ebsocalmtb
Member
- Joined
- May 8, 2023
- Messages
- 31
- Reaction score
- 75
- Location
- Southern Cal
- Current Ride
- 22' Tremor
- Current Ride #2
- Mountain bikes
Nice looking truck, I'm slightly partial to the color myself. Regarding your questions... see below. Grain of salt is that my writing style tends to be very assertive... please keep in mind that these are just my opinions and believies... while I am passionate about the choices I make and the endless research I do, these are not facts. One last ting, I did not proof read this... sorry
Regarding the tire component of your question, there's no way around an E load rating tire being pretty firm. I do find that they improve slightly to moderately once the sidewalls break in a bit. I haven't driven the Pirelli offerings in this class of tire but I have driven 5 of the current crop of E-rated tires over the last 10 years and they are all within 10% of each other in terms of pavement feedback. (my experience is with bfg k02, k03, toyo, falken, general grabber at). I typically run these at 37psi cold, which comes up to 45psi on a 90 degree day at 75mph. They all send a bit more road feedback to the cabin on low amplitude/high frequency road conditions... some of them seem to slap the pavement harder then others in general. One final thing about tires, is that each of these tires has slightly different dimensions even if you are comparing the same 295/70/18 sold/catalog size. I only mention that for context about what I'm about to say below.
Regarding suspension, the bilstein front shocks are height adjustable, but utilize a circlip ring/groove to set the height of the lower spring perch. That means you need to call the ball on the lift/height prior to assembling the shock with the coilover spring and the top hat prior to install. I am using the #4 circlip position on my truck, which is billed as .5" higher then stock height tremor. I think it's a bit higher then that, more like .75", but it may settle from there.
I am 98% certain you will not need aftermarket front upper control arm to alleviate clearance and rubbing issues with a lift that is 2" or smaller (over stock tremor height). I cannot comment on if you SHOULD do upper control arms if you are using a 2" lift over stock tremor height. My hunch/belief is that 2" (which is really +3" or +3.5" depending on options over a stock f-150) is sorta pushing it in terms of droop travel being limited by the front control arm. That's why I stuck with the mild lift position on these front shocks... Fwiw, I don't think this is something that is going to be an issue in practical usage for a vehicle that sees most, if not all of it's usage on paved/gravel roads. The droop travel issue is going to come up in mild/moderate off roading where you are corner weighting the vehicle.
Lastly, regarding the shock performance/feel. I have used the stock fx4 shocks with leveling pucks as well as 5100/5150's on my previous 2015' F150 and obviously now using 6112/5160's on my 22' Tremor. Both shock packages feel pretty much the same. The 6112 might be slightly firmer on crummy condition surface streets, but the differences are slight. There is no getting away from the fact that the bilstein shocks are firmer, and do transmit more road feedback into the cabin. I waffled back and forth on the bilstein setup and a set of eibach's as the eibachs have a reputation of being slightly softer on the road (which is a detriment in off road situations). Regarding your question on front/rear... It's counterintuitive I know, but I think the rear shocks are actually more impactful to ride then the front, so I would always do both. In fact, I could make a case for just replacing rear shocks immediately on nearly all non-raptor F-150's because for some reason, ford is convinced that the secret to ride quality is zero compression/rebound damping in back. It leads to axle hop, weird oscillations on rebound that make the truck feel very hard to control and significant bottoming impacts that crash through the vehicle. Said another way, I honestly think the rear shocks are further from ideal then the front are from a stock/oem perspective... but you feel the rear of the vehicle through your butt, and the front of the vehicle through your feet/hands. We as humans are more sensitive to inputs through our feet/hands (for good reason being hunter/gatherers) so that's what you'll notice first in terms of NVH... but from a performance perspective the rear shocks are a problem.
I digress... I can describe the change this way... On broken up asphalt or proper/fresh expansion joints the aftermarket shocks are firmer and translate those vibrations to the cabin. Another example would be driving in a road construction zone where they have ground the asphalt down in order to overlay new on it... that will be 'harsher'. It will be something you notice and question the first 3-5 times you jump in the truck and do city/street driving. That being said, anything bigger then pavement cracks and the aftermarket shocks ride smoother. Potholes, expansion joints that have separation, manhole lids, speed bumps, freeway expansion joints are all handled vastly better and transmit less large hits to the cabin. I think that despite the fact that the shocks are firmer... they feel smoother on the freeway because they are keeping you higher in the travel more often, thus there is more travel available for a given bump, and you're not loading up the spring force in order to use those bumps.
What is also improved is feeling of the truck bottoming out as it smashes through all of it's travel hitting a 2-3" pot hole. In those cases, it still has suspension left because it has more compression damping. Also improved is the un-damped rebound oscillation sensation you get with eccentrically loaded bumps. These are both things that a stock truck with e-rated tires does particularly poorly.
What I can tell you, is that my opinion is that stock shocks, with leveling pucks and e-rated tires is the worst of the combinations in terms of ride feel and comfort. You're getting the height from a ton of pre-load in front, with an under-damped shock... so the perception of a firmer spring, but less compression damping to deal with impacts. This is all exacerbated by a heavier tire, which makes the suspension hesitant to start moving, but also impacts the ride when the wheel/suspension changes direction.
In order to accomplish all of the things you asked... and if it were me in your shoes, I would consider doing the following.
1) get 5160 rear shocks and put those on now, to pair with the front leveling pucks. These shocks are cheap, and stupid easy to install yourself in your driveway. There are YT videos out there to show the install, but the big tip is to bolt the top of the shocks on leaving the banding in place that holds them slightly compressed for shipping. Then you cut the band and guide the lower mount/eyelet in place to slip the bolt in. This swap will improve the ride for minimal cost, and it will give you a flavor of the type of increase in compression damping and NVH you will experience if you were to change the front shocks.
2) consider if you want to achieve your leveling goals through a change in rear block, or lifting further in front. If your current setup is still more raked then you want, then you certainly have a choice to make. I have a hunch that lifting much/if-any higher then you are currently at in front through a longer/aftermarket shock, you could be into a front upper control arm swap. Once you're going there... you start to have to consider clearance issues from the aftermarket front upper control arms and your tire selection. Most FUCAs are larger in dimensionality not only in the A-arm portion, but particularly so around the ball joint. Oversized tires on stock rims can be problematic for clearance. For this reason, and the droop travel reason I listed above, if I were in your shoes, I would strongly consider getting there via a smaller rear block.
3) lastly, consider front shocks. My recommendation would be Eibach if you are concerned about street comfort. Consider bilstein 5100s if you drive your truck harder around corners or do anything more then a gravel road. Go with something like the bilstein 6112s if you have an inch for something that is "technically the right thing to do" from the perspective of an off road or truck aftermarket re-seller. The truth is, the majority of people that buy 6112s... do not need them and would have been perfectly satisfied with 5100s... and in some cases better off with 5100s as the damper is for sure slightly softer. I am one of those people... but the tinkerer and vanity in me wanted to justify the 6112s.
There is a lot of rambling here... and this is way OT from the topic the original poster asked about... but hey, it's friday and my crushing ADHD justified procrastinating work by typing up this forum post. Hopefully some of this helps... and remember, these are just my believies and opinions and I am certain that there are a few people out there that will see things differently.
