Ok so a little background my lower ball joints were the original ones with 156k on them. No vibration in the wheel, but with a 2” BL and a 3” suspension lift, figured better safe than sorry. Thought I’d take a chance on the Tacoma parts as a guinea pig, since this site has given me so much from all the members that have done the DIY threads.
Used a pickle fork to break the taper on the lower and upper ball joints since no one local had the “hinged tool” I’d seen online. Since I was replacing all the joints I had to separate, I wasn’t too worried, but those pickle forks can really tear up the rubber boots. If doing it again I’d order this tool and feel much better about it:


Pretty funny putting the LR uca on w/o instructions (got the torque specs off the website, but couldn’t find any install info). First side took 4 times longer than the second.
The tie rod ends are the same length as the 4runner units so after installing counting back the rotations the measured distances were the same.
Had to make a couple trips back to Sears for snap ring pliers, 32mm ˝ socket and a 27mm box wrench.