Agreed. If I had to do this again I am not sure I would have gone with Strutmasters. I am reserving my final assessment until I reset the sway bars / lateral bar. I might end up replacing both. One update. I put the third row seats back in and my wife and I took it for a ride down a bumpy road. I thought it felt a bit more balanced but I could be imagining hopeful things

 

A bit of extra weight (putting the spare back underneath) made a very noticeable difference for me as well, it's not an illusion. You might just need to adjust the static weight you carry to bring the ride quality back where you want it to be. That would be an annoying, but cheap and easy fix.

 

If a spare tire is throwing off ride height in noticeable way, then I suspect springs are wrong rate.

Spring rate is very important when it comes to on-road safety. Offroad is a totally different realm.

 

Thought I would offer an update here. Finally had the lateral bar loosened and re-tightened when the truck was on the ground in a neutral position. Huge difference in the ride. Also I found out that my rear brake pads were nearly gone so I think the front brakes were doing the bulk of the work so that was affecting the ride while braking as well. The ride isn't perfect but a whole lot better. Thank you for all the replies and assistance. Really made a difference in dialing this down.