How much is too much lift?

I'm almost ready to purchase a clayton lift but i don't know much about lifted cherokees. Would 8 inches be to high and tip over too easily compared to a 6.5. Is 6.5 iches plenty of ground clearnce or not enough. i won't be useing a front sway bar if that helps.

depends on what you want to do with it

well i rarely do water crossings. its mainly hill climbing/decents, and alot of rocks that tend to put you in some nice offcamber situations along with rock ledges.

I am at 6" with 33's and I never have problems with clearance. I was originally at 8" and didn't like it I thought it was too tippy.

it's not the size of lift that gives you ground clearance, it's tire size, so the bigger tire you can fit with least amount of lift is best, so i would go for around 5.5" and try to get some 33"s to 35"s.

so would 6.5 inches of lift clear 35's with moderate fender trimming?

Yeah, you could get yourself a set of TJ flares and install them then you should clear 35's

or you could just trim and run flareless, be cheaper and personally i think it looks better.

tjader said:

I'm almost ready to purchase a clayton lift but i don't know much about lifted cherokees. Would 8 inches be to high and tip over too easily compared to a 6.5. Is 6.5 iches plenty of ground clearnce or not enough. i won't be useing a front sway bar if that helps.

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I'm not sure how much of this you already know, but since you wrote that you don't know much about lifted cherokees.... 6.5 to 8" is going to be a major buildup, much more than deciding on which system to go with. You can still clear large tires by using a lower lift and doing some serious cutting on the fenders. I only mention this because some folks start out thinking about building up their xj only to discover that it includes a bewildering amount of other mods to get those inches and still drive home from the trail. A buildup like this will include lots of necessary steering and driveline mods too and will be serious time and money... But, enjoy!
Buck :canada:

I do know about lifting tj's and the work that has to be done. I just don't know about how well lifted cherokees perform offroad with different lift sizes.

tjader said:

I do know about lifting tj's and the work that has to be done. I just don't know about how well lifted cherokees perform offroad with different lift sizes.

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Xj's w/ 6" and 33's will get you just about anywhere.

The RE 5.5" kit with 37" MT/R's on 15x8" rims with 3.25" BS works really good for me. The ground clearance is great as well as the stability. For 35's, I have realized awesome stability in running the RE 5.5" kit, but instead of the 4.5" leaf packs and the 1.25" RE shackle for the rear and the ZJ 4.5" lift coils for the front that come with the kit, swap out the 4.5" ZJ coils for 3.5" ZJ coils, and for the rear, either loose the shackle, or swap the 4.5" leaf packs for the 3.5" leaf packs. This will give you a great riding 5" of lift, and is plenty of lift for 35's. As mentioned before little lift, big tires and wide stance are a great combo for clearance and stability. Fender trimming and proper bumpstops are very important when properly tuning your suspension. Check out the tech section of my site for helpful writeups on fender trimming and adjusting bumpstops.

8" of lift wont make it tipsy as long as you keep a solid wheelbase. 8in with. . .a 12.50 tire width would be a minimum.