My truck is right around 295,000 miles. It's getting to be the time I need to do some of the deeper maintenance on it, including timing belt and some other odds and ends.
I've done a couple thousand miles of fairly serious 4x4 between east Zion and Moab this year, and during the course of that tore the boot on a couple CV axles up front (and then gave this truck a mudbath in all the recent flooding). I likely need need to refresh other stuff in the suspension as well.
I'm thinking it'd be an opportune time to update the LBJ and other front suspension components. I'm currently running Bilstein 5100's and have been fairly happy with them. But I don't know when the LBJ's last got updated. Thus, questions:
- I'd hard the Taco LBJ's are an update, but replacement walk-throughs seem to indicate they're the same part.
- Taco tie-rod ends are mentioned as an upgrade, but... has anyone here bent / broken a tie rod before other stuff failed? I'm kinda dubious as to the utility of this upgrade.
- Is there an aftermarket provider that has a better LBJ solution?
- While I'm there, what other components would likely merit an update?
The use case is moderate-speed over fairly rocky roads (think the last couple miles of Hole-in-the-Rock, or the Orderville trailhead Jeep road, or the rockier parts of Moab) where there's a lot of vertical articulation while under acceleration. I am hard on this rig.
Any suggestions for LBJ (which seems to be the failure point up front) would be welcome along with other things that merit checking out.
99 4x4 SR5 with 5-speed
I've done a couple thousand miles of fairly serious 4x4 between east Zion and Moab this year, and during the course of that tore the boot on a couple CV axles up front (and then gave this truck a mudbath in all the recent flooding). I likely need need to refresh other stuff in the suspension as well.
I'm thinking it'd be an opportune time to update the LBJ and other front suspension components. I'm currently running Bilstein 5100's and have been fairly happy with them. But I don't know when the LBJ's last got updated. Thus, questions:
- I'd hard the Taco LBJ's are an update, but replacement walk-throughs seem to indicate they're the same part.
- Taco tie-rod ends are mentioned as an upgrade, but... has anyone here bent / broken a tie rod before other stuff failed? I'm kinda dubious as to the utility of this upgrade.
- Is there an aftermarket provider that has a better LBJ solution?
- While I'm there, what other components would likely merit an update?
The use case is moderate-speed over fairly rocky roads (think the last couple miles of Hole-in-the-Rock, or the Orderville trailhead Jeep road, or the rockier parts of Moab) where there's a lot of vertical articulation while under acceleration. I am hard on this rig.
Any suggestions for LBJ (which seems to be the failure point up front) would be welcome along with other things that merit checking out.
99 4x4 SR5 with 5-speed
