I keep flip flopping on suspension options.

[Agent_Outside]

80K miles on a Limited with XREAS. I drove a lot, 20Kish a year, lots of Highway, lots of tight winding mountain roads, and I spent quite a bit of time off pavement (a lot of actual miles but overall a low percentage of the total miles) no real “rock crawling” aside for trail obstacles here and there. I don’t carry much extra in terms of spung weight - aluminum skids and I’ll add sliders once the XREAS lines and everything come out. One day I may throw an aluminum front bumper at it if I find a deal on one. I occasionally but rarely tow, when I do it’s maybe 2000 lbs.

Anyway I kinda killed my rear shocks, long drive down well worn rutted up washboard gravel road, half hour at 35ish mph, they got hot and faded bad. I checked them a week after and they had started to leak.

I think I’ve settled on JBA upper control arms and Icon 2” rear springs but I keep going back and forth about going with 6112/5160 or just spending the extra money on setup from King. In all honesty I’d really like set it and forget it reliability but I’m more than capable of doing my own maintenance on the dampeners.

I swear I flip flop back and forth more than Hillary, but with Black Friday/Cyber Monday coming up I’m hoping to have my mind made up and to get in on a deal.

 

[arehman11]

80K miles on a Limited with XREAS. I drove a lot, 20Kish a year, lots of Highway, lots of tight winding mountain roads, and I spent quite a bit of time off pavement (a lot of actual miles but overall a low percentage of the total miles) no real “rock crawling” aside for trail obstacles here and there. I don’t carry much extra in terms of spung weight - aluminum skids and I’ll add sliders once the XREAS lines and everything come out. One day I may throw an aluminum front bumper at it if I find a deal on one. I occasionally but rarely tow, when I do it’s maybe 2000 lbs.

Anyway I kinda killed my rear shocks, long drive down well worn rutted up washboard gravel road, half hour at 35ish mph, they got hot and faded bad. I checked them a week after and they had started to leak.

I think I’ve settled on JBA upper control arms and Icon 2” rear springs but I keep going back and forth about going with 6112/5160 or just spending the extra money on setup from King. In all honesty I’d really like set it and forget it reliability but I’m more than capable of doing my own maintenance on the dampeners.

I swear I flip flop back and forth more than Hillary, but with Black Friday/Cyber Monday coming up I’m hoping to have my mind made up and to get in on a deal.

Let's keep the politics out of this. I am in the same boat. I think I am leaning towards the 6112/5160 and getting them on BF or CM. I think spending more and not needing them for your purposes would be money I could better spend elsewhere. However, if you have the money and don't mind spending more, you could go with a King or Icon setup. I spent a little more than the cost of Kings on my previous car, however I didn't do track days or anything so I always thought I spent more than I should have. With the 4runner I just want a 1-1.25" lift up front and leave the rears alone, it is more than capable in stock form for most "off roading" I would do.

 

[WandaRunner]

If you are seriously considering Kings, then give a few minutes research to ADS, I’ve had them for over 3 years. Bulletproof, 3 Utah winters no leaks. Just rebuilt this summer to valve for new springs. I have seen some 3rd party company offering a black Friday deal on them somewhere on the forum, can’t remember who.

 

[e60ral]

morons and their hillary obsessions :smh:

 

[Toffees]

80K miles on a Limited with XREAS. I drove a lot, 20Kish a year, lots of Highway, lots of tight winding mountain roads, and I spent quite a bit of time off pavement (a lot of actual miles but overall a low percentage of the total miles) no real “rock crawling” aside for trail obstacles here and there. I don’t carry much extra in terms of spung weight - aluminum skids and I’ll add sliders once the XREAS lines and everything come out. One day I may throw an aluminum front bumper at it if I find a deal on one. I occasionally but rarely tow, when I do it’s maybe 2000 lbs.

Anyway I kinda killed my rear shocks, long drive down well worn rutted up washboard gravel road, half hour at 35ish mph, they got hot and faded bad. I checked them a week after and they had started to leak.

I think I’ve settled on JBA upper control arms and Icon 2” rear springs but I keep going back and forth about going with 6112/5160 or just spending the extra money on setup from King. In all honesty I’d really like set it and forget it reliability but I’m more than capable of doing my own maintenance on the dampeners.

I swear I flip flop back and forth more than Hillary, but with Black Friday/Cyber Monday coming up I’m hoping to have my mind made up and to get in on a deal.

I have two lines of thought on this: buy the Bilsteins, and if you don't like them you can replace them and you're only out the cost of the Bilsteins; buy the Kings, because nothing is as important as handling, and 90% of your driving is on the road.

In any case, report back here so you can help me decide in 4 or so years.

 

[pheelmeh]

I've went the Bilstein route and the King route in the past - don't waste your time on the Bilsteins if you plan to do any type of off roading IMO. They're a mediocre "upgrade" - if you have the budget for King/Icon/Fox, etc i'd do research on what setup you want and don't even think about the Bilsteins.

Given said that, I decided to go Icon this time around - although the Kings were sweet and have a massive shock body, the ride style wasn't my cup of tea. I would recommend them again since they did the job and did it well, just do research on digressive vs progressive ride style.

Btw - I've had JBA UCA's on my ride for nearly 2yrs - they seem to be OK - never had a problem with them on alignments either on a 3.5" lift.

 

[dafuture]

I'm going to throw in a (semi)-outsider's perspective here. I just came over from driving a MK6 GTI for 2 years. I went through a host of upgrades and changes, so I'm pretty familiar with mods in general and their effects, if not specifically for the 4Runner.

My question to you would be the following: how much do you actually care? That's not to say you don't care about the truck, but rather does it really make a difference to you if you have Icons or Kings? You did fine stock for 80k miles and you haven't indicated that your driving will really be any different. Since it seems like you don't really want to have to think too much about maintaining your suspension, I'd say you should give the more cost effective Bilsteins another look. Even if they're only a mild upgrade, it would still be an improvement over your first 80k miles.

 

[sn_85]

I've went the Bilstein route and the King route in the past - don't waste your time on the Bilsteins if you plan to do any type of off roading IMO. They're a mediocre "upgrade" - if you have the budget for King/Icon/Fox, etc i'd do research on what setup you want and don't even think about the Bilsteins.

Given said that, I decided to go Icon this time around - although the Kings were sweet and have a massive shock body, the ride style wasn't my cup of tea. I would recommend them again since they did the job and did it well, just do research on digressive vs progressive ride style.

Btw - I've had JBA UCA's on my ride for nearly 2yrs - they seem to be OK - never had a problem with them on alignments either on a 3.5" lift.

How would you describe the difference between the Icons vs Kings? Looking at those two myself.


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[DesertCanyons]

Two inch shocks and fade to failure

... Anyway I kinda killed my rear shocks, long drive down well worn rutted up washboard gravel road, half hour at 35ish mph, they got hot and faded bad. I checked them a week after and they had started to leak.

I think I’ve settled on JBA upper control arms and Icon 2” rear springs but I keep going back and forth about going with 6112/5160 or just spending the extra money on setup from King. In all honesty I’d really like set it and forget it reliability but I’m more than capable of doing my own maintenance on the dampeners.

.. with Black Friday/Cyber Monday coming up I’m hoping to have my mind made up and to get in on a deal.

Yea, let's keep politics out of this. :iagree:

With the experience you had on a gravel road I would suggest 2.5" shocks. More is more. The cost diff is small IIRC.

If you hear about BF or CM sales please let us know. I'm looking for a set of ICON alloy wheels to go with my new ICON shocks. Maybe ICON or one of their retail outlets will offer a sale?

 

[pheelmeh]

How would you describe the difference between the Icons vs Kings? Looking at those two myself.


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Well the simplest way to put it:

I ran king 2.5s with the external resi's front and rear: Stiff. They were not adjustable FYI.

The Icons are still pending on my ride, but i've riden in a Icon equipped 4R - The Stage 7s are similar in that they are running external resi's on both front and rear BUT they're adjustable. Stiffer on the intial stroke and gets softer as the travel increases overall more comfortable ride.

 

[pheelmeh]

Yea, let's keep politics out of this. :iagree:

With the experience you had on a gravel road I would suggest 2.5" shocks. More is more. The cost diff is small IIRC.

If you hear about BF or CM sales please let us know. I'm looking for a set of ICON alloy wheels to go with my new ICON shocks. Maybe ICON or one of their retail outlets will offer a sale?

I purchased LT Icons last year on a Black Friday discount - look at some of the vendors on the forums days before

 

[AZ-YOTA]

I'm in your boat, kept going back and forth.

If you feel like spending more and getting better performance than Bilstein, but also find it hard to justify The cost of ICON or King, then Fox 2.0 or 2.5s might be something to look into. Think I may have settled on that (have yet to order) cause I would like them to be rebuildable, but don't want to spend as much as the other brands.

 

[fordracing19]

Buy once, cry once. I have a complete Toytec system with 5k miles on it under the work bench. Am now running adjustable Icons front and rear and like it a lot. I do wonder what Kings would ride like.

 

[Agent_Outside]

First of all it’s not politics, it was a joke you damn cry babies. But back to the actual topic...

I have 80K on the vehicle, about 50K of that was from me. I don’t know if the shocks were getting weak and that type of road at that speed for that amount of time just just finished them off of if that was the reason for failure. That was my first time on that road but it absolutely won’t be my last. My concern is will I cook and destroy the Bilsteins.

I can afford to go with the Kings but I don’t want to throw money at it just to throw money at it. If they are a better fit for my needs I will spend the money, if the 6112/5160 will hold up fine the price difference would basically pay for control arms and sliders.

If I come across a 20% Black Friday deal on Icon like I’ve seen in the past I might be inclined to go with that but generally speaking I will take King over the Fox and Icon every time. I’m hoping maybe Filthy Motorsports will have a holiday deal since they are awesome and close to home, if I can find 20% on Kings I’ll jump on it.

 

[mrblah]

my advice to you is this. If you are going to spend obscene amounts of money on your suspension, you should choose a company with customer service to match.


I went with kings. I probably would be happy with icon to.

 

[RedSled]

my advice to you is this. If you are going to spend obscene amounts of money on your suspension, you should choose a company with customer service to match.


I went with kings. I probably would be happy with icon to.

Enough said.

 

[puttster]

I agree with mrblah except for one thing: not Icon. Icon is digressive valving which makes it pretty stiff. I would go with King but the valving God from King just left to work for Fox, so if I were you, I’d go with Fox.

 

[arehman11]

I purchased Bilstein 6112/5160's yesterday. Going to set the fronts to 1.14" and call it a day.

 

[Agent_Outside]

I decided on Kings, no smokin deals for Black Friday but whatever.

I did not want Icon from the beginning but I saw 20% off for Black Friday I figured that’s to good of a deal to pass up... until I actually priced it out for something comparable to Kings and even discounted they are still more expensive. I figured if they were hundreds of dollars less than King I’d give it a shot, but 20% off has them still costing more than King, that’s crazy for what I consider to be a lesser product.

 

[Jhalko]

I decided on Kings, no smokin deals for Black Friday but whatever.

I did not want Icon from the beginning but I saw 20% off for Black Friday I figured that’s to good of a deal to pass up... until I actually priced it out for something comparable to Kings and even discounted they are still more expensive. I figured if they were hundreds of dollars less than King I’d give it a shot, but 20% off has them still costing more than King, that’s crazy for what I consider to be a lesser product.

Replacing my Xreas for my Toytec Boss setup was the second best mod on my truck. (Refrigerator is number 1, not even close!) I’m sure the Kings will be awesome.