

I trust that you'll like the ride.
 
I just finished my install. 2.5” coilovers in the front, 2.5” shocks in the rear, with Dobinson CV-559V springs. Big job for a DYI guy, but doable. I did the driver side first, and tried to follow the Filthy Motorsports instructions, and not unhook the sway bar links. I opened the KDSS valves. Almost impossible for me, I scratched the mess out of the bottom of the King coilover, but finally figured I would follow the recommendations from this site, and after unhooking the sway bar links, and loosening the sway bar mounts, it was MUCH easier, not easy, but easier. Reconnecting the sway bar endlinks was tough, but doable with a bottle jack, and some pry tools.

Overall, I’m happy with results. Sore as hell, but happy. Took me a few hours Sat night, all day Sunday, and finished up Monday am. Gonna let it settle some, and start the search for wheels and tires
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Nice job! And great time getting 'er done. I almost have mine back on the ground. Putting the wheels on the ground and final torque today. Taking me forever because bike racing (training) season in full swing, which means 8~9 hours of riding a weekend. Plus 3 nights/week of 1-2 hours each. Fitting the install around that is tough.

I'm a paranoid guy however, and while inspecting everything I found that I put just the tiniest, hairline crease in the driver side hardline while torquing the upper arm bolt. Less than 1/4" long (maybe 1/8") and just enough to catch a fingernail. So, I'm stressing that. I'm sure it is fine, but, paranoid.

If I ever have to have the upper arm out again I will TIG a bar to the end of a box wrench to make an extended "crow foot" wrench.
 
Moby said:
I'm a paranoid guy however, and while inspecting everything I found that I put just the tiniest, hairline crease in the driver side hardline while torquing the upper arm bolt. Less than 1/4" long (maybe 1/8") and just enough to catch a fingernail. So, I'm stressing that. I'm sure it is fine, but, paranoid.

If I ever have to have the upper arm out again I will TIG a bar to the end of a box wrench to make an extended "crow foot" wrench.
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Which hard line? One of the cluster near the UCA pivot bolt nut?
 
Yes, the thickest of them closest to the nut. My wife came out and told me I was being ridiculous. She pointed out that it looked like the line has a sheath over it starting at the upper junction (thus the thickest), that the mount flexes when she pushed on it and that an errand stone would likely do more harm than a tiny line that will barely catch a nail. But again, I have a paranoid personality and figure everything that can go wrong absolutely will.
 
Couple of updates from my install that might help others:

Ben at Filthy said a little contact at full drop wasn't a real problem. Hope to get it in for an alignment this week and see where it ends up (it's on the ground now).

I found KDSS much easier on the 200 than my GX. Here's what I did:

  1. Hooked up the passenger side first.
  2. Put the link in the pocket first, then jacked up the arm until the stud from the link fit.
  3. Snug up the bolt and nut but not torqued.
  4. Used 2 floor jacks on the driver side.
  5. Put the link in the LCA pocket first and then jacked the KDSS arm and the LCA until they lined up.
  6. Torqued all 4 nuts/bolts to spec on the ground with the help of a couple of extensions and the flex head on my digital CDI torque wrench (a wobble adapter and a short 19mm socket would do). Handy on the passenger side was a 19mm crow foot flare wrench and a long 8mm hex socket to clear the crow foot and a medium rachet to get good leverage.
For my GX, after the second time wrestling with the brackets, I welded a punch to a long tube and welded a handle to that to get enough leverage to get the bracket bolts to line up.
 
In the middle of my King 2.5 install. The stem of the shock contacts the LCA at full drop. I have shaved the bump stop, bump stop pad to get clearance for the coils. Rotated the cam bolts to the center of the truck to push the shock out a bit to help clear the bump stop. That however pushes the stem in the lower control arm. The picture shown is after I've shaved off some metal on the LCA and it still touches. Did anyone else have this issue?

I've already shaved off a fair bit and not sure I want to do much more. Any ideas?

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Gazziza said:
In the middle of my King 2.5 install. The stem of the shock contacts the LCA at full drop. I have shaved the bump stop, bump stop pad to get clearance for the coils. Rotated the cam bolts to the center of the truck to push the shock out a bit to help clear the bump stop. That however pushes the stem in the lower control arm. The picture shown is after I've shaved off some metal on the LCA and it still touches. Did anyone else have this issue?

I've already shaved off a fair bit and not sure I want to do much more. Any ideas?

View attachment 3136407
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You aren’t running a spacer on top of the shock are you? Mine are *very* close but don’t contact.. any downward movement from the top of the shock and I’d have contact there.
 
bloc said:
You aren’t running a spacer on top of the shock are you? Mine are *very* close but don’t contact.. any downward movement from the top of the shock and I’d have contact there.
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No spacers. Upper shock bolts have been torqued down so no extra play there. I'm curious what part number did you (or any others that have King 2.5's) get for the shocks? Mine are 25001-266A-EXT. Filthy and other places only have 25001-266A (w/o the EXT) listed. I purchased mine from Total Chaos with their UCA's so I figured these should pop right in without issue. I can fiddle around with the cam bolts a bit more and maybe shave a little tiny fraction more off but I honestly feel these should clear the stock LCA's. Unless the extended travel coilovers require me to get TC lower control arms. I can't imagine that being the case though.
 
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Gazziza said:
No spacers. Upper shock bolts have been torqued down so no extra play there. I'm curious what part number did you (or any others that have King 2.5's) get for the shocks? Mine are 25001-266A-EXT. Filthy and other places only have 25001-266A (w/o the EXT) listed. I purchased mine from Total Chaos with their UCA's so I figured these should pop right in without issue. I can fiddle around with the cam bolts a bit more and maybe shave a little tiny fraction more off but I honestly feel these should clear the stock LCA's. Unless the extended travel coilovers require me to get TC lower control arms. I can't imagine that being the case though.
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The following was on each tag for my fronts:
ORDER# STOCK, (20) 25001-266
Toyota LC 200 08+ Front C/O Right & Left
Build date 1/22/2020

Note that mind don’t have comp adjusters.

The ext does make me wonder. King was pretty great when I called them to try and figure out the type of fitting they use on the reservoir hose. Might be worth calling them to see what they say. I guess it’s possible TC specifies more extended length planning for their lower arm or something.
 
I'll snap a photo of what the PO of my rig did to deal with this, just noticed the other day while under there.
 
I didn't run into this on King installation on either a 13 or 16 LC. I did have to grind the bump stop, but that seems unrelated.
 
I guess to limit droop? Needless to say, I'll be knocking this off when I pull these for a rebuild

King Epoxy piece.webp
 
Gazziza said:
No spacers. Upper shock bolts have been torqued down so no extra play there. I'm curious what part number did you (or any others that have King 2.5's) get for the shocks? Mine are 25001-266A-EXT. Filthy and other places only have 25001-266A (w/o the EXT) listed. I purchased mine from Total Chaos with their UCA's so I figured these should pop right in without issue. I can fiddle around with the cam bolts a bit more and maybe shave a little tiny fraction more off but I honestly feel these should clear the stock LCA's. Unless the extended travel coilovers require me to get TC lower control arms. I can't imagine that being the case though.
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I wonder how much added droop the EXT versions add? Can you measure the distance between the center of the wheel to fender at max droop?

forum.ih8mud.com

Suspension Travel Comparison

Been meaning to do this to get some objective numbers to compare ride height versus droop travel versus compression travel. What better to do on a rainy day. Hope is that others may contribute and I'll update my table. We've known for awhile that some aftermarket suspensions increase what is...
forum.ih8mud.com forum.ih8mud.com

Couple things you may want to watch
1) Compression limit. This may require lowering the factory bump stop to avoid having the extended shock body become the compression limiter
2) Droop travel. Looks like quite a bit more droop. The CV angles have been known to be an area of concern with too much droop. This may warrant a diff drop to make sure CVs don't grenade in extreme articulation.
 
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