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To lift, or not to lift? That is the question...

stephenspann27

NAXJA Forum User
After owning my '87 D44 AW4 NP231 4.0 for a year, I finally have it road worthy, it has brand new paint, perfectly straight body, and I've rebuilt the engine, save the pistons and rings. Since then I've logged about 600 miles, and much to my surprise I'm getting 20mpg. It runs awesome.. other than erratic idle.. which I haven't made much effort to track down yet.

I had planned on taking the 3'' (or so) lift off my parts jeep, and transferring it to my '87. Its a real lift.. no blocks or spacers. However.. now that I see I can get 20mpg.. I'm planning on making my XJ my DD. Because I don't want to risk hurting the mileage I don't want to go up on tire size much. I may stick with 235's.. and certainly not bigger than 30'' tires. So if I'm not going to run tires big enough to warrant a lift? Why install it? I know its probably slight.. but a lift could also hurt the MPG.. and also create complications with alignment.. death wobble ect. I realize all of these problems can be over come.. with adjustable track bars.. maybe make up the MPG with a gear ratio change.. but that's a lot of time and money..

I'm think about just installing lockers front and rear (or LSD in the rear) and some midly aggressive AT tires that are not too loud..

thoughts?
 
Well i have 3.5" of lift and i was getting 20 mpg and sometimes better but now i'm only getting 14 but i think it has to do with a bad O2 sensor because it has been giving me the code and lots of other little problems that have come up but yes 20 mpg can happen with 31's and no other mods
 
30" tires don't require any lift unless you're wheeling it hard. If you're DDing it, throw the 30s on it and drive. I say leave it down.

If you're going with a LS, the Truetrac is about the best one out there.
 
After owning my '87 D44 AW4 NP231 4.0 for a year, I finally have it road worthy, it has brand new paint, perfectly straight body, and I've rebuilt the engine, save the pistons and rings. Since then I've logged about 600 miles, and much to my surprise I'm getting 20mpg. It runs awesome.. other than erratic idle.. which I haven't made much effort to track down yet.

I had planned on taking the 3'' (or so) lift off my parts jeep, and transferring it to my '87. Its a real lift.. no blocks or spacers. However.. now that I see I can get 20mpg.. I'm planning on making my XJ my DD. Because I don't want to risk hurting the mileage I don't want to go up on tire size much. I may stick with 235's.. and certainly not bigger than 30'' tires. So if I'm not going to run tires big enough to warrant a lift? Why install it? I know its probably slight.. but a lift could also hurt the MPG.. and also create complications with alignment.. death wobble ect. I realize all of these problems can be over come.. with adjustable track bars.. maybe make up the MPG with a gear ratio change.. but that's a lot of time and money..

I'm think about just installing lockers front and rear (or LSD in the rear) and some midly aggressive AT tires that are not too loud..

thoughts?

Links to three-part JPMagazine article on XJ mileage:

MPG:


http://www.jpmagazine.com/projectbuild/154_0808_building_a_fuel_efficient_jeep/index.html


http://www.jpmagazine.com/projectbuild/154_0810_building_a_fuel_efficient_jeep_part_2/index.html


http://www.jpmagazine.com/projectbu...cherokee_xj_project_mileage_master/index.html
 
For what its worth, I have a friend of mine in Germany (he may chime in here) when we were over there, and we both installed front aussie lockers in our jeeps at roughly the same time. Here is the kicker:

I have a full 6.5" clayton longarm suspension, Bilistein shocks, 33" TruXus MT's, Tom Woods shafts, SYE, yadda yadda yadda the whole nine. I spent 5 grand on my suspension, wheels and tires all at one time.

He has a locker and some, at the time, crappy AT OEM sized tires. Thats it. Bone stock otherwise.

We wheeled together on a number of occasions and he went 95% of the places I did. It was truly impressive. He had to use the skinny pedal a little more due to non agressive tires, and less clearance, but he went where I did with no failures.

My point? There is a lot to be said for a stock Jeep with a locker and decent tires if you pick the right lines. Sure, you wont be running many 4 or 5 rated trails, but you can certainly enjoy your jeep offroad, and still reep the benefits of being mostly stock (gas mileage, les part failures, etc). Once you learn the limits of what you can do, its all about picking and choosing your line, based on your and your jeep abilities.

I wouldnt change anything I did to my jeep (except for maybe the sucky a** TruXus tires), but you can do a lot with a little in a jeep.

[If I were you, and im not] I would throw on some agressive 29"-30" tires, lock the front, and wheel the hell out of it. Then when you are done, enjoy the nice ride back home @ 20mpg. You wont be disapointed.

If you get the bug to go bigger, do it right, and all the way the first time, or else you are wasting money on 2 and 3 inch lifts.

Just my $.02

~James
 
I appreciate all of the replies. Some good insight. At the risk of sounded like a moron.. coming from a sports car back ground, I sometimes take corners pretty aggressively.
I've been really amazed at how little body roll my XJ has, esp. with 260k on the suspension.If I were to lift it, it would get the jeep's weight higher in the air and possibly cause it to have more body roll. I realize that sometimes the aftermarket leaves, and coils are so much stiffer than the OEM that there isn't any extra body roll... but I have no idea what grade of lift is on the parts jeep. Just another factors I've been thinking about..

Maybe I'll run it stock until the rear leaf's start giving up.. or snap..
 
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This was the very same dilemma I faced with my 1992 Limited. It gets good milage, it's in good shape, it's comfy and everything works! I fretted and fussed over what to do... Lift it? Trim it? Go all-out, or leave it as stock as possible?

I left it stock and bought a YJ to beat on.

*ducks*
 
I can't comment on the gas mileage because I didn't get any good measurements before lifting and putting bigger tires on. Now I get 16-17 average though.

But I do take corners fast, with my 2" OME light duty springs, and sway bars front and rear. Sometimes I forget I'm driving the Jeep and not the Miata until it feels like it's going to be too late... But it gets through fine. It's kind of fun hearing the tires squeeling on a lifted Jeep.... until you flip
 
its not 100% about looks, but looks are important. stock cherokees dont do it for me.

do they do it for you?
why dont you drop it a couple inches below stock??
 
I can't comment on the gas mileage because I didn't get any good measurements before lifting and putting bigger tires on. Now I get 16-17 average though.

But I do take corners fast, with my 2" OME light duty springs, and sway bars front and rear. Sometimes I forget I'm driving the Jeep and not the Miata until it feels like it's going to be too late... But it gets through fine. It's kind of fun hearing the tires squeeling on a lifted Jeep.... until you flip

what size tires are you running? Yr model? auto or man?
 
Sell your 3" lift, get a budget boost, throw on some 30" tires, put a locker in the rear and call it a day.
 
I appreciate all of the replies. Some good insight. At the risk of sounded like a moron.. coming from a sports car back ground, I sometimes take corners pretty aggressively.
I've been really amazed at how little body roll my XJ has, esp. with 260k on the suspension.If I were to lift it, it would get the jeep's weight higher in the air and possibly cause it to have more body roll. I realize that sometimes the aftermarket leaves, and coils are so much stiffer than the OEM that there isn't any extra body roll... but I have no idea what grade of lift is on the parts jeep. Just another factors I've been thinking about..

Maybe I'll run it stock until the rear leaf's start giving up.. or snap..

You could swap-in some V8 ZJ front coils and add an extra long leaf from a discarded stock XJ set.
Add some better shocks and your 1-1.5 inch budget lift will handle those corners much better than stock.
235's would compliment such a light performance lift perfectly, IMO.
 
Thanks for the suggestions.. I do need shocks front and rear. That's why I'm having to think about this. Not sure if I should get some slightly longer shocks incase I ever install the lift.. or just get some stock length shocks.. Can't you use stock shocks with up to a 2'' lift?
 
Typically you can use them for a small lift, you could always go with a set of Bar-pin eliminators, and run better shocks, then you will have a little extra for when you lift.
My plan for my XJ is ZJ V8 Upcountry coils+2nd coil isolator (should net about 2.25-2.5 front), Then I was thinking bastard pack with 2 sets of XJ leafs and maybe a longer shackle.
 
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