OK, time to install these bilsteins. I've watched a few videos and read the factory service manual. Videos make it look super simple, of course. My truck has hydraulic swaybars and you have to relieve the pressure in the system before you take the suspension apart, otherwise the truck can end up leaning to one side or the other. The valves are located halfway down the drivers side frame rail. On my 2018 they're two 8mm bolts. Undo them three half turns, not 3 and 1/2 turns, so total 1.5 turns! Yes, count!
Ok, now get the truck up in the air, remove the rear wheels and contemplate this. I'm not swapping out the springs, so I didn't bother to remove the swaybar linkage or e brake cable. I did support the rear pumpkin with a big jack stand so it wouldn't sag.
Now break free the upper shock bolt. Oh, you can't because the shock shaft spins. Service manual calls for a special tool, which I don't have. Luckily one of the videos covers this and I use a set of vice grips on the dust cover of the shock, not actually pinching the shaft itself. Like this...
Put it there and it'll spin around and jam up against the truck, then you can sneak your 22mm wrench onto the top nut and take it out. Take out the 19mm bolt on the bottom and lever the stock shocks off. I think mine were leaking, with just over 28k miles on them. They're Tokico's, which are living up their reputation of being To-Leakos.
Ok, snake the bilstein in, making sure you've got it clocked so the remote reservoir doesn't hit anything. Get the top nut started, then droop the rear axle to line up the lower bolt and get it started. Now you get to have some fun, where you have to hold the top of the shaft of the bilstein so you can tighten the upper shock nut. Space is very limited but I was able to use the same vice grip and grab the slotted top of the shaft and then tighten up the shock. To put it mildly, this sucked. It also wasn't really covered in any of the videos I watched, they just glossed over this. You can just see my vice grips here
Ok, get the wheels/tires back on, drop the rear of the truck and now torque the rear shock bolt to 72 ft lbs. Time for the front. There are two ways to do this, either take the two bolts out of the bottom of the lower A arm where it goes into the hub, or pop off the tie rod end and the upper ball joint where it goes into the upper A arm. I did the lower A arm but thing the upper A arm might be an easier way to go.
Anyways, take out the two lower bolts going into the knuckle. Then take the nut off the lower strut bolt. Now loosen the two nuts holding the inner of the lower A arm in place so it'll pivot. Now loosen the upper sway bar end link bolt and take out the lower sway bar end link bolt completely. Also not shown on any of the videos is this bracket right here, which covered up my front inner upper strut nut
12mm takes that off and tuck it out of the way. Remove the lower strut bolt. Remove the four 14mm nuts holding the strut in place. Curse a bunch as you try to wiggle the entire assembly out, then make sure to not drop the assembly on your foot.
Stock vs Bilstein 6112
Eagle eyed viewers will notice I've got the front bilsteins on their lowest ride height possible. Supposedly this will yield a 1" lift. I don't want a lift as I have to sneak this under my 4 post lift and only have ~3.5" of clearance with the stock suspension. I just want to level the truck out. Ok, now grab that incredibly heavy bilstein strut and try to snake it back in. Curse a LOT! This also sucked and the bilstein upper hat has a specific way that it clocks, in fact there's an arrow and "Out" pointer on it. So make sure you're paying attention to that, another thing that none of the videos pointed out. Ok, muscle that bad boy into place and get the two outer upper nuts started. Now lever the lower strut eyelet into place and drive the bolt through, loosely install the nut.
Get all four of the upper 14mm nuts tightened down and torque them to 33 ft lbs. Now put that bracket back on with the 12mm bolt. Now get ready to board the struggle bus as you attempt to line up the knuckle with the lower A arm and get those two bolts back into place. I actually called a friend to help with this but managed to get the drivers side in before he showed up. Torque these bolts to 221 ft lbs. Yes, you read that right, that's what the factory service manual calls for. Now lever the swaybar eyelet back into the A arm and line it up to place the bolt in place. Do NOT attempt to actually get this bolt into its home, just get it into the eyelet. Torque the inner A arm nuts to 103 ft lbs.
Now move to the passenger side, which is much more of a PITA. The swaybar linkage on this side is very different than the drivers side and it also kept getting pulled up by the hydraulics and getting in the way. The bracket on this side doesn't obstruct the upper strut nuts, so leave it alone. Do the same on this side but getting the stock strut assembly out and the bilstein back in was a whole lot harder.
My friend showed up thankfully and helped me get the lower bolts into the knuckle and the sway bar eyelet into the A arm and the bolt started.
Now put the wheels back on and drop the truck. Cycle the suspension some. Torque the lower strut bolt to 133 ft lbs. Torque the upper sway bar end link bolt to 100 ft lbs and the lower one to 103 ft lbs. Toyota didn't do a captive nut on the lower sway bar bolt the way they should've and it's basically impossible to hold the 21mm nut in there. I managed to jam it with a wrench and get it done.
Don't forget to tighten up the KDSS 8mm bolts! Onto the measurements. I haven't really driven the truck more than up and down my street so hopefully it'll settle some. It got lifted more than I expected, almost 2" up front and 1" in the back.
Ok, so I'm in my early 50's and pretty fit but do have a few auto immune diseases that can cause me problems. I'm not ashamed to say that this job really kicked my ass. I was seriously gassed by the time I was done. I don't think it helped that I skipped breakfast AND lunch and wasn't paying attention to drinking water. That's on me, that was dumb. I got focused on finishing the job before I had to leave to pick my son up from school and that wasn't smart. I should've stopped for a lunch break and drunk a bunch of water. I think for heavy jobs like this on this truck I need to ask a friend to help me. And eat food. And drink water.
Anyways, on my 1 block drive the truck definitely feels more controlled, not as bouncy and the brake dive is mostly gone. I'll drive it a bit more this weekend and get an alignment done Monday. I made all the marks on the lower A arm cams and they weren't disturbed but I'd rather have it double checked.
