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Suspension & AxleTechnical discussions regarding alignment, stock and modified suspensions, lift kits, axles, hub conversions, gearing and steering.
This is a discussion thread titled "Why most spacer lifts are bad....", within the Suspension & Axle forum, part of the Technical & Vehicle Assistance Forums category.
guys, does all these problems with the spacer kit only applies to 4x4 or is on the 2WD too. I have a 2WD and been reading and search before I want to level out my truck. I have a 06 DC tundra 2WD. Thx.
Go jack up your truck set it on jack stands. Then loosen the bolts that hold the shock to the coil bucket. Let the suspension droop till the ball joints and steering bind. Tell me how far the suspension will droop. Now can you safely add a 2" spacer to the stock suspension?
Go jack up your truck set it on jack stands. Then loosen the bolts that hold the shock to the coil bucket. Let the suspension droop till the ball joints and steering bind. Tell me how far the suspension will droop. Now can you safely add a 2" spacer to the stock suspension?
thx, I guess you answered my question. Bilstein 5100 is the way to go I guess. Is just that my truck is still new (3000 miles) and getting new shock seem just a waste for now
thx, I guess you answered my question. Bilstein 5100 is the way to go I guess. Is just that my truck is still new (3000 miles) and getting new shock seem just a waste for now
Look at it in a different way. It's not a waste to make the truck perform the way you want it to! It's not a waste to make the truck SAFELY look the way you want it to!
Who cares how old the shocks are, if you get better ones then it's not a waste if you like it.
__________________
08 Silver Crewmax 5.7 4x4 SR5...
Work in progress...
ARE YOU THINKING ABOUT MAKING A NEW POST??? TRY SEARCH FIRST!!!!!
Nothing is ever a waste as long as it used and enjoyed. My spacer was a partial waste because while it lifted my truck as needed to clear bigger tires, it rode like crap. I now have 5100's that are waiting to be put on when I have the time.
Real coilovers are the best option, but the 5100's should be the only other suspension lift because it is the only other way to safely lift and improve your ride. Spacers just ride like crap, even my 1.25" spacer.
__________________ David~2001 Toyota Tundra 4X4 TRD SR5~SSautochrome headers~Single 2.5" exhaust w/ Flowmaster 50 series delta flow muffler~K&N FIPK intake system w/True-flow filter~ASP underdrive pulley~Hellwig Anti-Sway Bar(removed)~Powertrax No-slip~Bilstein 5100 front and rear w/AAL~Diff breather mod~255/85 BFG M/T on Wheelers Black Steelies Type B~Custom Rocksliders~Skid Row front skid plate~Custom Transfer case skid plate
Leveling kit spacers are not bad. What is bad is when a truck owner installs a leveling kit larger wheels and tires and then thinks he can take it off road and flog his truck. I know quite a few people, myself included that have a leveling spacer kit and don't have problems. But we also don't go off roading either. I just wanted a leveled look with slightly larger tires without having to spend a grip of money. I know one guy who runs a spacer kit AND a coil spacer too and beats the hell out of his truck and he has almost 20,000 miles on the suspension with no, none, nada problems.
Obviously special made coil overs and the like are great and extend the useability of the truck, but that doesn't make a product NOT designed to allow a person to push the limits, as suddenly a bad product. It's all a matter of what you want to be able to do, or look, with your truck. I'm sure Jerry and the gang will flame the hell out of this post, but it had to be said.
Leveling kit spacers are not bad. What is bad is when a truck owner installs a leveling kit larger wheels and tires and then thinks he can take it off road and flog his truck. I know quite a few people, myself included that have a leveling spacer kit and don't have problems. But we also don't go off roading either. I just wanted a leveled look with slightly larger tires without having to spend a grip of money. I know one guy who runs a spacer kit AND a coil spacer too and beats the hell out of his truck and he has almost 20,000 miles on the suspension with no, none, nada problems.
Obviously special made coil overs and the like are great and extend the useability of the truck, but that doesn't make a product NOT designed to allow a person to push the limits, as suddenly a bad product. It's all a matter of what you want to be able to do, or look, with your truck. I'm sure Jerry and the gang will flame the hell out of this post, but it had to be said.
I think you missed the problem. If you search on TTORA, you'll find more descriptions of exactly what Jerry & the gang are referring to, and many people who are not affiliated with the aftermarket who will say exactly the same thing.
It has very little to do with how much it costs or what the girls at the mall with think, and everything to do with how a suspension (arms, angles, shocks, etc) is designed. Shocks (dampers) are not supposed to be travel limiters, up or down. All they do is damp the movement from the tires and springs.
Likewise, ball joints are not supposed to be travel limiters. If you look in to it on the more offroad-oriented forums, you'll find that spindle gussets are a band-aid fix for a setup where a joint was allowed to be a limiting factor. All a joint is supposed to do is allow movement...never prevent movement.
Bump stops and limit straps, however they're implemented, are what you should be using to limit suspension travel. On the stock truck, you have rubber bump stops, and the coilover suffices as the limit strap. The joints do not limit travel at all, and the shocks are not forced to be a bump stop.
When you add spacers within or above the coilover assembly, you force joints and shocks to become limiting agents.
If you like, I can take a picture of one of my rear shocks...I set it up in a hurry, and the shock was forced to act as a bumpstop one too many times. The end cap was popped off the body, and while the shock is still functional, I now get to rebuild an otherwise perfectly good 7100.
Camburg already has pictures available of what eventually happens to joints when they're forced to act as limiters.
This isn't a flame, nobody's on your case, but I'm not sure you know why spacers are capable of causing so many problems. A lot of other people didn't know either, years ago, at least on this truck.
If you're gonna run a spacer, you have to be very, very careful setting it up. Your buddy might be doing fine at the moment, but if he's out flogging it, he's gonna eventually show damage to the upper ball joint if it's the droop limiter, and the shock if it's forced to act as a bumpstop.
Sean, the guy with the stacked kits is a pretty savy dude when it comes to making things work, but more than anything, he's willin try different things, and then beat the hell out of it which is not what most of us do. I broke more stock stuff when I had a truck that I took off road than any aftermarket equipped truck, excluding a CC chevy I had with a pro comp bolt together drop down kit which was a pain to keep lined up until I had it all welded up.
I understand what can be said that if you do X, Y can result. But because Y can result doesn't mean that Y will result. Review this forum since its inception and you will read more posts where a Tundra owner had to take his bone stock truck back in because something broke. Remember what I stated in my original post, that leveling kits were not designed to supplement a stock suspension with the ability to drive them more aggressively. Leveling kits are meant to level a vehicle so that larger tires can be installed. For this purpose the apparently work great and do what probably half a million truck owners (just a guess of course) want them to do. I am friends with two fairly major truck suspension and customizing shops owners and see them or talk to them fairly regularly. Leveling kits are the main part of their business now. Both will confide and say that the current truck consumer doesn't want to spend a bunch on a big suspension lift or expensive products like they did a year or two ago. They want a reasonable cost means to get their truck up a little and add some slightly larger wheels and tires. One of my friends told me about a Tacoma with a leveling kit that came back in to get fixed. They guy jumped it and the landing bend down two sides of the strut spacer. The other guy has yet to disclose in any of our conversations that I can remember that any of the trucks he's installed leveling kits on (a daily operation now) have returned. So in the giant big picture, we end up with confusion. We have a guy who sponsors a suspension forum giving the leveling kit manufacturers a lashing since he makes products that do the same thing for four times the cost (and for off roading they are great as I've ridden in several aggessive desert off roading they worked great). Then we have some people who are simply adamantly opposed to anything that doesn't seem reasonable. And we have folks who can honestly say they have not had one single of any of the problems noted. So who's right? All I can say is that both me and the friends or associates of mine that have leveling kits on our trucks have no plans to remove them because they read it on a forum that they are bad. They work, I have no complaints and so far none of my friends do either (except for fuel mileage ).
The first and foremost point to be said about your post is yeah, there are all kinds of shops out there that will push spacers because they are cheap/innexpensive/affordable, (pick your word, mine is garbage,) because they have intent to sell something to make money. Yes of course they are going to be more than happy to SELL you a kit, that is what they do and how they make their money. I have seen more than one off-road shop push a spacer kit or sell something that was poorly designed to a customer. Why wouldn't they. They only have to warranty the install, not the actual part or the design of the part, just that they installed it correctly based on the manufacturers instructions.
Secondly, off-road shops generally don't make the spacers, they just install them. They buy the parts and then sell them to the customer and for a "reasonable" price install that part of the customer's truck. A very handy service for joe shmo that doesn't have much money but because he got someone with a friendly face and "seemed" to be very knowledgeble helped him out and he will go on his merry way.
I don't like off-road shops or any parts shop for that matter. I guess that is why I buy my parts from a guy in Oregon and I live in Arizona...
The most simple analogy I can give for a spacer lift is:
Don't try to shove 10lbs of $hit into a 5lb bag.
Spacers are bad on all vehicles, it doesn't matter what you drive. They weigh right up there with those cast little blocks that you can shove between the coilspring coils to lift your truck. You have seen these at Checker and autozone, yeah, they are great, shove a chunk of metal between your coilspring, fabulous idea...
I have seen ball joints get damaged on daily drivers with spacers that were NEVER offroaded and what took them out was the over extension when the truck entered an inclined parking lot. This was not abuse, it was not jumping, it was just going from the street to an elevated parkinglot enterance.
Spacers are bad, hands down.
__________________
08 Silver Crewmax 5.7 4x4 SR5...
Work in progress...
ARE YOU THINKING ABOUT MAKING A NEW POST??? TRY SEARCH FIRST!!!!!
I don't like off-road shops or any parts shop for that matter. I guess that is why I buy my parts from a guy in Oregon and I live in Arizona...
I've learned that when it comes to Internet forums, it is futile to argue with a obvious Pessimist. You are entitled to your opinion while others like myself are entitled to enjoy our contradictory opinion.
Bryan <---still enjoying his leveled truck very much
How about a spindle lift? Any mfg's thinking about making one? Although I know the high-end suspension kits definitely improve off-road handling, most folks that purchase the good stuff still drive their trucks beyond what it's really made for. After co-driving in a trophy truck, I've realized there is no middle ground...just better than stock, and all out(read $100K+). That being said, I'd just like to level the front end up but have been spooked by the possiblity of destroying my upper ball joints. If replacing the ball joint was cheaper, I'd take the risk. Maybe machining out the ball joint so it has more droop?(ala Downey Off-Road '84~94 pick-ups). Never thought about driveways, etc. with just the between the pocket strut spacer. Sounds like a spindle lift would give us the "easy" leveling lift.
Thanks for reading. Gettin' older and practical, I guess.
How about a spindle lift? Any mfg's thinking about making one? Although I know the high-end suspension kits definitely improve off-road handling, most folks that purchase the good stuff still drive their trucks beyond what it's really made for. After co-driving in a trophy truck, I've realized there is no middle ground...just better than stock, and all out(read $100K+). That being said, I'd just like to level the front end up but have been spooked by the possiblity of destroying my upper ball joints. If replacing the ball joint was cheaper, I'd take the risk. Maybe machining out the ball joint so it has more droop?(ala Downey Off-Road '84~94 pick-ups). Never thought about driveways, etc. with just the between the pocket strut spacer. Sounds like a spindle lift would give us the "easy" leveling lift.
Thanks for reading. Gettin' older and practical, I guess.
There have been spindle lifts offered for Tacomas, and the spindle offered in Camburg's race kit I suppose is technically designed similar to a lift spindle...but I guess I'm wondering, since you've co-driven the real thing, why would you be looking for height vs performance? You know that spindle lift won't do a thing for the truck other than height? For the cost of a new spindle, snout, hub, etc. you're better off getting a uniball upper arm and a set of coilovers. You'll have as much travel on your 2nd-gen as a 1st-gen LT kit.
There is just no "easy" way to "level" a double wishbone independent suspension. The geometry and joints work great the way they were designed, if you want it up without messing up that geometry or buying new components, and don't care about performance, a drop bracket really is the only way to do it.
Devin, I got spoiled rotten in a TT regarding speed and bumps, actually what bumps? :-)
I'd just like to level out the front end without compromising the ball joints with a spacer. I've never priced spindles, so I'll assume they're almost as much as a well designed "kit"? I just kinda figured that with the spindle, nothing else is changed except the position of the hub.
Like a few others that mentioned, I don't plan on off-roading at all except getting to my pit without being in a hurry.
Re: Why most spacer lifts are bad....
David~2001 Toyota Tundra 4X4 TRD SR5~SSautochrome headers~Single 2.5" exhaust w/ Flowmaster 50 series delta flow muffler~K&N FIPK intake system w/True-flow filter~ASP underdrive pulley~Hellwig Anti-Sway Bar(removed)~Powertrax No-slip~Bilstein 5100 front and rear w/AAL~Diff breather mod~255/85 BFG M/T on Wheelers Black Steelies Type B~Custom Rocksliders~Skid Row front skid plate~Custom Transfer case skid plate
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