An Idiot with a Wrench (and not enough common sense)

Clearly i'm talking about myself.

I replaced the front shocks on the truck (again the 6112 failed at about 5 years).

Anyway , like an idiot i didn't matchmark my eccentrics as i was getting an alignment after the install.

Also, noticed my flattened cam tab on the front of the drivers side.

Shop did the alignment and noted the cam tab and also the eccentrics are frozen on the passenger side (not uncommon). I had broken the bolt free so i thought i was in the clear during shock swap, not so lucky i guess.

Anyway after driving on the highway the steering wheel oscillates back and forth about 1/4" inch at the wheel (its terrifying) returning to center and no pulling. I'm heading back to the alignment shop and hoping for a eccentrics until my some time frees up.

Anybody think thye can get me back to where i started before the install. Kicker is i re-used the springs on the 6112's and after thinking about it probably didn't need the alignment if i had match marked.

Also can I just bend the cam keeper back or will it bend and brek? worth a shot I guess.

 

I wouldn't bend anything and I wouldn't rely on marks before tearing something apart either. Always gat an alignment when the suspension is messed with.

 

how would you fix the front guides for the eccentric that's flattened out? Would you jump right to replacing with aftermarket and having a shop weld repair? or would you take a chisel and bend it back up. I'm thinking it just sets the position of the cam and doesn't lock it in place. That's what the bolt does?

Thoughts?

 

I did the same thing. My little ear that holds the eccentric nut in flattened and when i had an alignment done, they tried to bend it back and it sheared.

Took it to a muffler shop and gave them some cash ($20 or $40) to weld it back. Make sure to have them use one of those boxes that they hook on the battery so they dont fry anything when welding on the frame.

 

I ended up ended up having the shop rebalance the wheels.

I don.t see how a truck that doesn.t have a symptom (granted i.ve regretted those tire beads since install) . Suddenly has a problem and the only thing i touched was the front shocks/lca.

But for $45 bucks we'll start there i guess.

A co worker mentioned a good local mechanic whom works on tundras. I might feel him out to see about that flattened tab and adjustments or replacement lcas.

Thanks for stopping me from bending that tab and breaking it.

 

do you happen to know if they heated it up first?

 

I dont believe so.

 

Are the wheel lugs overtorqued? Was the suspension torqued down with the vehicle sitting on the ground at normal ride height? Sometimes a wheel weight launches itself, sometimes a re-balance is needed after a number of miles as the tires wear down to keep them smooth. Good luck finding your solution!

 

I’ve had a tire throw a weight a 1/4 mile after leaving the tire shop. I’ve also heard a mixed bag with the tire beads it only really heard of them helping much with 37”+ tires.

I’d second the recommendation to double check and re torque the bolts you touched when installing the 6112’s. I chose to use the “don’t touch the eccentrics” method when installing my 6112’s and have ended up with an alignment that was still in spec (better, actually). Also double check steering components to make sure the tie rod ends are fully seated in the knuckles.

I once had a tire shop run the lugs down whole hog and it warped my rotors, which caused poor tire wear in the short time I drove it as such, which caused a shimmy in the steering wheel at speed. It still tracked well but quickly became downright scary to hit the brakes aggressively as the wheel shook violently. After having to cold chisel the lugs off when I had time to replace them on a weekend (just after the shop had closed for the weekend, of course) the shimmy dissipated but didn’t go away u til I replaced the tires. I rotated them so the bad tires were in the back and didn’t shake the whole truck, then replaced them as soon as I could get a new set to show up. Just one more thing to check.

 

This summer i'll replace the LCA on both sides (as that passenger side frozen is not great).

Thanks for the suggestions.
I don't know for sure but my thoughts:
1) I used the lug nuts finger tight when i did the rotors, made sure all contact surfaces were clean and bright and nothing (burr or other related) was there. Then i typically anit-sieze the contact area to keep it from welding itself to the hub. This could be an issue but i don't believe so.
2) I rotated the tires and the oscillation continued for about 250 miles, then it stopped. Lugs felt under torqued upon removal but the vibration stayed after rotation and torqueing to 100 ft-lbs. (aluminum after-market rims)
3) Tire place is confident it was wheel imbalance "I had tire beads" and they installed weights. I never loved the beads and actually regretted them as I couldn't really rule out balancing for issues as you can't see if they are still there or working etc.

I can't prove their theory as the chattering stopped prior to the visit.

I can positively report the truck is smoother under 30 and before it was choppy (which i always just thought was the A/T tires 33s.

Thanks again for everybody whom tired to help.

No major Issues before the front shocks.
Only thing i touched was the LCA and swaybar (and of course the brakes & front shocks).


Thanks again guys.

Did you break the upper control arm or the lowers for the install?

And how do the 6112 rides. Mine seems pretty stiff. I drove my FIL's F-150 (same age i think as my 2010) his truck just sucks up the road/bridge/potholes, I feel everything (for better or worse).

 

More questions: if i re-used the springs what would have actually changed if i had match-marked without touching the set points (which is what i should have done).

 

For the install, I didn't loosen the alignment tabs or upper control arm; I just unbolted the two bolts holding the lower balljoint to the spindle along with the sway bar links. I didn't undo the ball joint itself, just freed it from the spindle. The LCA doesn't drop free like it would when you undo the alignment bolts, but there's enough movement in them that you can put a pry bar in the end link pocket and push the LCA down enough to sneak the coilovers in to place. I've done it that was three times now and in 180k miles, they've yet to adjust the alignment tabs. I've had toe adjusted a smidge but camber and caster haven't needed it.

This is my second set of 6112's; I like them that much. My first set rode like butter. This set is a little stiffer on the small stuff. BUT, I put them on just before the weather turned cold and they haven't seen much roadtime above freezing temps, so haven't give them a fair shake. I also run them at the lowest setting which, IMO, give a better ride.

I also noticed that dropping a little pressure in my tires improved the ride without sacrificing handling. I run LT275/65R18 AT's so they require more air pressure than the P rated equivalent. My last set was 275/70R18 so I think because they had a little more casing volume, they rode a little smoother. I went from 45 psi to 41 and it make an appreciable difference.

 

I'm at 40ish lbs on 305/55/20 ridge grapplers. Its a little harsher than i'd like. But okay.

I have a lot of co-workers who praise the tundras smooth off road ride (stock) and i don't know if i went the correct direction.

Why haven't you bought rebuildable shocks if your 3 sets deep on the 6112s ( I would think you'd up to the cost of kings, etc at this point?)

I hesitate going lower as i'm 99% highway and getting 12.5 or so currently. going lower on tire pressure isn't going to help that.

Thanks again for the advice about swapping the shocks. We're doing my buddies truck next (stock shock length) going to just break those two bolts and the links.

 

40 psi is just about perfect for that tire size. If you compare the inflation charts for that tire size to the stock P275/65r18 (taking in to account that you derate a P rated tire by 10 percent) 40 psi is a touch high for the 30 psi factory front, and a little low for the 33 psi rear tire. If you are not hauling or towing, you can drop 5 psi in the tires and still have a load rating of 2095 lbs. 29 psi on p275/65r18 is 2143 lbs. But a big fat wide tire like that is gonna exacerbate any alignment or balance issues. Not that there's anything wrong big fat wire tires like that... They sure look sweet. But 12" wide ridge grapples suck gas.. And the road manners of a tire that size with a semi aggressive tread aren't exactly great. Better than muddies, though.

I'm actually on my second set of 6112's; the first set lasted 100k. I ran factory fronts for 70kish but swapped out rear shocks for Fox 2.0 at 50k, then 5160's at 60k or so. I also tried some Eibach fronts for a short while after the 6112's. I've actually pulled the front shocks at least four times that I can recall because I once upon a time tried a couple of shims up front with the factory coilovers. The guys at IronMan4x4 use the same method in their install video, but add a ratchet strap to the mix to pull the LCA down and hold it in to place.

I've been contemplating upgrading to a fancier set of rebuildable shocks but it doesn't make sense monetarily. The 6112's have something like a 2.6" body so, I would need at least a 2.5" body shock to "compete". Adjust-ability would be the next improvement to make spending more cash seem a reaonable choice, else it would feel like paying more for less (disregarding the fact that you can have higher end shocks custom valved). The Fox 2.5 DSC and Dobinson MRA's are at the top of my list; Kings were the third choice, but from what I'm told, they don't hold up well to corrosive environments like salted roads. At face value, it almost does seem equitable, but if 6112/5160's are $1200 for the set (pretty sure I paid less than $1000 for them when they were released) then I need to replace them thrice to get in to the same price category as the two aforementioned shocks (the Dobinson setup being a tad cheaper at $3400 for the set and the Fox's being a bit more at $4100 for the set unless I get the non adjustable set which are still more expensive than the Dobinsons). That's 300k miles of shock absorbers for $3600. That's 1.2 cents per mile.

Take the fancy shocks and fork out the money upfront and lets make them go 300k miles. The factory recommended rebuild schedule for the Fox shocks is 50k miles if driven 100% on the street. Admittedly, I spend much more time on pavement than off, but I still get off the paved road enough to say I don't do 100% street. But, it's a starting point. So to get to 300k miles, we need to service the Fox shocks a minimum of five times (this gets us to the point that they need to be replaced/serviced at 300k miles, so we aren't including the 6th service which would get another 50k miles of use). Shock service is $115 per shock, or $460 to do all four corners (unless I'm misunderstanding the pricing structure and that's per pair, which would be great). $460 x 5 = $2300. Add to that the fact the vehicle is down for a week or two waiting for the rebuild. Instead of calculating the cost of downtime (which is very valuable to me as I depend on my truck daily), lets just add the cost for a shop to R&R the front shocks absorbers and additional time assuming I have spare set of factory parts to swap in for the week or two in order to avoid any excessive downtime. What does a shop charge for that? $200 plus an alignment? So $300 for each service? That's an additional $1500, making our grand total 4100 + 2300 + 1500 = 7900. At 300k, that's 2.6 cents per mile. We pretty much never break even with just replacing 6112/5160's because shock service plus an additional shocks service is $1520 every 100k vs $1200 every 100k for 6112/5160's. If you are ok with downtime or don't mind replacing the shocks yourself twice every 50k, then you can break even at 1.1 Million miles. That is, until you get to you next service, then it bounces back and forth until 1.3 million miles and you are totally in the clear and it's cheaper to keep servicing the Fox shocks.

Now that your eyes are bleeding from reading all that malarky, there's something to be said for upgrading and quality of ride. And to be honest, most truck mods don't make sense monetarily; we mostly mod to improve the user experience - whether that be aesthetics, capability, or just make it unique. So the argument I set up above isn't valid. The same argument could be used to justify NOT upgrading to 6112's, but to use factory black shocks instead.

And now that I've sufficiently threadjacked this area, carry on..

 

Thank you for a well written well thought out post.

My only comment would be if you can pull stocks your mechaniclly inclined to rebuild/refresh shocks. Would add a few hours of downtime and cut down the cost.

Have you tried the 5100s? From the cost you could swap these every 50k and be out cheaper? Granted they aren.t as big a dia, but from a road guy 99% mentaility would this make sense?

Thanks again for the respons.