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A big thanks to @samsmith1226 for his SR Trim Level rear shock upgrade thread, that was the inspiration for this post.
Wife and I have a '24 SR5 Xtracab that we absolutely love, I've been doing some upgrades -- TRD Pro Wheels / Duratracs, wider OEM mudflaps and Trailhunter ARB bed rack -- to make it look a bit beefier.
Our ongoing complaint with the truck is that the back end is very bouncy. In curves, hitting a bump will cause the back end to hop left or right. After reading Sam's post about his 4-door SR and the TRD Offroad rear shocks fitting his 4-door on leaf springs, I quickly bought the same shocks and just did the install on our Xtracab.
The change in the ride is night and day. The back end now feels like the front end, rough riding like a truck but planted rather than bouncy. Well worth the $200 I paid on EBay for the shocks.
Technical Info / what you need to do this yourself:
Tools I used: torque wrench, 19mm ratcheting wrench, 17 mm socket, wire cutters, pry bar, rubber mallet
Shocks - Toyota Part# 48530-AK020, tons of places to get them by just googling the part #
Factory Shock Removal:
Top bolt is 19mm, a ratcheting wrench works best. The top bolt will spin the shock shaft so a crescent wrench on the flat part at the top will keep it from spinning.
Bottom bolt is 17mm and comes off easily. A small pry bar can be used to slide the bottom shock mount off the post at the bottom.
The bottom post on my passenger side had a bit of rust on it, which I removed with a wire brush and covered with a little bit of red grease. On my driver side there was zero rust.
New shock install:
The shocks came to me with a wire holding the shock compressed, I left that wire on when mounting the shocks. I ran the top of the shock through the hole at the frame, put the bottom shock mount over the post then used a rubber mallet to push it fully on. Before tightening, I used wire cutters to cut the wire holding the shocks compressed. This pinched the wire at the top where I had to use the earlier pry bar to slightly compress the shock, then pull the wire out.
Top mount torque spec: 18 ft-lbs officially. Since you are just compressing those two rubber boots, at some point it will go from easy to tighten to much harder. Stop tightening.
Bottom bolt torque specs: 72 ft-lbs. Tighten then torque as normal.
Total install time for me was about 40 minutes.
Wife and I have a '24 SR5 Xtracab that we absolutely love, I've been doing some upgrades -- TRD Pro Wheels / Duratracs, wider OEM mudflaps and Trailhunter ARB bed rack -- to make it look a bit beefier.
Our ongoing complaint with the truck is that the back end is very bouncy. In curves, hitting a bump will cause the back end to hop left or right. After reading Sam's post about his 4-door SR and the TRD Offroad rear shocks fitting his 4-door on leaf springs, I quickly bought the same shocks and just did the install on our Xtracab.
The change in the ride is night and day. The back end now feels like the front end, rough riding like a truck but planted rather than bouncy. Well worth the $200 I paid on EBay for the shocks.
Technical Info / what you need to do this yourself:
Tools I used: torque wrench, 19mm ratcheting wrench, 17 mm socket, wire cutters, pry bar, rubber mallet
Shocks - Toyota Part# 48530-AK020, tons of places to get them by just googling the part #
Factory Shock Removal:
Top bolt is 19mm, a ratcheting wrench works best. The top bolt will spin the shock shaft so a crescent wrench on the flat part at the top will keep it from spinning.
Bottom bolt is 17mm and comes off easily. A small pry bar can be used to slide the bottom shock mount off the post at the bottom.
The bottom post on my passenger side had a bit of rust on it, which I removed with a wire brush and covered with a little bit of red grease. On my driver side there was zero rust.
New shock install:
The shocks came to me with a wire holding the shock compressed, I left that wire on when mounting the shocks. I ran the top of the shock through the hole at the frame, put the bottom shock mount over the post then used a rubber mallet to push it fully on. Before tightening, I used wire cutters to cut the wire holding the shocks compressed. This pinched the wire at the top where I had to use the earlier pry bar to slightly compress the shock, then pull the wire out.
Top mount torque spec: 18 ft-lbs officially. Since you are just compressing those two rubber boots, at some point it will go from easy to tighten to much harder. Stop tightening.
Bottom bolt torque specs: 72 ft-lbs. Tighten then torque as normal.
Total install time for me was about 40 minutes.
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