Now I had another issue…the tires were rubbing the body mounts. Not on regular roads but every time I turned into driveway, hit a bump in parking lot, or drove down parents dirt driveway on farm…they would rub terribly. Worse on drivers side as they ate hole in rubber mudflap cover on body mount. Passenger side was okay and not wearing but noticed slight shiny spot on UCA from sidewall.
So I drove a week or two and finally broke down and called ToyTec.
I saw they had kits put together to help in the selection (recent visit to website shows the kits are no longer configured…much to my chagrine as I liked being able to read and figure it out alone) but I got their 3” kit that included Front OME coils (Medium) Rear OME coils (Medium) and two billet top mounts for the coil over and strut setup with new hardware. These replace oem top mounts and provide for an extra inch of lift up front to make vehicle sit level front to rear. I decided after talking to ToyTec and being assured I could run my oem shocks and struts fine for a while to do it this way and save some money as I just put on tires and rock sliders.
Went to local Frankies Tire shop and he said he only had one guy he would trust to do it and do it right…but would be two weeks as he is very busy (does a lot of work for local professional hockey team players and their personal vehicles). So went to Gerald’s Tires…a local tire shop with 5-6 shops locally owned. Great service, great work, great (fair) prices. They said they would do it plus an alignment for $300. Twice as much as Frankie but they could do it now…and the local off-road shops wanted $700 to do the install alone. WTF? $700 for 3 hours of work…MAX? Yep….so put down the money as all my friends and new friends from Land Cruiser community were all busy that weekend or did not have strut compressors and after the stories I had heard on how stout the OME springs were I was not about to try myself and need my face reconstructed like a witness protection program participant. I kind of like my ugly mug like it is.
They install it and took about 3 hours including alignment…kid that did it said it was his first FJ…but he drives a Tacoma Pre-Runner and was stoked to see how it was put together and talk to me during installation. Truck was not looking competent on outside to match its drivetrain and off-road lineage.
First thing I did was make max ration turns with a little speed to get weight to go to outside tire and see if it rubbed. IT DID NOT. Then I hit a couple speed bumps and went over the curb in a turn…NO RUBBING…then took dirt road to dump…NO RUBBING. Woooooo hooooooo finally. Did some wheeling on hills and 20-30% inclines and declines stuffing tires and only slight rubbing on the most extreme downhill positions with wheels off camber and stuffed back as far as they would go. Still got some light rubbing when wheeling on passenger side UCA…..but that can wait as it is very, very slight and cant even hear it.
Before Lift
After Lift
Clearance with Body Mount
Rubbing on UCA
