who's running 14" travel shocks up front? specifically Bilstein 5100s?

I'm getting ready to order some Bilstein 5100s and I'm hoping I'll be able to fit the 14" travel ones up front, but my truck is 2000 miles away so I can't really measure. So who has 14" travel shocks (21" compressed length) and what did it take to fit them?

Mine:
-7 inch lift, front D44, leaf springs
-it's basically a blank slate, I can weld shockmounts anywhere on the axle, and anywhere in the wheel-well area, but I don't want to cut through into the engine bay.
-I want a good 6" of uptravel


or, if someone has about 7" lift and feels like just measureing for me I'd like to know the distance from the hole the stock shock goes through to the bottom of the axle tube.


thanks

btt.

I'm running 12s on 8 inches of lift and bw cutouts with 33s (moving to 36s after I spin the acos around a few times). I'd think you're going to need to go bumpstop it, go with 33s with about my lift or better, or try tj flares maybe? I'm just tossing out guesses based on my setup.

If I screwed another inch on my acos I'm fairly certain I could run the 14s.

I run DT8000's of the 8407 flavor. According to their website they are 32 ext. and 18.5 coll. I run a set of RE shock conversions to get eyes on both ends. For me its about perfect. I run RE's 7.5" coils and RE 4.5 leafs with RK 2.5" shackles and 35 BFG Mud KM's. I built my XJ as a DD so I planned on just trimming up my flairs somewhat similar to Skyjackers and with this set up, NO BUMPSTOPS, at full compression It leaves me about an inch from top of tire to bottom of factory flair on my 99. The reason I say no bumpstops is because these have a built in bumpstop. I hear alot of people saying not to rely on them but I have not had a chance to make some and have not had any issues. Plus they have a lifetime warranty and if the are advertising "built in bumpstops" they should work.

I'm going to get the 12s, in case anyone else is wondering:

I just chatted with Ary online and he ran 14" Bilsteins on 7" lift, with the axle mount right at the bottom of the axle tube and the upper mount in the stock locatioin (with adapter), he only had 3-4 inches of up-travel.

BrettM said:

I'm going to get the 12s, in case anyone else is wondering:

I just chatted with Ary online and he ran 14" Bilsteins on 7" lift, with the axle mount right at the bottom of the axle tube and the upper mount in the stock locatioin (with adapter), he only had 3-4 inches of up-travel.

Click to expand...

I'm running 14's with about 6.5" lift. The shock sits on top of the axle, but is mounted outside of the coil buckets up top. I only have about 4.5" up travel. Definatly not worth it. Get the 12's.
Billy

JeepFreak21 said:

I'm running 14's with about 6.5" lift. The shock sits on top of the axle, but is mounted outside of the coil buckets up top. I only have about 4.5" up travel. Definatly not worth it. Get the 12's.
Billy

Click to expand...

Yeah I've got ~7" and have RS9005s up front...with stud conversion and BPE, and have about 4.5" of up travel. Those things are too long for me. I'm getting some 7100s...not sure which flavor yet. Have a little more measuring and adjusting suspension height before I order them.

The 12's are plenty. It's not easy positioning them to get full use out of them. Really, you can get great performance out of an XJ suspension with 10" shocks. I run 12's with a JKS mount on top and the lower mounts are moved both downward and outward from the stock location, the bumpstops are raised on bottom and lowered on top, and I still have trouble bottoming out the shocks. I really can't go lower......I've already ground some off the caliper so it clears the shock at full lock. I've moved the lower mount outward because of trouble with the shock hitting the frame when fully twisted up.

For crawling and trail work the 10" travel shocks would be fine. I run the 12's for more travel on the fast stuff, but I have to adjust my limiting straps from trail work to speed work to make use of the extra travel.