LLAMA Tales Thread

[DannyLlama]

Wind Caves... This is a mile hike up a steep hill:

The dog got super hot and wanted to CHILL OUT

Sand Canyon:

 

[DannyLlama]

Trail damage, lol I need a lift

Some night time flex

All in all, it was a great trip. Most of the time I was driving around in the middle of no where by myself without another truck in sight. Glad I made the trek solo, it's def a self confidence booster.

I didn't realize I was sleeping in an active wash and if there had been flash floods, It would've washed me, my tent and the truck... Not to mention I was sleeping right on a fault, as i was told by visiting geology students.

Good times

 

[Sundog7121]

Thank goodness no rain! :rofl:

 

[Gabex35]

LLama's Thread, new shoes, new beginnings

Great photos. There are some pretty gnarly YouTube videos of flash floods in that area. Something to keep in mind.
There's so much to explore out there, we are truly lucky to have this within a couple hours drive.

 

[Jhalko]

Do you still have xreas? Man it's night and day off-road when you make the switch.

 

[G8RB8_12SR5]

Looks like fun dude. I drove my buddy's Grand Cherokee hemi across the highway that runs through the desert just to see it. Wish I had more time to explore. Looks awesome.

 

[Antman]

Looked like a great time Danny! You keep doing stuff like that and you will need a fridge. Once you get one there. is. no. going. back!

 

[DannyLlama]

Great photos. There are some pretty gnarly YouTube videos of flash floods in that area. Something to keep in mind.
There's so much to explore out there, we are truly lucky to have this within a couple hours drive.

I tried looking on youtube for some videos of flash floods but I couldn't find much

It was something on my mind the whole trip, didn't get good sleep because every time I heard a noise I thought that was it! lol

between that and a potential earthquake, I am just really glad I made it out in one piece.

Do you still have xreas? Man it's night and day off-road when you make the switch.

Yes :/ still XREAS, waiting for some cash to do the lift, I can't wait man. I'm so over it!

Looked like a great time Danny! You keep doing stuff like that and you will need a fridge. Once you get one there. is. no. going. back!

Funny enough, I just dropped a bug in my wife's ear "Hey when the kids are a little older and we go on long camping trips, I think a fridge would be very useful" wife "If it fits enough stuff, yea that would be very beneficial"

 

[BrianSD_42]

Just catching up on this thread. Hope to hit a run with you soon.

 

[Okki]

How did your upper A-arm project end up?

All well that ends well?

Okki

 

[DannyLlama]

[MENTION=55815]Okki[/MENTION] yea we finally got it with a "pitman arm puller" see last page here

http://www.toyota-4runner.org/5th-gen-t4rs/209434-help-suspension-install-ucas.html

So to add on to the thread, I replaced XREAS with

1. Fox DSC 2.5 w/ resi fronts and Camburg ball joing UCA
2. fox 2.0 in the back with icon 2" springs

The install was a pain in the a$$ to say the least and i'm disappointed with Fox QA but the ride is really nice with these shocks.

Taking off old suspension

The bolt in the back behind the fender is where the XREAS lines are, we unplugged those and all the fluid is retained in the lines.

rear shocked installed, the resi is close to the brake line and i keep having to make sure it doesn't touch in case the resi gets heated, any recommendations?

Another shot of the shocks, with some spacers that we couldn't figure out what they were for, maybe for KDDS?

 

[DannyLlama]

On to the Fronts, now this is where it took us over 10-15 hours alone.
First problem was taking off the stock UCA's, it's supposed to be an easy thing, hammer the side of the Spindle and the UCA come's loose. Well, not so much, after hours of hammering, pulling, pickle forks and everything in between, the only thing that saved us, as discussed above is a pitman arm puller:

obligatory photo of the suspension porn

After that most of the install was fine, until we got to the sway bar. that's where we spent another 3 hours trying to figure out how to put the sway bar back.

The only way for the sway bar to completely clear the driver side radiator support bracket was to modify the bracket itself

Posted about it here:

http://www.toyota-4runner.org/5th-gen-t4rs/209619-fox-2-5-dsc-install-questions.html

which works for now until I figure out a permanant solution, there's also little clearance between the shocks and the sway bar near the wheels. I'll post photos shortly.

Anyway, here's the end result, and I know i know, i need a better photo:

Closer shot of suspension

 

[Jhalko]

How did your alignment come in with the Camburg's?

 

[DannyLlama]

How did your alignment come in with the Camburg's?

Another member on here recommend an old school shop that does it manually without a computer. Everything was good and truck drives nice.

Juat trying to figure out what the best compression settings for road driving. Wish Fox had a manual with recommended settinga.

 

[HOJeepster]

Are you still enjoying the ride with the Foxs?

 

[415T4R]

I am looking to do a similar set up with the Fox CO up front and the 2.0s in the back. How has your ride been with the new set up?

 

[cbielat]

Nice new set up, Danny!

 

[DannyLlama]

I am looking to do a similar set up with the Fox CO up front and the 2.0s in the back. How has your ride been with the new set up?

My answer is two folds.

The actual ride and build quality of the coil/shocks is unreal.. The journey has been a nightmare, to the point of my considering swapping out all FOX components.

I can go as much detail as you would like. The short version is, we (me and other members) are fairly confident they only test fitted the 2.5 DSC's on KDDS trail models.

What do I mean? They don't fit right on non-KDDS equipped models. The coils was within a hair line of the sway bar and at times making contact. There is scuff marks on the coil and on my sway bar from the contact. It's pretty obvious they test fitted on a KDDS T4R.

Additionally, the rear reservoir can was moving and making contact with the break line, which they fixed.

What did I do? I have been e-mailing them since October of last year. After 80+ e-mails and empty promises, they finally agreed for me to come to FOX in SD so they can look for them self. They ended up adding a longer spring seat. After speaking to the engineers, it sounds like they will be doing that moving forward, at least to the non-KDSS models.

So now everything seems to be OKAY... I have been trying to drive it rough through bumps and other objects before I take it out anywhere.

My recommendation is, if you are going to order them, call FOX directly after you make your purchase and ask that they send you an "updated" model, one containing a longer coil seat.

Front coils before and after

Before

After

Rear coils before and after

Before

After

More on the subject - http://www.toyota-4runner.org/5th-gen-t4rs/209619-fox-2-5-dsc-install-questions.html

 

[KVA]

Don't forget to REPLACE this part!!! :cheers:

 

[DannyLlama]

[MENTION=119176]415T4R[/MENTION] I updated the post with photos for reference.