Did the rear and am considering the front.. I am replacing with Sensa Trac so no new springs. I think I saw an article on how to do this a while back but repeated searches fail to find it. All I remember is it first described rloosening the three bolts and said not to touch the top shock bolt. All of the searches came up with people who also replaced the coilover and that had added difficulty. How hard is it to replace the shock with the factory coilover. Do you have to do the trick with the jack to get the original coilover back in. Once I pull the coilover I am commited...

 

well if you wait a few days (week maybe) ill have lots of pics for you.

basically what you need to do is get some white paint, mark where the spring and the top plate are (a line to realign them again as you need that lower shock eye to be aligned but its fixed by the 3 upper mounting bolts. (this is what i plan to do when i take mine apart again (read i forgot something...)

other than that its pretty straight foward. at 137k miles on mine, the shocks were shot (and they were sensatracks, aftermarket???)

 

I did mine and was apprehensive, but it is really easy. Jack it up, unbolt the three top nuts, the big bottom one and the whole assembly comes right out. Compressing them is not that hard either. The BIGGEST thing is as Sean said, you have to have the top plate lined up with the bottom eye of the shock when you reassemble. If you don't it won't go back in. I know from experience on that.

I did not have to use a bottle jack either. If they are stock, they should go in with little or no effort.

I may have a write-up bookmarked. I'll see, but I have to go to work right now.

 

There are tons of thread on YT if you use the search button......

......but here's one that would have turned up for shock install writeup:
http://www.4rnr.net/suspension.html

 

Thanks for the replies and I did search for over an hour but did not find an article on using the original coils. Also is the "top plate" the piece with the 3 bolts? I believe it is but want to make sure what I put the white paint on..

 

Ghost, it doesn't matter much if you are using the original coils are aftermarket ones, the procedure is the same. Yes, the top plate is the piece with the 3 studs on it. You really don't need to use any paint to mark them because when you go to install them you can just torque the lower shock mount into alignment by sticking a ratchet extension throught the hole along with a cheater bar on top (like a floor jack handle or a piece of pipe) and turn the shock eye until it slides into the lower mount. You may need to use the jack on top of the control arm or loosen the lower ball joint from the spindle (just makes shock alignment easier if you do).

 

Just make sure you don't take the big nut off without holding the spring in place with spring compressors. You don't want it shooting off.

 

I thought the fronts were much easier than the rears. I just did this a couple of weeks ago. (in the freezing cold!) Another tip is to soak the nuts in PB Blaster for a couple of days. Other than that, it's pretty straight forward.

 

Just to add to this, you may want to take the fronts to a shop and have them use their wall-mounted spring compressor unless you feel very confident in your own abilities. Compressed springs of this size are extremely dangerous if the spring compressor lets loose. Most shops charge about $30-50 to swap over the parts if you bring them the shock assemblies (ie just remove them from the truck) along with the new shocks.

 

I will echo MTL...

I have done struts/coil overs on many vehicles but never trucks. I put the new front shocks in the 4runner the first time and I was questioning the safety of th espring compressor back then. When I put the new PP springs in with the billies, i used the wall mount at my buddies garage. It only took me 20 minutes.

My recommendation moving forward, remove top 3 bolts and bottom bolt, bring to a local shop, have them swap the spring / shocks, bring home and reinstall.

These springs are not exactly a playground for inexperienced mechanics.

Be Safe!

 

I really didn't think operating the spring compressors were that dangerous. I think sawzall'ing the rear shocks was more dangerous than that.

The compressors I got were from Autozone (free rental). They seemed pretty stout, but I did take precaution when using them. I even had a piece of carpet on the spring and had a friend stand on it while I compressed the spring and took out the strut. I don't think I could feel good paying someone $30+ to do this. It was easy.

BUT, do it at your own risk.

 

Not sure if you saw this one or not:
https://www.yotatech.com/forums/f2/my-lift-98715/

The average front spring on a 4runner/Tacoma will have near a ton of force behind it.


How on earth is sawing through the stud on top of the rear shock dangerous?

 

So will any other spring.

It's not like there is some double-galvanized, off-the-charts-tensile strength, NASA developed mechanism holding the spring in place. If you notice, there is ONE nut holding the spring it in.

Exactly.

 

imo take it somewhere that has a heavy duty wall mounted compressor, that way you dont die. there was no way the spring compressor that I got from auto-zone would ever work. i thought it was going to break long before there was any releif in tension on the upper bolt.

if you take loose the 4 lower ball joint mount bolts, it makes getting the spring /shock assembelly in and out alot easier.

 

After doing mine once, with stock springs, I didn't think it was very unsafe. The only way things could have gone wrong was if the compressor broke. I didn't have to compress mine very much to get the shock body to become loose inside the spring. I guess the compressor could have slipped off, but that was unlikely too if you use the safety pins. I actually had a hard time getting the compressor back off the spring.

Other than time, it's not that bad with stock springs. Just be aware of what you are doing and you should be OK.

Here's another write-up. Not exactly what you are doing, but close:

http://www.4x4wire.com/toyota/projects/blackbean/ome/

Another:

http://www.bajataco.com/SAW-Install-1.html

 

Not quite......depends on the spring rate and how far it needs to be compressed.

It's no big deal until something goes wrong as in the link I posted. All I'm saying is that if the person doesn't feel comfortable in their skills, then take the front assys to a shop......it's not rocket science, I'll vouch for that.

 

Well, the guy's first mistake was to buy a Harbor Freight tool. I will NEVER trust their tools. Not even a hammer. I've seen way too many broken sockets and wrenches. But for their prices, what do you expect?

Like I said, the Autozone compressors were pretty stout. Plus, I took extra precautions on top of that. I wouldn't call myself mechanically inclined, and I thought that it was fairly simple. I wouldn't recommend a total newbie to tackle this, but any average gear head (about 99% of the people here) won't find it too difficult. I'd much rather do the fronts, than scrape up my hand trying to tighten the nut in the rears. Now THAT was a PITA.

 

Thanks for the replies. I am not a novice on maintenance but have never messed with coil springs before. I had no trouble with the rears (big stilson wrench - zero cuts or nicks on hands) and did the rear diff today. I have a question or two that I am unclear about. Someone posted about using white paint to make sure the top plate and spring were aligned with the eyehole on the shock. I can't visualize this at all. I could understand turning the shock with a piece of pipe to line it up but what does a white mark on the spring and top plate have to do with that. Plus if I take them to a shop - will I still have to turn them via the eyebolt..

OK - I just looked at a picture and at my new shocks and think I understand the lines. There is an "indention" on the shock for the lower end of the spring and the upper end is not really attache to the top late except by tension from the spring so when you are turnign it with the eyebolt - you are really turning the spring around the bottom of the top plate. At least thats what it seems to look like. Am I even close on this?

 

I believe you have that right. Really, it's not that hard to do if you have a few tools and the time. I did it, and that says a lot. Now that you know the top plate needs to be aligned with the bottom eye of the shock before you uncompress it, you should have no problem. Just look at the shock assembly when you take the old one off and it should be clear. Keep that in mind and you should be OK. Worst case scenario is you have to compress it again like I did.

I also rented the spring compressor from Autozone, and it is pretty beefy and it has the safety pins. Only compress the spring just enough to wiggle the shock inside the spring. Then you can loosen the main nut on the shock to take it apart.

 

I think you pretty well have the idea and don't bother trying to line everything up perfectly since it will tend to shift a bit anyway when you uncompress the springs. Using the paint idea won't hurt anything but it's just an unecessary extra step.

The topic has covered a few times before:
https://www.yotatech.com/forums/showthread.php?t=98715
https://www.yotatech.com/forums/f2/problems-front-bilstein-install-37295/