SilverRunner's Build and Adventures Thread

Thanks man! Definitely not the time to panic and stab the brakes that’s for sure!

 

A buddy of mine just sent some high resolution photos he took. Some great shots!

 

Fiddled around with some ways to get a little more flex out of the rig today.

Ended up installing some .25” top hat spacers on top of the extended travel Dobinson's shocks. This lifted the front of the rig a bit and also earned half an inch of down travel when flexed out.

Thanks to the diff drop my CV angles are still good. Luckily, I already have upgraded front bump stops to avoid bottoming the shocks out internally. I still have about 1.5" of usable rake as well!

I did turn the steering wheel and inspect for any binding at full droop. No issues with the CV’s, and not too much boot bind. No contact between the coil and UCA's ball joint cup either (although it was very close)

This is about as far as I’d push a mid travel setup. Not bad for IFS.



The floor jack ran out of travel here. Used a 6" thick piece of wood to try and flex it out.

The rig still had more to go. Especially in the rear.



Loving how the rig stayed nice and level when testing cross axle articulation.

 

These are some great shots. I wish I could have gone this year.

 

Just enough rake and more travel than ever before. Good stuff!

 

35s? Or regear first?
Hmmm

 

488s first. Your tranny will thank you and approve as well.

 

Loving the build so far. How do you like the Sherpa Crestone Sport? Sherpa is running a Black Friday deal right now and I am thinking of picking one up.

 

Thanks man!
I love the rack! It's a quality product. Everything came deburred and the powder coat was done very well. It works as intended and doesn't make too much wind noise.

I did find that the sport version has some wobble in the middle portion of the rack between the mounting feet. I fixed this by adding two extra mounting points to my awning. This seemed to reinforce the side bars and stop any lateral wobbling at freeway speeds.

I think the only difference between the sport and the regular crestone is the thickness of the side bars. My intuition says the regular crestone would not suffer from the lateral wobbling that my sport seemed to. Regardless, mounting the awning was always the plan; luckily that fixed this problem.

Past that I have no reason to get the heavier duty version... I do not have plans to haul more than 100 lbs of gear up there. These rigs are already top heavy enough!

 

Very nice, love what you've done to it. Have exactly the same 4runner trim and color but all OEM

 

Thanks man! And nice I can't wait to see what you do with it!

 

Ive been wanting to do a 2 inch lift up front and 1 inch lift in the rear but undecided on what suspension. I gotta do more research.

 

I've had quite a few setups on this rig. Lot's of experience with friend's rigs as well. Feel free to DM me if you have specific questions.

 

Anything you would suggest that is good for a daily driver that doesn’t make the suspension really stiff? It would be more of just a weekend offroader, so I feel like kings or icons would be super overkill for me.

 

It all depends on what you want to do with it. I eventually went with Dobinsons IMS extended travel. No complaints on ride quality on or off road. The extended travel was worth the extra coin imo. The flex you can achieve is pretty decent for IFS and stock length control arms.

Check your inbox and we can work through your goals for the truck.

 

Glad to hear you like it! I ended up purchasing one - waiting to get the email that I can go pick it up.

 

Nice!

 

You’re an inspiration bud! I dabble in the wild with Gulo but haven’t graduated to the level you and Silver are at.

 

Thanks man! It's been quite the journey.
The mod and adventure addiction never ends.

Have a full front end control arm rebuild plus some weld reinforcement in the works. (collecting parts now)

Need to work out some wiring to get an AC/DC converter to fully charge my new power station and fridge setup.

Also have a auxbeam 8 gang w/ an 'OE Panels' switch panel on the way. (Christmas present from the wife.)

Hoping to get all that installed before an upcoming road trip with the wife and our new addition to the family. A baby girl who just turned five weeks old yesterday!

After our road trip I'll be prepping for Toyota Jamboree 2026. I've heard rumors it will be held this April. Really hoping to get out unscathed again. I swear barnwell mtn tries its best to take out your doors and quarter panels!

 

Prepping for some 2026 adventures!

Been dealing with some increasingly worse noises coming from the front end. (Pops, bangs and squeaks during low speed turns)

Put in some work yesterday to make the IFS tight and safe again.

Woke up around 5am and headed to my buddy's place. I had a ton of work to do and needed his help (and shop press) to get this one done!

First step was jacking up the car



And getting the skids out of the way.



Then removing the LCA's.



The ball joints were still good but the worn bushings were causing some severe clunking.



Luckily, Whiteline makes an upgraded bushing for our rigs. Part number W53522.

So, out with the old!
https://youtube.com/shorts/BVFPGbXTPco?si=WSX5stt0fNcUOYTx

And in with the new!




Before the lowers went back in I wanted to add some reinforcements around the frame “ears” that locate the LCA.

I already have total chaos cam tabs, but adding the gussets from marlin crawler really help reinforce the frame! Unfortunately, it took A LOT of grinding and fitting for the marline crawler kit to fit with the total chaos cam tabs. But in theory this should be the best of both worlds.

Always remember to disco the battery before welding











Frame reinforced, painted black and put LCA’s back in! I don't have any photo's of it but the LCA's struggled to go back in. Easiest way I found was a floor jack to push the LCA up and a ratchet strap to the frame to pull it into place.

Also shimmed the Perry Parts bump stops to help protect the shocks. Since I added top hat spacers my bump stops needed a 1/4” shim to limit up travel and protect the shocks from bottoming out internally.





After this I moved on to the UCA’s. I’ve had Apache off road uppers for a few years now and they’ve held up great. However, I noticed the MOOG ball joints they come with were starting to get a little noisy, especially if I didn’t grease them every 5k miles. I thought it’d be worth removing the uppers and checking the ball joints and bushings while I was here… Man was that a battle I was not ready for!

Wish I had pictures of the rest but I'll just do my best to explain.


Driver side went good. Hammered the spindle, ball joint popped free. Removed UCA and swapped the ball joint on the press. Bushings looked good so back in it went. No drama.

Started on the passenger side to do the same and ended up fighting that ball joint for 2 hours… On the driver side hammering the spindle wss enough... Not on the passenger side. Eventually this escalated to a mini sledge, pry bar, and a lot of heat from a propane torch. IT WAS STILL SEIZED IN THE SPINDLE.

14 hours into this job and parts stores were closing. Had to run and get two ball joint forks as a last ditch effort.

Ended up having to stack two forks in between the spindle and upper control arm. Hammered them in, applied so much heat the boot melted off the ball joint and grease fires were starting. Kept hammering in the forks with a mini sledge and finally, finally, while spitting molten grease and rubber, the ball joint came free from the spindle.

I could finally rebuild the passenger side UCA, bolt everything up, and torque everything at ride height.
Offered up the skids to see how much I’d need to trim to account for the Marlin Crawler frame gussets. The answer? Quite a bit.

At 17 hours I was ready to tap out. The rig was stronger and tighter feeling than ever. A good stopping point.

I left my skid plates at my buddy's place knowing we can trim them later. Besides, the alignment and secondary bolt check will be easier with the skids off anyways.

Off to get the rig aligned and I’ll be back in a few days for those skids!

So happy the rig feels tight and safe again! Plus, it’s stronger than ever! Definitely worth the effort.

 

Holly Frijoles Batman!!
What a job this was. Dang brother...I would have called it quits much earlier. You d'man.

 

Haha thanks man. After sleeping for a couple hours, yesterday seems like a fever dream… I left home at 5am and got back at 2am last night.

I only had one day budgeted for this rebuild and wanted to squeeze in those gussets while the lowers were off. It was quite the job.

Encountering that stuck ball joint so late was the “I bit off more than I could chew” moment. Had some heavily caffeinated pre workout and dug in. Luckily, my buddy Chris is an absolute legend who persevered through my stubbornness

 

I appreciate you sharing all the journeys so far with your rig!! I have to get out more and hit some trails ASAP .stay safe yall

 

Got the rig aligned!
Bad news: It needs a zero point calibration and the jeep shop I went to has no idea what that is despite “working on a ton of 4Runners “




Good news: Alignment is spot on!
Bonus good news: the shop had an RTI ramp out back






Didn’t bother engaging the locker. Just rolled up until rear driver started to lose traction and thought “good enough”

The next day I got a chance to clearance this skids for the Marlin Crawler kit. Luckily they didn’t need much!


Also cleared the codes and the zero point calibration was done automatically by driving straight for a few seconds. Super easy.

Kind of wild since I had like three error codes popping up.
-pre collision system malf.
-cruise control system malf.
-MTS unavailable
All cleared and systems up and running now

With that the front end rebuild is done. The rig feels more solid than ever. Certainly ready for another year of abuse!

 

Finally got around to installing the Diode Dynamics XPR reverse lights.

They work as advertised. One thing I noticed was the Diode Dynamics actually provide a tactile “click” when installed.

This was not the case with my old high output Lasfit bulbs (which kept falling out of the connector and into the tail light housing… Requiring me to remove the tail light and fish out the bulb)









Finally have working reverse lights again!

After this I moved on to some regular maintenance.

Oil change first. OEM filter. Then 6 quarts of Costco’s 5W30 and .6 quarts of marvel mystery oil.

Always put my oil cap here before I drain the oil… a good reminder to fill the damn thing up again before closing the hood!





Drain and filled the power steering reservoir as well. Imo, doing this every oil change is by far the easiest way to maintain the power steering fluid.


The reservoir is stained because I waited 30k miles before my first flush… Since that first flush this is how I’ve maintained it. (Using Valvoline max life ATF for reference)

I also decided to remove the engine cover since some fellow forum users made the point that it’s just another area for mice or other critters to hide.



Doused the engine bay with some mighty mint rodent repellent as well.

Checked all the witness marks under the rig to make sure nothing was coming loose. Then checked torque on the lug nuts.

 

Well done bud!

 

Thanks! I usually don’t post maintenance or little mods here but I’ve been inspired by @djwantke ’s build thread. Between both of your threads I could be occupied for hours! Love it!

 

you earned a drink or meal now, sir

very productive folks here

 

I just seen this now

Hah,
I barely do hard work and don’t even change fluids (noob)..yet! not far away

feelings mutual

 

My contribution to this thread…my weekender, silver 2023 SR5P.
Love it!