Ok. Got the jeep in my workshop (it is a woodworking shop so it took some doing to move machines out of the way to take advange of the previous owners house mod, a garage with a pit).

After putting her up on floor jacks and letting the front axel hang free it became obvious that things are out of adjustment.
First change I did was to adjust the upper passenger control arm to be the same length as the driver side. They were off by 1/8".


As you can see in this picture the axel is shifted to the drivers side


Here is what the passenger side spring looks like



Here is what the drivers side looks like




A little closer view of the whole front axel



So how do I get this setup right? Do I lengthen the front adjustable track bar?
Could there be something up with the rear setup that is also impacting the front?

Thanks for any/all help. Figures today was 80 degrees and tomorrow we are getting snow and I cannot pull the jeep all the way into my shop to work on it in comfort.

 

Your axle will pull to the side at full droop because of the trac bar. That's normal.

 

Yeah, you have to measure the axle while its sitting on the ground. If you look how the track bar pulls the axle as it raised by the nature of how it is connected.

Check out WOL's write up...http://project-jk.com/jeep-jk-write-...ation-write-up

The control arms should be about the same length. Sometimes they may add a little caster to one side just to compensate for the slope of the road.

 

Whew - thanks for the info on the axle shifting over. I thought I had really screwed things up.

I also found WOL's write up on Basic JK Front end alignment.
I have gone back and checked everything according to the install write up and the FT install instructions.
This seems to be the next step.

Is it safe to assume that once I have it dialed in correctly the springs will seat properly and not have the odd compression causing them to not be straight? Will I have to make the changes and put a load back on the suspension to know or will it just all click into place?

Yes you are dealing with a Newbie. Thanks

 

it'll go into place. once its lined up.

Congrats on doing the install yourself

I know your frustrations, I've been there..

 

Thanks. This has had me up till 1-2am every night since Saturday. Then I have to get up and be at work by 6am and think about it all day long.

Given the hours I have put into it I could have paid the local guys to install it a few times over but I sure would not undertand how this all works. Nothing like a problem to make you stop and figure things out.

I picked up some different grease zerks. I figure if I am going to be pulling things apart I might as well put in zerks that make it easier to get at them and take care of that task.

couple of hours of work. Then some sleep. I will work on the Jeep after the snow stops and things get sunny again tomorrow.

If anyone else has this lift installed and has their bolt center to bolt center measurements for the adjustable control arms I sure would be interested. I think that would be a better measurement then the space between the jam nut and where the tightens down to.

 

Don't give up RCubed... I wouldn't have had the guts to try that mod on my own, good for you man. Sounds like you are getting closer to having it figured out. It will be worth all your effort for sure!

 

X2...it should come close to center with weight on it, if not then adjust

 

I have been analyzing this and have tried a couple of adjustments. It looks like I am getting close but I want to double check my thought process.

The spring perch on the axle to me needs to center below the upper spring perch. The way it started after the lift install was that the lower perch seems to be sitting back (towards rear of vehicle) from the upper perch. I have been adding a little length to the lower front control arm effectively pushing the axle forward to get things lined up.

I will also adjust the upper control arms so that the caster does not get thrown way off but I suspect I do not need to make a 1:1 adjustment here due to the geometry of the upper vs lower control arms attachement to the axel. In fact now that I think about this. If I take the OEM ratio in the difference in length between the upper and lower control arms, does that ratio remain the same with the new components?

Thanks again

 

I am sure that would be good. You may want a little bit more of caster though since you will running larger tires. Supposedly your steering wheel should snap back to center after going around a slow curve. Thats a good way to judge if you have enough. Dont kill yourself making your spring perfectly straight. Just get your caster set the best you can and live sith the bent spring.