wvax101

cut the fenders its cheap and easy and looks great

BIGJ

i know when i put my 33's on i had some rubbin issues when i turned to sharp the inside tire would hit the sway bar. so i juts had some 2" pucks put on top of my coils till i could afford a proper lift and back spacing. it worked just fine till funds were available for do what i wanted to do. but i know others havent had any issues with it, so it just depends on what you wanna do,

Sethmark

Historically speaking... this is the most capable rockcrawler ever built:


Nelson and Nelson's Tiny. Bundrant drove it to a bunch of UROC titles, as did Scherer.

Super low (18" belly, if I recall correctly), super light. It was about chest high on most folks to the top of the cage. And when they brought it out, people laughed. Said it wouldn't work.

Here's the lesson learned though. BIG tire, minimal lift, functional suspension is the way to go. The factory suspension is good, but not perfect. It needs a few refinements to get maximum travel out of it. But you can make one hell of a functional rock crawler by keeping the vehicle low and retaining its Center of Gravity and rewarding it with proper springs, shocks and componenets necessary to loosen the suspension such that it moves freely without restriction.

Perfect Example is the new Poison Spyder Custom rig (and ironic, since Larry spotted for Bundrant for all those wins)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDga-hN1ZNA

That's about the hardest trail at the hammers that a non buggy could do... I've driven it and its NASTY... I didn't make the 2nd obstacle (the water fall) that Larry walks. LOTS of tire, not a lot of lift, and functional suspesnion.

YOU ARE ON THE RIGHT TRACK IN MY OPINION!

wolfmanii

So, it seems I can get stuff in 33 inch tire to my stock JK without any modification. The biggest disadvantage of this upgraede to me is
it limits the wheel upper travel by about 1.5 inch (33 inch - stock 30 inch devide by 2)

But adding a light suspension lift help solve the problem. I guess 2 inch lift
is good enough to recover the loss of upper travel.

There are a lot of < 3 inch suspesnion lift choices. But many of them have a
bump stopper which limits the upper travel, so it merely make the frame sitting
higher than before, but do not help much on articulation (especially upper travel). Can anyone suggest a good mild (<3inch) lift that gives the biggest flex?

Also, I may want to switch to 35 inch tire later, so I would like to choose a wheel that will fit both 33 and 35 inch tire, any suggestions?

Sethmark

No. Your factory suspension is limited by the bump stops, not tire size - even with a 33" on it.

Add a lift to increase chassis height and run a long travel shock and spring for more effective articulation DOWN. There's only so much up travel possible. There's all sorts of stuff in the way that would need to be relocated to get tons more up travel. A 3" kit isn't allowing the tire DEEPER into the wheel well, its just pushing further away from the body to start with.

wolfmanii

Thanks Sethmark, but I don't understand why lift doesn't help up travel.
To me, if the wheel is pushed further from the body to start with, that means
the wheel can travel up longer distance to reach the same point (say 2 inch below the fender flare) as before the lift, right?

Sethmark

Your thinking is sound. The axle NETS greater travel... but its not getting DEEPER into the wheel well. Its range of motion is vastly improved. But physical limitations prevent it from being capable of going higher into the chassis. You may go from 2" up travel to 3" uptravel, but the tire isn't getting stuffed deeper.

The problem is Springs, Shocks, and Bump Stops.

When you lift a car, you buy a longer spring. That spring is also longer when its collapsed all the way. It can't squish down as far as the factory spring.... and squishing it to where the coils touch is bad for the coil and causes premature fatigue. So lift kit mfgs use bump stops to limit the up travel so as to not damage the coil... and the shock.

Longer springs offers increased travel, so you can now use a longer shock. The problem is that the price for a longer shock is that the collapsed length is longer than the factory shock. Again with the bump stops.

Simply, a lift may actually increase the NET amout of travel substantially, but the axle itself isn't going to be stuffed deeper into the wheel well. B/C of the spring, shock and bumpstop, the axle is actually stuffing LESS into the well.

wolfmanii

Sethmark:

Thanks! So the main problem is the range of spring/shock that limits the up travel.

For example, the stock spring/shock range is 10 -- 20 inch (middle point is 15 inch)
uptravel = 10 - (20+10)/2 = -5
down travel = 20 - (20+10)/2 = 5
total travle = 5+5 = 10

Now with a 4 inch lift, the new spring/shock range is changed is 12 -- 26 inch
(middle point is 19 inch, which raise the car by 4 inch)
the travel increases,


uptravel = 12 - (12+26)/2 = -7
down travel = 26 - (12+26)/2 = 7
total travle = 7+7 = 14

So after the 4 inch lift, the total travl increased from 4 inch (from 10 inch to 14 inch)
but the tire can not go into the wheel well as deep as before because of the 4 inch lift.
In fact,the upper limit position of the tire is actually 2 inch further away from the fender flare
compared to that before the lift

But what if we can find a spring/shock that range is
10-28 inch (middle point is still 19 inch). Then this time

uptravel = 10 - (10+28)/2 = -9
down travel = 28 - (10+28)/2 = 9
total travle = 9+9=18

so even with the 4 inch lift, the tire can still go up as close to the fender flare as before the lift.

Of coruse, it may hard to find this kind of spring/shock. I am just talking theoritically

wolfmanii

Anyway, for those mild suspension lift kit on market (2-3 inches). which one
provides the best articulation?

Sethmark

Suspensions aren't setup that way. Most have a lot of down travel and a lot less up travel. The shock isn't setup neutrally.

You will find that there a lot of opinions on lift kits. LOTS. Most of opinions based on where someone already spent their money, not geometry, quality of components, etc....

Wheel travel is important, but not the end all be all. Tires, weight balance, lockers, driver skill... lots of things factor into how far down the trail you get.

Choose a quality lift with quality components and you're likely to get quality performance. But a lot of it is populatiry contest. I could throw out 4 names and you'd get the fanboys, the haters, and the in betweens. Few of them have actually pushed their cars to the limit with multiple kits under identical conditions to know what's really best.

You're in Florida. You might see some RTI ramps, but mostly its sand, mud, and a few rutted out roads. Tire selection is as important as anything else.

If you were in a different part of the country, you would have different needs. I dumped my 60s, atlas 700r4 TJ for a high hp CJ I built when I moved cross country. I needed to get power to the ground fast, not crawl.