It didn't take long for me to decide I needed (aka: wanted) to replace the suspension on my new used Tacoma. Although the TRD Tacomas have a slightly firmer suspension, it was still a little soft for my taste. So much for that Cadillac ride I was bragging about!
About a week after purchasing the truck, I went ahead and ordered the needed Old Man Emu components from TRDParts4U which just so happens to be at Toyota of Dallas - right across the highway from where I work. I ended up with their #881 (medium) front coils, N91S (firm) front shocks, #15A & 15B rear leaf packs, N85 (firm) rear shocks, greasable shackles, and all the required bushings and brackets.
The installation was pretty straightforward. The Tacoma uses a strut type setup for the front, so the front shocks and coils need to be assembled with the factory top plate assemblies. I also ordered a set of these assemblies, so I simply took the coils, shocks, and factory top plates down to Pep Boys and had them assemble everything for me on their wall-mounted coil spring compressor. Once that was done, all I had to do was remove the old assemblies and install the new. Pretty simple. I took a few pics of this process, but didn't get into the little details of things like individual parts and such.
The rear was straightforward as well. Dealing with the rear leaf springs is just kind of a hassle and required a bunch of finagling to get everything in place and lined up. I did not disconnect the rear brake hose when doing the rear, although it's probably something that should be done. I simply dropped the axle enough to take tension off of the stock leaf packs, removed the leaf pack U-bolts, removed the rear shackles, and disconnected the front of the packs from their respective frame brackets. The rear eyes of the new leaf packs use Old Man Emu bushings with the greasable shackles while the front eyes use factory bushings (new Toyota bushings were supplied by TRDParts4U). I reused the stock U-bolts, although some folks recommend to get longer U-bolts. The stock bumpstops, which sit on top of the leaf packs over the centering bolts, need to be drilled out underneath to fit over the longer centering bolts of the new leaf packs. Also supplied was an exhaust pipe drop bracket. This simply replaces the rear exhaust hanger and drops it a couple of inches to allow the pipe to clear the new leaf pack.
One thing that was not supplied with the OME system was a bracket to raise the brake proportioning valve (BPV). This is a contraption that's mounted on the rear axle just to the right of the differential. There's a rod that extends from this contraption up to another contraption mounted on the driver side frame rail. The BPV senses the load in the rear of the truck and adjusts the delivery of brake fluid to the rear based on the angle of the rod thingy (industry term) that goes from contraption A on the axle to contraption B on the frame. If the angle of this rod is on the steep side, less braking power is delivered to the rear since this is sensing that there's not much of a load in the rear. If the rod is more horizontal, this is telling the BPV that there's a heavy load that might require some extra braking power.
So in short, the BPV needs to be raised roughly as much as you lifted the truck to keep it close to the factory angles. It's simple enough to fabricate a bracket out of a piece of flat stock and a couple extra bolts, so that's what I did.
My initial impression of the OME system is positive. Keep in mind it's only been in about a week as of the writing of this thing. Right now, it's kind of difficult to describe how the ride has been affected. It's a firmer ride, and while it's a bit rougher of a ride than the stock suspension, it really shines in handling big dips in the road and things like that. There are a few dips I go over every day that would bottom out the OME HD suspension I had on the Jeep as well as the Tacoma's stock suspension... these dips don't seem to phase the new suspension on the Taco.
Anyway, on to the pics (in no particular order)! I didn't get any of the rear taken apart. I was busy pounding in new bushings and finagling things into place.
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And here's how it sits with a new set of 265/75/16 BFGoodrich All-Terrains:
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