I am currently running Bilstein 5100's, but I am doing a lot of reading (for the future ) about the Icon 2.5 Series Extended travel shocks and coilovers and I have just a quick question I cannot seem to find a definitive answer on.

How much more travel does the 2.5 "extended travel" Icons have vs. the Bilstein 5100's? (with and without the Icon uniball UCA's)

About an inch more. You will need the uppers arms and diff drop spacers.

are you sure? whats the stroke length of the icons? im getting a solid 10" of travel out of my tundra 5100s.

Are you saying the icons have more than an inch extra of travel?

Some relevant info, quoted from my build thread....

Link to quoted post

Nice post, BFAD. I have been SLACKING on reading build threads lately, so I missed that one before.

I'd be interested to know how much up travel those 5100s and toytecs can achieve... I have put the body of my coilover all the way down into the very bottom of the coil mount on my ICONs.

I think it's important to note, however, that travel isn't the only reason for running the 2.5" diameter suspension setups... They're a night and day improvement (in mine, and everyone else I know that has made them change's opinion) over the 5100 and Toytec setups.

I have shortened my bump stops quite a bit, and i have tubbed to completely clear 35s up front, and then on top of that i have 3" of body lift up front, and they are close to rubbing at full stuff. you can see here. obviously the ride is not as good as something like an icon or king shock though. makes one hell of a budget shock though.

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Agree completely. Riding in a full 2.5" ICON truck absolutely ruined my 5100's for me. They ride like trash in comparison. Wish I had known this before picking up the Billie's.... lol. Won't make the same mistake with the Land Cruiser...

I had total different feeling riding in an icon setup. My feeling was glad my $800 setup feels great compared to a $3000 setup. Lol. It did feel better at 50mph on a small dirt road though. Glad I don't go that fast on the trail. Then I might upgrade.

Ha, my thoughts exactly...

Travel numbers aside, the bigger differences between a 2.5" c/o vs 5100's are:

* increased oil capacity to minimize fade (only a factor in prolonged high speed use). You can also add external reservoirs also to increase the oil cooling capacity.

*rebuildability -these are, in theory, good for the life of your vehicle!

*spring selection - you can get almost any spring rate and spring length you want when adding skid/ bumper/ winch weight. Spring length can help take some preload off your c/o's (which will make the ride smoother) by going from a 13" default coil to a 14" coil.

*more adjustability for fine tuning ride height

Having both, I'd pick my 2.5 SAW's over 5100's. The price difference is staggering though! Just a few highlights in difference I thought would be good to know for anyone reading this.

You're also missing tuning, since you can rebuild them you have endless tuning possibilities. If someone takes the time to fine tune a shock it will outperform any king or icon shock that's just been bolted up and not specifically setup for that vehicle.

One thing I thought was kind of crazy, ICON recommends rebuilding after 15k miles for offroad use.

Is this normal or can they go longer like 40k miles if mostly street?

How did I miss that?!

My Sway Away's have at least 45k and are just now at the point that they could use a rebuild. I bought them with around 35k on them, and the previous owner ran them hard on a DD turned trail rig and they definitely have been put through the ringer.

i recently switched from radflo's to icons, but more or less the same thing in design, i got about 40~50K out of the radflo's before they needed to be rebuilt, daily driver with heavy weekend logging road use and some light wheeling on occasion.

you'll get quite a bit more out of them for just street use, the 15K is basically heavy use in high cycle, high speed type driving.