Stock Height / Spring Question

I've been doing alot of reading here about what kind of lift I want to get into on my '01 and out of curiosity I went and measured my current height. I got 17.5" in the front and 16.5" in the rear. The front seems ok, but I should be at 17" in the rear, correct? I have a few things in the back of the truck, but nothing that weighs anything too significant. I'm gonna empty things out and re-measure later this afternoon, but the numbers just got me thinking. There's 73k on the truck right now. Is it realistic to assume that the rear springs are simply sagging?

You bet your bippy. Rear XJ springs are prone to sagging.

Yeah, that's what I expected. It was bugging me, so I just went out and re-measured with it empty and it came up the same.

I guess it's time to go spring shopping.

Fear not, there is a solution. You can add a leaf to your existing spring pack, or get helper springs. Both are lower cost, longer term solutions to replacing stock springs with new stock springs.

Yeah, I was thinking about that...but I think I want to go up 2" or so. I don't know how well the current spring pack will like it if I do an AAL.

Well, if you've got the scratch, you might like an OME lift.

Don't want to hijack, but along the same lines...what about re-arching springs? I've been thinking of doing that.

Lawn Cher' said:

You bet your bippy. Rear XJ springs are prone to sagging.

Click to expand...

Are MJ springs different? and prone to sagging?

If you want to improve the load bearing potential of your springs and get a lift at the same time look into some old body style Dakota springs. The springs go for $50 or less for the set at a junkyard. Disassemble your spring pack and use the Dakota springs like add a leafs. You can go from 1” to 4” of lift depending on how many extra springs you want to use. New spring clips are only a buck or two apiece from Schucks, AutoZone, or Pep Boys. The new center pins and u-bolts are pretty cheap too. The whole set up is well below $100 and will handle heavy loads much better than the factory ones ever did.

prljeep said:

Are MJ springs different? and prone to sagging?

Click to expand...

Being a spring-under design, MJ springs have more arch and hold up better to loads than the nearly flat XJ springs. MJ springs also make great AAL's for XJ's.

Lawn Cher' said:

Well, if you've got the scratch, you might like an OME lift.

Click to expand...

That's what I did - I noticed the same 1/2-inch sag on my '92, and decided that I might as well start fresh. I had it done for me at OK4WD in Stewartsville, NJ, since I didn't have the experience, time, tools, or level working space to do it myself.

After the guy at the dealer told me that my VIN showed 30 possible spring codes for the front coils (!!!), that the left and right coils probably were different codes (!!!), I priced the OME kit.

Turned out it was only a hundred bucks or so more (including installation and alignment), so I went with it. While they were at it, I got front swaybar discos as well, seeing as my OEM end links disintegrated when they attempted to unbolt them. On an '01, that shouldn't be a problem.

It goes in tonight to "have its bolts tightened", now that it's had 1000 miles to settle in. I'd have to say it's at least the equal of the OEM suspension, even with Poly bushings in the leaf packs. Even with my 225/75R15 tires, the truck looks very natural at that height. Think I'll go with 30x9.5 when the treads wear out, though - fill in the wheel wells a bit. Overall, I'm pleased with the result - definitely a good alternative to OEM for a little more height and no sacrifice in ride quality.

Unfortunately, I had vibe issues, so had to have a Tcase drop put in. I now have vibes at high speed (60-70mph region) that might indicate worn front driveshaft ujoints, according to the shop. They said they saw another XJ with the same kit do exactly this, and it turned out to be the front d/s, but I haven't gotten the shaft out yet to see if it changes things (having the shop do it while it's on the lift). An '01, having the more vibe-prone tcase output, might also suffer vibes at this height, so don't be too surprised if you do. If you don't, consider yourself to be one of the lucky few.

HTH,

Rob

Even with my 225/75R15 tires, the truck looks very natural at that height.

Click to expand...

That makes me feel good. My girlfriend just put 235/75s on it, so I was kinda worried if a 2" lift would look strange. I was planning on picking up some 30x9.5s, but she jumped the gun and took care of the tires while I was in Vegas last weekend. (She runs a Goodyear shop)

Unfortunately, I had vibe issues, so had to have a Tcase drop put in. I now have vibes at high speed (60-70mph region) that might indicate worn front driveshaft ujoints, according to the shop. They said they saw another XJ with the same kit do exactly this, and it turned out to be the front d/s, but I haven't gotten the shaft out yet to see if it changes things (having the shop do it while it's on the lift). An '01, having the more vibe-prone tcase output, might also suffer vibes at this height, so don't be too surprised if you do. If you don't, consider yourself to be one of the lucky few.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the heads-up. I hadn't seen anything on this yet in my roaming of the board.

Toph said:

girlfriend...runs a Goodyear shop

Click to expand...

Nice! Good catch there, I tell ya...

Toph said:

That makes me feel good. My girlfriend just put 235/75s on it, so I was kinda worried if a 2" lift would look strange.

Click to expand...

That should look slightly better than mine does - after a couple of days, the bigger spaces in the wheel wells won't even look odd.

Toph said:

Thanks for the heads-up. I hadn't seen anything on this yet in my roaming of the board.

Click to expand...

No problem. There might be something on the Modified board, but it has been a while since the topic came up. At any rate, all you can do is go one step at a time and see how you do - every rig's different.

Incidentally, I got mine back Sat. afternoon, sans front driveshaft. Turns out my high-speed vibes were due to one of the two joints in the double-cardan CV was bad (tcase end of the joint), as well as a ball that's in there to keep tension on things. The rest of the shaft is fine. It's going to take them about a week to get to rebuilding the shaft, so in the meantime I'll just go without 4x4 (pre-snow, who cares?).

My front driveshaft was rebuilt back in December. It seems that the change in angle messed up the one joint (guess it didn't like the change). It's a shame to have to rebuild the shaft yet again, but it's far cheaper than having to rebuild the Tcase to put in an SYE. (the shop doesn't have a high opinion of the "hack-&-tap" style)

Lesson? if you're getting vibes, take a good look at your driveshaft ujoints - you might just find your culprit and save a few bucks over the more expensive solutions.