Lift experimentation

hoss75 · **Posted:** Thu Oct 27, 2005 9:51 pm

KJ04 wrote:

Keep dreaming Al, and maybe someday we'll all be buying from Jeepin Al's.

In the meantime my Liberty's sitting with a blown housing, and I'll be Da#$ed if I'm putting another stock one back in it.

Hmm... guess you're going to hell now!

krazz1e · **Posted:** Thu Oct 27, 2005 11:25 pm

Very nice, looks great. Tom can make you that custom shaft when your ready, they are about $400~ double carbon.

Keep us updated, and get us some more pics!

ManicMechanicJoe · **Posted:** Wed Nov 09, 2005 11:12 pm

you mentioned something about not being able to sell your lift unless you could find a machine shop to fab them for you? My buddy owns a machine shop. They build sterndrives for boats. Lathes, CNC mills, pretty much anything you can think of but a tubing bender (i would have a new bumper by now if he did). If you send the schematics of anything we can fab it if you are interested...

Jeepin Al · **Posted:** Thu Nov 10, 2005 6:24 pm

Just to keep everyone informed, the rear lift did perform well off road, and after a real close look - no cracks in my welding (yea! PS I don't weld my a-arms). I have adjusted the rear arms to move the whells back to the center of the wheel well, and to change the pinion angle. The drive shaft is really vibrating now between 45 and 50 mph and than again between 65 and 70 mph. I have ordered a Tom Woods SYE and driveshaft. I will be installing them soon, and I will report on how easy it is to install, and how much of a difference it makes.

Question, has any one seen the TJ lift from Nth Degree (think that's the name of the company)? If you look closely at their lift, they have rear spring perch relocators, which push the spring back further. I am experiencing this now with the KJ. With the arms made longer, and lift (now around 5.25 inches) the springs are tilted to the rear a little. I don't think they will pop out, at least they haven't, but they are not sitting correctly. You can barely notice the lean in the springs, but its there. This maybe corrected with cutting the poly pucs at an angle matching the spring tilt. The best would be moving the spring perch. Just a quick explaination, with the higher lift, the rear wheels move closer to the inner fender which inturns shortens the wheel base a little. If you look at your lifted KJ's you will notice that the rear wheels are indeed a little closer to the rear door flare. It is possible to flex enough to tear off the door flare. Mine has some real neat tire grooves in it. This is one reason adjustable or longer lower rear arms are need for higher lifts.

As for fabbing up an upper rear arm, and than selling it, I have a great idea for complete replacement for the OE tri-link, I just need to draw it up. I true lower long arm system would work better in the rear, however, I think for overall bolt on application, the original lower arm mounts would be better. The new upper tri-link would just bolt to a new diff mount, such as the one I fabbed up. And the lower arms wouldneed to be adjustable. Now that the rear is taken care of, off to the front.

My front set up consists of 2.5 rusty's springs, a Daystar top plate, 1 inch poly puc, 1 inch spacer on the top of the strut assembly and the clevis lift. With the sag in the springs I think I am sitting right around 4 inchs of lift. Even with my arms, at full drop, the arms contact the springs. The CV joints at 78k are really complaining off road, but are still relatively quiet on road. I did however, pump them full of grease. I inserted a .25 inch steel tube under the boot and pumped in the grease, used small hose clamps to seal the boots back up. If you do this, just make sure you put the adjuster of one clamp on top the oppisite clamp adjuster on bottom, this way the rotating weight of the clamp adjusters cancel out.

So far, so well for the additional lift in the back. I think I will e-mail Skyjacker and see if they would make me a set of rear springs that will give me 5.5 inches of lift, so I can take out the Daystar pucs.

Paragon Off -Road park next week, another test!

Al

the1jferg · **Posted:** Thu Nov 10, 2005 6:35 pm

Looks Nice.

Great shocks "Edelbrock IAS shocks"

Jeepjeepster · **Posted:** Thu Nov 10, 2005 6:50 pm

Very nice.

One thing i dont understand is this "And by the way, I measured the steering knuckle on a 2005 Liberty, they are one inch taller than the 2002. I have my budding ordering a set, next the front end and 4+ inches......mad you say......yes I be Laughing." when did they do this, ive heard nothing of this. What all did they change with this, did they put different springs in them, or are the 2005 libbys higher?

Jeepin Al · **Posted:** Thu Nov 10, 2005 9:38 pm

Oh yea I forgot about that, my son crawled under a CRD and measured the steering knucles and said dad they a inch taller than yours! I said wow! I goin' to order a set of thems! I did got them about two weeks ago, took the front tire and match them up, and guess what...........my son can't use a tape measure. Da..ed kid! So hope was high that taller steering knuckles were available to help us all in our pursuit of a taller lift. The grand Cherokee units are much taller, they fit but they are $285 each my cost, and stick out very close to the tire (see the Liberator, it has the Grand steering knuckles on it).

I am truely sorry if I got anybody's hope up, but this is the way of the engineer, trial and error, or trail and break it.

Al

One thing I have noticed on all late model Liberty's the stock ones anyway, all the half shafts tilt downward towards the diff. My 2002 prelifted all the half shafts tilted downwards towards the hub bearing.

Jeepjeepster · **Posted:** Sat Nov 12, 2005 12:45 am

ohh, ur poor little son. Dont get mad at him, its not his fault he cant measure. lol, funny stuff.

FreedomKJ · **Posted:** Sat Nov 12, 2005 2:57 am

Man, I wish I had the money and the time to experiment like you do Al. I guess I'll just wait for you to figure out the "ultimate" solution and then I'll copy it! Keep up the good work!

Jeepin Al · **Posted:** Wed Dec 07, 2005 10:54 pm

Here's.......Al again (you thought I was going to say Johnny didn't you!),

Just an update, the rear lift is working fine, and I am working with Tom Woods, (actually he is working on it, I supplied a used 242 transfer case, and some input) on a SYE for the new style 242 and our Libertys. I seemed to have bent my driveshaft ever so slightly and its vibrating real bad now at 55 and above. I shouldn't have tried that black trail at Paragon! Please hurry Tom!!

For the front: I begged and pleaded with my buddy who owns a big tool and machine shop that does top secret stuff for the Military into taking a front axel housing and welding supporting plates and a ring around the pinion bearing race to strenghten the front diff. Once I get it back I will post pictures. I just dropped it off, discussed somethings with his welder, and said "make it stronger" he said 'give me a week or so".

I got tired waitng for a Grand Cherokee front diff, and the after looking at the Dana 44 I have, I think its going to be a little out of my realm. I think I could do it, the swap that is, but I can't lay up the KJ that long since its my daily driver.

So with the reinforced front diff, I am going to dive in on a 5 inch lift for the front. I will drop the entire assembly, which will lower the front skid, but this will be made up by the ability of running 33" tires! What the hey, I my try 34" when I wear out my 245's. I also have a set of JE Reel HD front half shafts waitng to be installed along with 4.11 gears.

I have have under development stainless steel brake hoses that once the first set is made, you will be able to order any length you want, for stock application, as well as, lifted KJ's. The rear hose on mine is at it's limits with the 5 inch lift. Once I get the SYE and the rear hose I will put it back to 6 inches.

Al

Eddo · **Joined:** Thu Jul 07, 2005 7:01 pm **Posts:** 1214

Sounds like you really got a plan Al. I'm really intrested to see how it all turns out. Please keep us updated.

uvalax236 · **Posted:** Thu Dec 08, 2005 12:33 am

When this kit is done Al, I may have to come and visit you for my spring break while we put this on my KJ. Ill help you test it out, no problems there!

chefdab · **Posted:** Thu Dec 08, 2005 4:01 am

Yeah Al, how about keeping a parts list for all the stuff going into this to be able to accomplish the 6" lift so we can get an idea of the total cost. Everything from a-arms to cv half shafts to brake lines and driveshafts and bracketry, etc. And don't forget lots pf pics. And when your done, how about a full write-up for the tech section unless you plan to market this as a whole kit. In that case, sign me up for one!

Guyute1210 · **Posted:** Thu Dec 08, 2005 12:46 pm

Jeepin Al wrote:

One thing I have noticed on all late model Liberty's the stock ones anyway, all the half shafts tilt downward towards the diff. My 2002 prelifted all the half shafts tilted downwards towards the hub bearing.

I think we looked at this at Jeepfest (maybe not the first time you did) and my half shafts are about 1/4" higher at the hub bearing than at the diff side.

Jeepin Al · **Posted:** Fri Jan 27, 2006 2:29 pm

Hello everyone,

I have ordered the “engine cradle”, the part of the Liberty that holds the engine, the front suspension and all the other goodies. I finally found one at a good price. I also ordered another set of a-arms, this time they will drop 3 inches instead of 1 inch as they do now.

Once I get these, I will start on the front end lift. I figure I will have all the parts I need by next week. I can lay the Liberty up for a while, and fit the lift on it. (yea I don’t have much of a life! :roll:

). This time I will take very detailed pictures of what I am doing.

For the back, once I get the front squared away, I will replace the “rube” rear upper arm, with a tube type tri-link. I am going to bug Tom Woods again to see how he doing with the SYE for our 242’s. I need this for 6 inch lift in the back. I will be contacting some spring companies to see how hard it would be to get some custom springs made up.

I should have the new stainless steel brake lines in very soon.

The lift kit, when I get done with it, will have he following parts:

Front:
New upper a-arms
Two inch spacer for the cradle
Front stainless steel braided brake lines
Possibly the Fab-tech coil overs (a $700 expense) for the new Grand
Rusty’s 2.5 inch lift (well kinda)
Engine mount spacers

This should give me around 5 inches of lift in the front

Rear:
Tom Woods SYE and driveshaft
Rusty’s lower arms (adjustable)
Custom upper tri-link with Daystar flex joint
Edelbrock AIS Shocks (I can’t remember the part no.)
Skyjacker coils with Daystar 2.5 inch pucks or custom made 6 inch springs
Stainless steel braided rear hose.

This should give me around 5-6 inches of lift in the rear.

Wish me luck!

Al

krazz1e · **Posted:** Fri Jan 27, 2006 2:52 pm

good luck! can't wait to see it.

x3rdxStrikex · **Posted:** Fri Jan 27, 2006 3:08 pm

keep up the great work Al! just remember to take a beer break when you're frustrated.

Lift experimentation

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