3" Lift Enough For A Mall Crawler?

[seanof30306@yahoo.]

You want big, cool looking tires, but not the drop in gas mileage that comes with it. They only way help that gas mileage drop is to regear, which it sounds like you are unwilling to do.

I agree the statements are in opposition, which is why I took the information Smokeyyank was kind enough to give me on what big tires had done to his mileage and decided against the 33 x 12.5s.

275/60-17 are the stock tire size on my 2000 Expedition - they are WIDE. You will not be able to fit them without scrubbing the bejeebus out of your suspension on a Rubicon rim offset.

Here's where that confuses me. I stuck 275/75 16s on Rubicon rims on my Jeep once.



They rubbed like hell, but from the looking I did, the rubbing in the rear could have been ameliorated with a little BFH work, and a 3/8" slip on spacer.



Even with a 3/8" slip-on spacer, it didn't appear to me that the 275 tire was too wide to fit inside the wheelwell. Check the weights it took to balance those KO2s, by the way!



The rubbing in the front was much worse, but most of what I was able to see was at the front and rear of the wheelwell/fender flare, and on the control arms.



Those 275/75 16s were 32 1/2" tall. I figured a 275/60 17, which is only 30.1" tall, coupled with a 3" lift would resolve the fender/flare rubbing, and the control arm rubbing could be resolved with offset control arms.

No Bueno?



The wheels I've bought, TUFF T20Rs, are 17 x 8; +10mm offset. That calculates to about 4 3/8" backspace. They're due to get here Thursday; I'll measure them to be sure then.

http://www.wheelhero.com/customwheels/TUFF/T20R-Silver/wvid20590

As for mileage, When I went from stock 225/70-15 to 30x9.5-15 on 3.55s, I lost about 1.5mpg average. When I had 31s, I lost 3.5mpg average. 30" tires seem to be the upper limit for minimal mileage loss.

So, I ran my 225/70 15s for a little over 40,000 miles, and averaged 17mpg.

I went to 255/70 15s (29" tall) and got 60,000 mile out of them. Later in the life of the tires, I changed the way I drive, and was averaging 19 mpg. The speedometer was never corrected, so that means I actually travelled more miles than the speedo shows, doesn't it? if that's the case, my mileage should be better than 19, shouldn't it?

For the last 47,000 miles, I've been running 245/70 16s (29 1/2" tall. The mpg stayed the same. The speedo is still not corrected, so that means the mpg is actually better, doesn't it?

I'm with Dan, this is a childish troll statement.

Man, I came on here to find out how to do what I want to do to my Jeep, not for all this silly drama, but how is my statement childish and trollish, but his comments about Magic cards and saying I want to make the changes to my Jeep to impress high school students not?

I'll tell you something, I actually came up on a guy putting a "Mall Rated" sticker on my Jeep. If he'd been putting it on my window, I would probably have laughed and left it on there, but this jerk stuck one on my driver's-side fender, and was going over to the other side to put one on the passenger-side fender when I came up and asked him what the hell he was doing. He started talking trash to me about my Jeep being a Mall crawler in that stupid Handicorn voice. I put him on the ground and held him there till the cops got there.

You know they sell those stickers for that, right?

http://www.jcroffroad.com/product/DLMLLRTD.html

Wonder why they sell them in sheets of 10? I mean, I'd actually buy two of those stickers to stick in my quarter windows as a joke, but what would I do with 10?

Search youtube and find out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkD2baUnyRQ

Yeah ... tell me who the trolls are.

For my rigs future, which is mainly 90% road driving, I'm going up to 31s as a max tire size with my 4" lift. I'll use 255/70-17 on a rim with 4.5" backspacing. I'll also be regearing to 4.11 to compensate. I barely have fender trimming and this set up would put the edge of the tire at the edge of the flare and keep it off the control arms.

I would suggest getting some fresh UpCountry level springs to get you back up to stock height, and getting 255/60-17 (29x10) tires. Should give you that wide look you are hoping for and keep with the stock mileage. A low Jeep with a wide tired stance is pretty sweet looking.

I don't think my front springs have sagged any. I read somewhere on here that an unlifted XJ should be about 17" from the center of the wheel to the bottom of the fender flare. Mine is 18" in the front. If 17" is stock, then 18" would be correct for an Up Country, wouldn't it?

The 275/60 17 is only 1.1" wider and 1" taller than the 255. You don't think another 2" of lift and offset control arms would cover that?

Asthetically, I think 3" of lift looks great on an XJ.

EDIT: Also, I don't see any AT tires in 255/60 17

 

[seanof30306@yahoo.]

I always found it funny that people shit on a guy that wants larger tires for looks on his jeep, yet the same people shitting on him would throw a leveling kit and 35s or something on their tow rig for...looks?

The guy wants his jeep to look cool with larger tires...who cares.

Thanks, man.

I've been on those forum for over 10 years. In the past, you didn't see this kind of crap.

Something's changed in the past couple of years though. Now, if you're not running 15s on soft-8s, you get pounded like a whack-a-mole every time you stick your head up.

A couple of weeks ago, a guy posted a pic of his 2 door 2WD XJ in one of the Facebook XJ groups. He's got a home-made 6 1/2" lift on it, and is running 36 x 14 x 20s on it with Notch Customs X-Max flares.

It looked like a Hot Wheels car. I actually accused him of photoshopping it. He posted more pics of it, and described the build. His workmanship was incredible.

I suggested he post a thread about it on here. he said he's a member of this forum, but seldom posts because of the Soft 8 Nazis. We all ahd a big laugh on that one.

I decided to put up a thread on it, and a mod deleted it within 15 minutes. never found out why.

I thought this forum was for all XJs. Guess I was wrong.

 

[87manche]

look, I'm telling you that lift height doesn't matter.

The relation to the suspension components remains nearly unchanged.

you cannot run that wide/tall a tire on a stock rubicon wheel without spacers.
spacers will then push the tire out so that it contacts the fender lip with very little uptravel.

So you do like the guy in your last post. you hack the fenders up to make room for the tire to clear it.

You don't want spacers.
You don't want to cut fenders.
you don't want to regear.
you don't want to lose MPG.

What you want is not possible.
There are compromises that must be made when you start changing things. Even with a regear you'll eat up suspension components faster and your mileage will go down because of the increased weight of the tires. Balljoint life decreases exponentially with lower backspacing, unit bearings too, because you're putting more leverage on them.

Like I told you in the last thread, anything larger than a 245/75/16 is going to rub on stock arms. WJ arms barely clear. increase width or diameter another 1/2" and it will rub. push the wheels out and you'll eat the fender.

I don't know how else to explain it to you, it's simple geometry. Go outside, jack up one side until it hits the bumpstop in the front and measure it.
The reason everyone runs cheap steel wheels is because they're cheap, and you can get them in a 4.5" backspace that fixes the issue without the use of wheel spacers. often times a set of steel wheels is cheaper than a good set of wheel spacers.

now, I've run 35's on 3" of lift. it can be done, but you're gonna get a wheel with 4" of backspacing and then cut the fenders to the body line to clear them, and need additional bumpstop still. you could do 33's with the same formula and probably not need bumpstop.
A 33' that's 10" wide will fit, but still need less backspacing to clear suspension, but you could probably get the top of the tire to tuck into the fender so you could avoid cutting the front. you'll need lots of bumpstop to keep it happy in the rear, along with hammering down the inner fender seams everywhere.


i'm not sure why i even bothered, because i'm just a hater that doesn't want to see you spend your money.....

 

[smokeyyank]

Since I'm going to replace the rear leafs, anyway, I'm thinking of OME springs; 2, or 3"; whichever works.

In the front, my springs are already 1" lift Up Country's. I've seen bigger isolator pads in 1 1/2" lift, 1 3/4" lift, and 2" lift, so I'm thinking I'll use whichever of those brings me to match whatever I do in the back.

With bigger isolators, do you need to do the drop brackets for the front swaybar?

With a 2", or 3" lift in the trar, will you need to lower the transfer case?

Also, I don't know what an "ACOS" is.

Hahaha, oh boy. Mall crawlin stickers, magic cards, internet trolls...so much fun. Do we get to sign everyone's year book on the last day too?!

I'll be honest I have no idea about backspacing or metrics wheels sizes. I just know what I think looks good and what works. Different strokes for different folks.

As for what you where asking.......

For the sway bar. You may need brackets just depends on how big you go. I would say yes if you're going above 2" total.

For a 3" lift. You may need to drop the transfer case. Don't think you would really need it for 2". I had to drop the tcase on my 3.5 and for driving around it's fine, but I would prefer a SYE.

ACOS is what iluv83vettes said.

 

[dan1977p]

I don't care how big of a tire you have. Really, I don't. When someone says they want x and y but x and y are mutually exclusive, they get informed of that by folks. That's all most of us are saying. You can't lift and put bigger than stock tires on a car and retain the same MPG. No mention of steelies vs alloys and if you pulled your head out of your butt, you would see what folks are saying. Alloys, btw, will help your MPG vs steelies so I would support them 100% in your case. I'd use them too if I thought they would hold up when bashed on rocks around here.

FWIW (since I can't seem to shy away from a measuring contest), the P in 1977P stands for paramedic and I've been on our Search and Rescue team. I've saved my fair share of lives and rescued more than a few folks who thought they could weather conditions they had no reason to be out in.

 

[seanof30306@yahoo.]

Hahaha, oh boy. Mall crawlin stickers, magic cards, internet trolls...so much fun. Do we get to sign everyone's year book on the last day too?!

I'll be honest I have no idea about backspacing or metrics wheels sizes. I just know what I think looks good and what works. Different strokes for different folks.

As for what you where asking.......

For the sway bar. You may need brackets just depends on how big you go. I would say yes if you're going above 2" total.

For a 3" lift. You may need to drop the transfer case. Don't think you would really need it for 2". I had to drop the tcase on my 3.5 and for driving around it's fine, but I would prefer a SYE.

ACOS is what iluv83vettes said.

If the sway bar brackets need dropped on a 3" lift, and probably the t-case, I wonder if it would be better to just go with a lift kit, where all the components are matched?

I'm concerned with throwing the suspension geometry off by too much. Don't want any more death wobble problems.

 

[smokeyyank]

If the sway bar brackets need dropped on a 3" lift, and probably the t-case, I wonder if it would be better to just go with a lift kit, where all the components are matched?

I'm concerned with throwing the suspension geometry off by too much. Don't want any more death wobble problems.

Yes, at 3" you're going to need to drop the tcase. You can pieces together what you want. Kit's are great but if you want specific characteristics you'll always be better off piecing it together, but it will cost more.

 

[seanof30306@yahoo.]

I don't care how big of a tire you have. Really, I don't. When someone says they want x and y but x and y are mutually exclusive, they get informed of that by folks. That's all most of us are saying. You can't lift and put bigger than stock tires on a car and retain the same MPG. No mention of steelies vs alloys and if you pulled your head out of your butt, you would see what folks are saying. Alloys, btw, will help your MPG vs steelies so I would support them 100% in your case. I'd use them too if I thought they would hold up when bashed on rocks around here.

FWIW (since I can't seem to shy away from a measuring contest), the P in 1977P stands for paramedic and I've been on our Search and Rescue team. I've saved my fair share of lives and rescued more than a few folks who thought they could weather conditions they had no reason to be out in.

a) I never said I expected to retain the same MPG. I said it wasn't worth the huge drop in MPG he described to run those 33" tires, so I dropped the idea of the 33" tires.

Read that again ... slowly. Let it sink in. Had you read it the first time, you wouldn't have posited your whole "When someone says they want x and y but x and y are mutually exclusive, they get informed of that by folks."

I never said I wanted both x and y. If you'd read what I said, you'd know that.

b) There is no "measuring contest". You chose to characterize what I do with my Jeep as trying to impress high school students. I corrected you, pointed out that you live in an area with even more extreme winter weather than what I experience, and said I assumed you were out in the bad weather helping people, too.

You'll notice, unlike you, I managed to say what I had to say with out sneering at you, or insulting you.

c) It's kinda silly for the guy who acts like a jerk to start whining about the lack of respect he's being shown.

 

[CarbonXJ]

Here's where that confuses me. I stuck 275/75 16s on Rubicon rims on my Jeep once.

Those 275/75 16s were 32 1/2" tall. I figured a 275/60 17, which is only 30.1" tall, coupled with a 3" lift would resolve the fender/flare rubbing, and the control arm rubbing could be resolved with offset control arms.

going up in rim size and dropping the aspect ratio works well, but the tread width doesn’t stay the same, even though it should. Sure it looks like it does on paper, but not in the real world. I’ll measure for you when I get home just how wide the actual 275/60 tire carcass is versus the tread width. And yes, it could be corrected with offset control arms, but it is a very wide tire. My 235/60-15 on my truck SHOULD be 9.3” wide – the tread is actually 9.6” wide and the carcass is 10.5” wide. This varies by tire manufacturer though.

The wheels I've bought, TUFF T20Rs, are 17 x 8; +10mm offset. That calculates to about 4 3/8" backspace. They're due to get here Thursday; I'll measure them to be sure then.


Very close to the rim set up that I want to use. That will help, but now you’re closer to the fender with the wide tire. I like them, good choice bro.

Man, I came on here to find out how to do what I want to do to my Jeep, not for all this silly drama, but how is my statement childish and trollish, but his comments about Magic cards and saying I want to make the changes to my Jeep to impress high school students not?

I'll tell you something, I actually came up on a guy putting a "Mall Rated" sticker on my Jeep. If he'd been putting it on my window, I would probably have laughed, but this jerk stuck one on my driver's-side fender, and was going over to the other side to put one on the passenger-side fender when I came up and asked him what the hell he was doing. He started talking trash to me about my Jeep being a Mall crawler in that stupid Handicorn voice. I put him on the ground and held him there till the cops got there.

You know they sell those stickers for that, right?

http://www.jcroffroad.com/product/DLMLLRTD.html

Wonder why they sell them in sheets of 10? I mean, I'd actually buy two of those stickers to stick in my quarter windows as a joke, but what would I do with 10?

Search youtube and find out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkD2baUnyRQ

Yeah ... tell me who the trolls are.

I just say to take to take a light-hearted approach to comments here. Most are in good fun. The defensive stance for every comment is uncalled for. I have a rebuttal for many of them as well, but it’s too easy to get off track in a pissing contest. I know you want to stay on topic.

I don't think my front springs have sagged any. I read somewhere on here that an unlifted XJ should be about 17" from the center of the wheel to the bottom of the fender flare. Mine is 18" in the front. If 17" is stock, then 18" would be correct for an Up Country, wouldn't it?
You are correct. I would not recommend anything over 2” as far as coil spacers, so you should be fine up front with those and that adj track bar. New rear leafs and shackles will help the rear, and I also suggest an SYE kit.

The 275/60 17 is only 1.1" wider and 1" taller than the 255. You don't think another 2" of lift and offset control arms would cover that?


They are very large tires. The tread width is different from the carcass width. The sidewall will bulge out farther than the tread, and THAT is what scrubs. Had that issue on my 87 Ranger I swapped a 5.0L into it, I could not find wide enough tread that wouldn’t scrub the leafs with the sidewalls or hit the tie rods, and still stay inside the fender while driving. I chose to get a smaller tire for my truck; on the XJ you can trim inside the fender and bumpstop, but only so much.

Asthetically, I think 3" of lift looks great on an XJ. Agreed - It should have been 3” higher from the factory, it’s the best look in my opinion.

Like I told you in the last thread, anything larger than a 245/75/16 is going to rub on stock arms. WJ arms barely clear. increase width or diameter another 1/2" and it will rub. push the wheels out and you'll eat the fender.
THIS. As you widen the tire, the arc they travel in gets wider. When that arc intersects the fenders and control arms, things get messy.

Personally, for a pavement pounder XJ, I'd set it up with a 2" lift and some 245/70-17 white letter tires. As big as you can squeeze with minimal mods.

 

[Cottontail]

Yes, at 3" you're going to need to drop the tcase. You can pieces together what you want. Kit's are great but if you want specific characteristics you'll always be better off piecing it together, but it will cost more.

Not true. I'm well over 3" and running 32" tires and I've yet to drop the t-case.

 

[smokeyyank]

Not true. I'm well over 3" and running 32" tires and I've yet to drop the t-case.

And how many times have you replaced the u joints.....? Technically you don't have to drop it but let's just say it's advised to do to......

 

[Cottontail]

It's pretty dangerous to speak in absolutes when dealing with Jeeps. Perhaps it is advisable in your experience. In mine, it is not advisable.

I haven't done or needed u-joints in quite some time. I have a full case SYE and have the rear axle shimmed appropriately and it works just fine.

 

[CarbonXJ]

Not true. I'm well over 3" and running 32" tires and I've yet to drop the t-case.

You never said you HAD an SYE in that first post. If you go by what it written, it sounds like you are over 3" with a stock slip yoke still installed, which would eat u-joints. based on this information, it WOULD be advisable to drop the case, OR get an SYE kit.

It's pretty dangerous to speak in absolutes when dealing with Jeeps. Perhaps it is advisable in your experience. In mine, it is not advisable.

I haven't done or needed u-joints in quite some time. I have a full case SYE and have the rear axle shimmed appropriately and it works just fine.

Here we have the needed information. Now we know you DO have an SYE kit, and would NOT need to drop the case, since that would defeat the purpose of an SYE. So your statement is true, but horribly misleading without that information.

 

[Cottontail]

I'll concede that fact that I didn't give complete information, however Smokyyank didn't really give complete information either....

The pitfalls of giving advice on the internet....

Again...the danger of absolutes...

You gotta admit, the rest of the post has been entertaining...

 

[CarbonXJ]

This has been my source of a smile all day long, for sure.

it's the internet - it gets wild. pretty soon we might have some cat memes showing up

 

[seanof30306@yahoo.]

http://i.amz.mshcdn.com/TUGnCLIUndm...m/wp-content/gallery/catmemes/KeyboardCat.gif

 

[smokeyyank]

I'll concede that fact that I didn't give complete information, however Smokyyank didn't really give complete information either....

The pitfalls of giving advice on the internet....

Again...the danger of absolutes...

You gotta admit, the rest of the post has been entertaining...

Guess, I'm lost on what I didn't give.......

In either case it's been funny as hell and the :flame: are buring so let's get out the mallows and make up some s'mores!

 

[91Heep]

Wow this has Definately escalated quickly.
I have enjoyed the entertainment though.
I second the notion for 245/70's, if you choose 2".
Tire options would increase as well.
I recomend Mastercraft AXT.
It's a good tire for the $$$.

 

[seanof30306@yahoo.]

The SP Cherokee will NEVER wear 245s again!!!!!!

 

[91Heep]

The 245/70 is more tire than the 275/60.
It may be numerically smaller but it isn't completely smaller.
Are you aware of tire tread width vs. Wheel width resulting in good or bad tread wear patterns?
They need to be somewhat matched since this is your daily.
And it doesn't matter what you've ran on what wheel for however many miles, it's something that you may want to consider.

If it were my daily i was setting up with your limitations / goals I'd use:
-Rubicon express RE1600 track bar.
- 2" coil spacers.
-extended sway bar links or the lowering brackets.
Probably brackets since the stock end links work well.
-BDS 3" leaf springs.
-fixed lower control arms with bushings at each end.
Your chassis still has camber adjustment.
( several name brands out there)
-appropriate length shocks....
everyones preference is different there for sure.
-1" T-Case drop.
And Definately 245/70r17's considering your wheel width.

I'm not pro SYE or Bilstien for every application.

And that can't be argued because it's my opinion and it's just how I would do it.
You would have all needed parts to acheive the look your wanting in a way that makes sense to do it.
My opinion is only worth what you have paid me for it.