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Need some suggestions about shocks

SC Rednek

NAXJA Forum User
Location
Winchester TN
I recently finished putting 44/9 axles under my jeep. My jeep's primarily built for rockcrawling, but I often end up going through miles of desert to get there.

Just going down the main roads in Johnon Valley on Saturday, I went airborn a couple times at under 20 mph. Running Rancho rs9000xl shocks, set almost as hard as they'll go, still doesn't even feel like I have shocks. I drive over an 8" rise at 10 mph, and it will hit top and bottom of the travel on both axles, sometimes more than once.

Within a few hours I bent the rear passenger side shock, and slightly bent and destroyed the valving in the front passenger shock. Immediately breaking the the axle mounts both times, after the second one I had to be done for the weekend.

Looking for suggestions on what I can do to make it better. Not looking to go real fast, but I want to at least be able to drive around at a reasonable speed and not get laughed at by my friend in a stock CJ7 going twice as fast without any problems. I'm capable of fabbing just about anything I need, so any suggestion is welcome.
 
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welcome to the desert, shit doesnt last around here. especially jumping with white rockets. people dont run foxes or kings cause they look cool....

...you bumpstoped and limit strapped/limited properly?
 
I run Fox 2.0 res shocks all the way around. Best $ I have ever spent. I am running a 9.5" stud mount made for a JK in the front and a 8.5" in the rear. I also upgraded the res on the fronts to the 11" body instead of the 8" that comes on it. More oil is better.

And you have to valve them to get them usable. I am running 70 something compression in the front and 70 in the rear. But the rear needs to be more like 80-85.
 
Those look like about $475 a peice, I'm sure I could find them a lot cheaper if I look around for a while. If I do those I'll have to replace the two cheap shocks I broke now and save my pennies for about 8 months. Is there anything wrong with the $230 non-bypass fox 2.0 shocks? How fast will they overheat? I'm not a racer, I just want to go more than 10 mph.
 
The bypass tubes are to make the shock valving tunable without tearing the shock apart. The way it's supposed to work is you set up the internal valving(on the piston) slightly hard,then you can adjust the bypass to fine tune the ride.
For a street/trail rig, seldom run flat-out in the sand, non-bypass shocks will be fine. The reservoir is also kind of optional(resis will run cooler, longer, but again, not a huge issue on a light trail rig) although the resi shocks can be shorter for the same travel length then a non-resi shock, making them easier to fit.
Search around on the jeepspeed forum. There's a lot of shock talk/, and several pretty good threads on shock fitment/tuning.(Ok, it's almost ALL we talk about,... Do a search on shocks in there and you get just about every thread ever started :D )
 
alright, I'll head over to that forum tomorrow if I have some time at "work". I've never looked much into shocks before, so I may have some more questions into a couple days after I've done some reading.
 
I've been reading and it looks like the Bilstein 7100 is the most popular in my sort of application. The 14" travel, short body w/ reservoir would fit my front mounts perfectly, and I could build the hoops in the rear to fit. They're recommending 360/80 valving on the front and 275/78 on the rear, would that be resonable since I do drive this Jeep a lot on the street too? Also a little concerned that the shaft is only 14mm (about 9/16"), doesn't seem very strong since I just bent a 1/2" shaft on a shorter travel, less damping shock.

At $195 or so a shock I could probably afford them in 4-6 weeks, so I wouldn't have to replace my current broken shocks, just get the CJ put back together and drive that for a while.

What's the reasoning in one shock behind and one in front of the rear axle? I heard someone once say it helped prevent wheel hop, but when I was looking arond today I saw of lot of people didn't bother keeping that setup. Is it worth keeping that design or putting both shocks in front or behind the axle?
 
What's the reasoning in one shock behind and one in front of the rear axle? I heard someone once say it helped prevent wheel hop, but when I was looking arond today I saw of lot of people didn't bother keeping that setup. Is it worth keeping that design or putting both shocks in front or behind the axle?

I believe they are mounted that way to help prevent axle wrap.
 
I just got my income tax refund, so these are my options. Looking to order next week if anyone has any opinion on any of these, good or bad. My biggest concern with the Bilstein is the little shaft, but I'm not sure if the larger shaft is worth the extra $100 per corner.

King 2.0 smooth body remote reservoir
$290, 14" travel, 35.585" extended, 7/8" shaft, user adjustable
http://www.polyperformance.com/shop/King-2.0-Performance-Series-Smoothie-Shock-p-24116.html

Fox 2.0 remote reservoir smooth body
$285, 14" travel, 35.10" extended, 7/8" shaft, user adjustable
http://downsouthmotorsports.com/i-1...ervoir-smooth-body-shocks-5-8-7-8-shafts.html

Bilstein 7100 remote reservoir
$185, 14" travel, 35.04" extended, 14mm (9/16") shaft, 360/80 front, 275/78 rear valving
http://www.eshocks.com/bil_ORvh.asp?Series_Index=Q3&Length_Index=1Q2&Manf=All&SubChar=Q
 
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before you buy nice shocks. mount them/ bumpstop and limit strap so they don't break
 
Trust me I will, I have to build new mounts for these shocks, so I'll be welding in limit strap mounts at the same time.

I've got the time to do this right, my CJ5 should be back together this weekend (putting on 4" lift YJ RE springs + 1" lift shackles), so I'll just wheel that till the XJ is done.
 
Sounds like your shocks were blown or you're undersprung quite a bit. How long of shocks are you running? Definitely make sure you place your bumpstops to fully bottom before shocks do.

If you only occastionally hit the bumps at speed, I would just get some Bilsteins.

Here are my 5125s at about 50 on a whoop road (12-15 inch whoops). 6inch up, 6 inch downtravel.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7F4VFEhfcc

I just run OMEs on my XJ, but it's a real mild offroader.
 
go with a REBUILDABLE/REVALVEABLE shock, neither 5150's, nor 5125's are USER rebuildable...

7100's or a regular, non adjustable fox 2.0 would be enough, the king stuff is nicer, but pricey... you could allways dive right in, and look around on rdc for some used stuff to save coin, it might mean getting the 2.5's for upfront with the savings... sky's the limit. please keep us updated, im allways interested in high end shock setups.
 
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