Front shock and spring assembly

[cj80cruiser]

I asked this question on another thread but didn't want to derail the guys thread any more than I already did. He had a clunking in his front suspension somewhere and was trying to pinpoint its location. Somebody suggested checking his tophats to see if the shock had wallowed out the center hole from not being tight enough.

My question is, how do you know what's tight enough and whats too tight when you're squishing the rubber shock mounts down?

I've only changed shocks on solid axle trucks and just got it tight enough that the rubber just started to squish to about the size of the washers supplied with the shocks. I should add that I disassembled the old worn out stock shocks and reassembled everything using my parts trucks front suspension as my coil spring compressor. When assembling these i jacked the lower control arm up high enough that it lifted the truck slightly and then tightened the top nut on the shock down. I'm thinking it's good to go but wanted to see what you guys think.

 

[Stick Figure]

My question is, how do you know what's tight enough and whats too tight when you're squishing the rubber shock mounts down?

When your torque wrench clicks

http://www.ncttora.com/fsm/1996/SIL...toypdf/02rmsour/2002/024runne/sa/fsa/reas.pdf

http://www.ncttora.com/fsm/1996/SIL...toypdf/02rmsour/2002/024runne/sa/fsa/comp.pdf

 

[tbst]

I dont know if 18 ft lb would overcome the lock nut.

 

[bak3rme]

i believe as long as you see a couple threads you're good. more than 5 seem overkill. Is that kinda what you are asking? I have the same clunking issue also. At first i was running tundra coils, and i was thinking the tundra coils are a bit wider so they would rub against the frame whenever i hit a bump..but now im' running OME i still get the clunk

 

[1985taylor1925]

Hey cj80, Ive pulled my front assembly apart 3 times now playing with different coil/shock combos. You basically tighten it till the nut starts to lock out. Once it starts to get snug, your good. Thats how my original OEM front assembly and both Tundra set ups that Ive pulled apart have been. On all three of them I observed that they were tightened to where the bottom of the nut was at the end of the threads. Obviously you cant see this. You just feel when the nut starts to get snug. Since all three of those front set ups were Toyota OEM and unaltered, it seems thats the way to go.

 

[cj80cruiser]

i believe as long as you see a couple threads you're good. more than 5 seem overkill. Is that kinda what you are asking? I have the same clunking issue also. At first i was running tundra coils, and i was thinking the tundra coils are a bit wider so they would rub against the frame whenever i hit a bump..but now im' running OME i still get the clunk

yeah, that's what I'm asking. I have a clunking on the driverside front on my old 96 stock suspension. Just trying to replace the shocks since they are worn out and didn't want to complicate the diagnosis with another clunking sound up front by not getting this buttoned up tight enough.