This has come up a few times recently and so we finally decided to look into it. 05-15 tacoma spindles and 03-09 spindles are roughly the same. They share the same bearing, same LCA bolts, same sway bar holes, and same bracket mounts. What they do not share is the same UCA ball joint hole. We did some measuring this week on stock components of both a 4th gen 4runner and a 2nd gen Tacoma.
Here's what we found. 4runner mounting hole and ball joints are slightly larger than the Tacoma ball joints and mounting holes.
4th gen runner stock ball joint at the taper is .7
Stock spindle ball joint shaft hole. .695
Stock 2nd gen ball joint at the taper .6685
Stock 2nd gen spindle ball joint hole .684
I found this out myself when I bought 2nd gen spindles that had already been gusseted and learned my 4th gen camburg UCAs would not mount correctly. Fortunately @Mike_taco4x4 was upgrading to heimed uppers and I was able to buy his TC uppers to match the Tacoma spindle. So careful trying to buy cross platform parts. Unfortunately there just isn't that much info out there about this difference otherwise I would have likely skipped the Tacoma spindle and had my runner spindles gusseted. Sad thing is, most people aren't even aware of this difference and will likely give incorrect information about the compatibility between the two models.
Here's what we found. 4runner mounting hole and ball joints are slightly larger than the Tacoma ball joints and mounting holes.
4th gen runner stock ball joint at the taper is .7
Stock spindle ball joint shaft hole. .695
Stock 2nd gen ball joint at the taper .6685
Stock 2nd gen spindle ball joint hole .684
I found this out myself when I bought 2nd gen spindles that had already been gusseted and learned my 4th gen camburg UCAs would not mount correctly. Fortunately @Mike_taco4x4 was upgrading to heimed uppers and I was able to buy his TC uppers to match the Tacoma spindle. So careful trying to buy cross platform parts. Unfortunately there just isn't that much info out there about this difference otherwise I would have likely skipped the Tacoma spindle and had my runner spindles gusseted. Sad thing is, most people aren't even aware of this difference and will likely give incorrect information about the compatibility between the two models.
