Suspension Install Instructions - Your Expertise requested

[Kurosawa]

I'm really looking forward to hearing your feedback on how this went for you and any lessons learned. I need to pull my front ICONs off for a rebuild next week and have been searching for hours trying to pick up tips on the process. Best of luck, I hope all goes smoothly.

 

[Crab Sack]

Here are the socket sizes Toyota uses, all in mm of course:
8,10,12,14,17,19,22,24
I forgot to mention a grease gun with moly grease for your UCA ball joint.

I’m excited to see the finished results, good luck on your build.

 

[TexAZ]

a couple tips for the rear:
let the axle hang. use a floor jack to raise each side up just enough to take pressure off the lower shock bolt. remove the shock bolt.
this will let the axle drop further. on the passenger side, remove the 14mm nut on the top of the sway bar linkage. support the linkage with a jack or just let it pop. keep track of the hardware.
if you use a long prybar (like 4 ft) you can lower the axle enough to removed the springs. for the shocks, just use a pipe wrench to hold the body and a wrench to loosen the nut on top.
when you get the shocks and springs in place, use a jack to raise up the sway bar linkage. put a stopper in front of the jack, as the arm will rotate and want to kick the jack forward. you can just pump the linkage back through the mounting hole in the frame and tighten the nut back down.


on the front:
check harbor freight for a ball joint separator. not the pickle fork one. a horseshoe with a bolt through the middle. makes it much easier that smacking it with a hammer.
use a sharpie to mark the alignment cam bolts and loosen them. you will need an alignment, but you probably have to drive to the shop, so keep the lower cams pretty close to where they were.

 

[Hoosier Daddy]

Thanks @Hoosier Daddy ! Maybe I just unbolt the LCA from the spindle on both sides. Maybe that will make life a bit easier?

Well, it's adding additional steps, but IMHO it's worth it to take away the risk to the CVs. You'll need to support the spindle/axle in the process. Be warned - getting those 2 bottom bolts lined up and threaded in again on the LCA/spindle during reassembly is an exercise in patience, to say the least. And make sure you torque them properly.

 

[Itsky]

a couple tips for the rear:
let the axle hang. use a floor jack to raise each side up just enough to take pressure off the lower shock bolt. remove the shock bolt.
this will let the axle drop further. on the passenger side, remove the 14mm nut on the top of the sway bar linkage. support the linkage with a jack or just let it pop. keep track of the hardware.
if you use a long prybar (like 4 ft) you can lower the axle enough to removed the springs. for the shocks, just use a pipe wrench to hold the body and a wrench to loosen the nut on top.
when you get the shocks and springs in place, use a jack to raise up the sway bar linkage. put a stopper in front of the jack, as the arm will rotate and want to kick the jack forward. you can just pump the linkage back through the mounting hole in the frame and tighten the nut back down.


on the front:
check harbor freight for a ball joint separator. not the pickle fork one. a horseshoe with a bolt through the middle. makes it much easier that smacking it with a hammer.
use a sharpie to mark the alignment cam bolts and loosen them. you will need an alignment, but you probably have to drive to the shop, so keep the lower cams pretty close to where they were.

Thank you for the detailed tips @TexAZ! Much appreciated!

Regarding the ball joint tool, is this what you are referring to? Harbor freight “pitman arm puller”?

Would this one be the right size? 3/8 drive and “jaw opening 1-5/16”

Tie Rod and Pitman Arm Puller

This tie rod and Pitman arm puller is slim enough to fit into tight areas but sturdy enough for high torque pulls on most cars and light trucks. The heat-treated pulling screw features a protective black finish to prevent rust and corrosion.

www.harborfreight.com

Thank you!

 

[TexAZ]

That's the one.
I had to trim one of the arms for another project, but it should work unmodified.

On the front, I would tackle the job in two stages. First replace the coilovers. Leave the stock upper arm connected.
Loosen the lower cam bolts, remove the sway bar linkage, and remove the two lower ball joint bolts. Support the hub with a jack stand and the lower arm will drop enough to swap the shock/spring assembly.
Bolt all that back together then swap the upper arm.

 

[Itsky]

Here are the socket sizes Toyota uses, all in mm of course:
8,10,12,14,17,19,22,24
I forgot to mention a grease gun with moly grease for your UCA ball joint.

I’m excited to see the finished results, good luck on your build.

Super helpful! Thank you!

@TexAZ bought the pitman arm puller, $15.

 

[Itsky]

Wanted to drop in with update.

I did the installation yesterday with my father in law, the OME shocks and springs are in! But, not without difficulty.

Prework - went smooth,
- KDSS valves were free of rust, removed shield, and loosened no problem. I bought a 5mm 3/8 hex bit from SK tool, it fits perfect, but was probably not necessary.
- spc control arms went toghether easily with good instructions
- marked alignment cams with paint marker (proved to be useful)

Rear suspension. starting at 10am we had LC lifted and wheels off.
- rear went together without drama. Needed to use a pipe wrench to hold shocks. 22mm swivel head ratcheting wrench was the ticket here.
- used @TexAZ ‘s method. Worked great. I was able muscle the KDSS and sway.
- we were feeling good, and took long lunch at 12:15pm

front suspension - starting about 1:30pm
- first problem, how to get the stearing connection off the spindle? hit it with brass punch? Nope. Put nut on hit it? Nope. Used pitman arm puller shown above at a strange angle? Yes! This worked, but took an insane amount of force! With the tie rod off we had to spend about a 45 mins chasing and cleaning up the threads on the tie rod end, to clean up our mess. What is the best practice here? It was a pain!
- removed LCA > spindle bolts, loosened the LCA aligment cams (loosen nuts/bolts on forward side)
- remove sway bar on LCA
- second problem Install OME coilover, clearanceS are tight to get the shock bottom into the LCA, the shock bottom was not exactly 90 degrees to the 4 top bolts had to loosen top shock bolt to adjust. Resulted in a lot of knuckle mashing and exercise. Check this first!
- third problem - while supporting the spindle with a jack stand and popping the uca taper, it realeses with force, our wire tie was not tight enough, the jack stand didn’t support it enough, our us wrestling the LCA back onto the spindle, we over extended the ABS wire on the passenger side. Didn’t figure this out until we started the LC to start on the other side.
- onto the UCAs, again following @TexAZ ’s fantastic process recommendation, unthreading he top bolt is super tight, you have to unclip hoses and the factory washers are so tight, they really work against you here. You have to use extreme patience here, time consuming effort. On the driver side you have to remove the battery, but it’s the easier side.
- wrapped the passenger side, just in time for 6pm dinner 4.5 hours to do the passenger side
- 7:15 staring on driver side. Much smoother, still had challenges getting tie rod off the steering linkage, pitman puller to required a s***load of force, but worked without damage threads (please share the recommended was to do this)
- buttuned up the drivers side at about 9:15 pm and we were feeling pretty good. At this piont we only three things left to do, LCA alignment cams on the ground, front sway bar and put on the tires
- fourth and biggest problem - reattaching the front sway bar to the LCAs was the biggest bitch of all time. We tried everything! Jacking up the LCA, ratchet strap, loosening the sway bar attachment bolts, hanging like a monkey from the sway bar. It was impossible to get the round bushing to line up so the bolt could line up. We spent 90 minutes without progress. Then, we stumbled this method ( What's the trick to reinstalling stabilizer bar links? ) and got it done. That is a fantastic tip. You are man @619TOY ! Get a tight fitting 6 point socket long extension and just muscle the bushing where it needs to go.
- wrapped up at about 11pm with a huge mess in the shop. Took us about 9.5 hours

The drive home was short, but the alignment was magically spot on. felt good, but looking forward to a real test.

Still need to do an alignment and remedy my buffet of dash lights.

I’ll come back though and a more detailed review.

Thanks again!

 

[TonyP]

If the ABS wire is busted and you don't know where, you can use a multimeter on the continuity setting to isolate the exact spot. The replacement harness isn't cheap, repairing is much cheaper (or free if you already have the tools).

 

[Itsky]

If the ABS wire is busted and you don't know where, you can use a multimeter on the continuity setting to isolate the exact spot. The replacement harness isn't cheap, repairing is much cheaper (or free if you already have the tools).

Thank you for this tip, I need to do this. Just watched a YouTube video on how to test continuity. Next I guess I’ve got to take out the wire and do some diagnostics.

 

[Kurosawa]

I'll be pulling out my front Icons tomorrow for rebuild and just want to say thanks for all the info in this thread and documenting your project. I'm counting on a smoother process being that it's a simple swap of just the fronts but I've learned some tricks here nonetheless.

 

[Kurosawa]

I'll be pulling out my front Icons tomorrow for rebuild and just want to say thanks for all the info in this thread and documenting your project. I'm counting on a smoother process being that it's a simple swap of just the fronts but I've learned some tricks here nonetheless.

Just a follow up here for others who may be doing a rebuild on Icons they already have installed and end up on this thread. I was able to remove and replace the fronts without disconnecting the KDSS. I should note I also have UCAs from Icon and these may give the added travel to do this that those without UCAs might not have(first and only experience with this so not sure).

I did turn the KDSS valves.
Disconnected the ABS wire.
Loosened the UCA joint.
Disconnected the steering arm tie rod.
Loosened the LCA bolts.
Removed the coilover.

FYI - I sent the Icons to SDHQ for the rebuild and they were easy to work with.

It ended up being simpler than I expected given my research around the forum, even though it was a basic remove and replace I thought the KDSS disconnect was mandatory and was happy I discovered I could avoid it. I will say the rebuild process is a pain in the ass though, having to pull, box, mail out, wait a few days and then reinstall is a hassle I'm glad only comes around every 30k miles or so.

Thanks to those that have added tips here and around the forum, I'm sure some of those are why this went so smoothly for me.

 

[JADANT]

This was a great thread. I was able to follow along but for some reason I ran into some issues. Like my driver side steering tie rod end bolt got messed up when I used the pitman tool, I think it bent it a enough where the crown bolt wouldn’t screw down. So have to pick one up this morning to finish it off. I do have a couple of questions.

How much torque do I need to torque the UCA long bolt that goes through the bushings?
On the lower part of my BP51’s came with a note zip tied to them to not use the parts in the kit but to use what’s already installed, so I installed it as is, anyone else run into that?
How do you know if the rear springs are sitting properly?

All in all I spent about 6 hours doing the rears, 6 hours (4hrs just on the passenger side) doing the fronts, and 1 hour doing the UCA’s.
I got some help half way through on the rears and again half way through the fronts. I will say this that that during the frustrating parts I would have to walk away for 30mins then come back and would finish a part and that gave me more fuel to finish.

The sway bars were by far the worst and most time consuming part on the rears. The front I started to take the sway bar out on the passenger side then decided to reconnect it and it that is why it took me 4 hrs on the passenger side. But was able to do the driver side without disconnecting the sway bar.

I am really wondering how bad my alignment is going to be, appointment for alignment is on Tuesday... will let you guys know.

Thanks again for all the knowledge here. I am now a happy owner of a stock 200 series with BP51’s (2721 springs) and new SPC UCA’s!

 

[iqbal624]

Here's a mistake I made-

I've done lift installs on lots of Toyotas before, but I'd never buggered an inner CV joint in the process until the 200. Pushing down on the lower control arm to install the lower strut mount is what caused the problem. Luckily, it didn't pop out far enough to come apart completely, but the inner joint bound up so tight I couldn't get it to straighten out again. Rotating the wheel hub popped the joint back into alignment, but not before I had cut open the rubber boot to see what was going on inside the joint. At that point I had to pull the whole doggone axle anyway.

For the other side of the truck, I supported the knuckle with a jackstand and then unbolted the knuckle from the lower control arm. That way there was no risk of over-extending the CV when the lower control arm was pushed down.

TonyP already mentioned this risk above. Be careful.

Can someone share a picture of what you need to be careful of? Which part do we want to make sure is not over extended? I’m going to attend the install in the next week or so, so just wanted to make sure as this hasn’t been an issue with other suspensions I’ve done (FJ, GX, taco).
thank you!

 

[Itsky]

Can someone share a picture of what you need to be careful of? Which part do we want to make sure is not over extended? I’m going to attend the install in the next week or so, so just wanted to make sure as this hasn’t been an issue with other suspensions I’ve done (FJ, GX, taco).
thank you!

My advise is to take off the abs wires before you do anything else. The unclip high (kind of difficult to do) and at the wheel.

I destroyed both of mine exercising great caution