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Harsh ride! Bilstein 5150s?

M

mikeswrangler

NAXJA Forum User
Location
Norwell,MA
00 xj. I recently went from a rubicon express 5.5" short are lift w ome shocks to a 6" long arm kit and Bilstein 5150s. I have the front axle all dialed in. But the front end when hitting potholes hits prety damn hard. I have plenty of up and down travel w the shock. I am assuming it is from shock valving but I have never run 5150s. reading up on them have heard mixed reviews depending what vehicle they are in about being a harsh ride. I'm bought them used so I'm unsure which valving is in these. I'll try and read the sticker on them tomorrow as there are two different set ups that they could be. Has anyone run these and had a harsh ride. It's pot hole season and it's so obnoxious I have parked it and been driving my sweet Volvo. Haha.
 
Sorry it's 32psi not 35 miss type. But either way same pressure w both lifts unless the bump just traveled threw the arms differently. I'll lower it to 30 but I don't see it changing much.
 
You should be below 30 easily. I run 25 for my 35s. Try 27-28. I bet that will smooth it out abit and get you more miles out of your tires.

I hate to say you bought the wrong horse but that is not a good kit for a number of reasons. At the height your running and it not being a true long arm kit. It's going to be a bad deal. You going to catch a lot of hate on teraflex real quick. There is no amount of shock that can fix a badly designed suspension system.
 
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I have been extremely unimpressed with the bistein 5100 and 5150s. the off the shelf valving tends to suck.

removed them from a few rigs in favor of either a 7100 with a tune or a fox 2.0.

the only luck I have had with the 5100 is on a stock rig, but I suspect their valving differs from shock specified for a stock rig as opposed to a lifted one. no real info to back that up, just my own observations.


you tire pressure does seem a bit high though. and yea, that suspension setup is pretty much crap.
 
I understand the front set up of the teraflex "long arm" is retarded w using short adjustable uppers but long lowers. I am going to make it a radium arm set up by attaching the uppers to the lowers. Besides that the rest of the kit is nice.
 
I know 5100's are available with multiple halving options, so I imagine 5150's are the same? If you put a pair with the stiffest valving in, it would probably feel harsh on the street.
 
Yup. 255/70 up front with 5150s on a mild rig on 35s and the ride was like a cadillac. Granted I ran my 35s down at around 25 psi on the road.

Something is wrong.
 
I run 255/70 5125's and metalcloak 5.5" tj coils. Smooth as glass. 5125's are available valves 360/240 and I'd imagine that would be real harsh in an xj.
 
Aired down to 27 psi. Still rough. I'm gonna switch the springs out to my re ones and see if it's different. I ran teraflex coils in mt tj and they road AWSOME. But maybe the spring rate for their xj kit is different?
 
pics of the setup, front LCA angles, rear shackle angle??

the TF kit is all hard joints so they will make more noise, but what do your LCA angles look like?

perhaps a joint or two was bad out of the box? Slop in a hard joint with bang and clang . if the kit was used I would consider replacing all of the hard joints and then see where its at.

-are you sure the subframe thing wit the TF kit is all torqued down?


are the bushings in the shocks good? upper shock mounts are tight?

are the 5150s brand new or used? are you 100% sure they are not shot?

what coils are you running ?

did you by any chance leave the upper coil isolators out when you installed the coils? that will make a lot of noise on bumps.


what size potholes at what speeds?
 
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that is strange. The 5150's on my truck feel a little soft to me. I run 40psi in my 32" Kumho KL71's and get great handling out of my XJ. I doubt its the shocks...

IRO 4.5" coils / Rusty's 3.5" leaf pack w/HD Eng shackle relocation and 1.5" RC shackles.
 
First thing you need to do is find out what the valving on the shocks really is before you waste time on other options.
 
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