So I recently bought a 2004 wrangler unlimited stock and I'm ready to start making mods. It is my primary vehicle mon-Fri and I spend sat and sun driving all over North Carolina- sand, water, forest, mud. I'm an active duty marine so I'm constantly throwing gear in it and I have two German shorthaired pointers I take hunting- so I need a functional and high performance vehicle. I'm thinking the first three things I need to do are suspension lift, tires and rhino line the inside. That being said, I bought a straight six because all the research I did said they are easy to work on - but I'm startin from scratch here - zero knowledge, willing to put in the time research and elbow grease. I just need some guidance on where to start!! So far I think I've narrowed lift brands to terraflex, skyjack and faptech (sp?) and the tires to general grabber at or bf Goodridch mud terrain. That is literally as far as I've gotten. Any help, advice, opinions are welcomed ! Xx, Katie
Kik ladyusmc
Do you have an idea yet what size tires you want to be able to run? Once we know that we can come up with a few suspension lift height recommendations. And is your budget reasonable enough to be able to do things right or are you thinking you'll need to take shortcuts that may not be optimal?
You want to achieve 4 inches of lift between suspension and body to run 33s. I would suggest a 2.5 or 3 inch suspension lift and a 1 inch or 1.25 inch body lift, no more than that. The brands you mentioned are not well known for quality. If you do decide to look into a smaller lift, some good ones are zone, OME, currie/savvy, and a few others. I am sure people will chime in. If you want to go with a 4 inch suspension lift and no body lift, you will need to spend a bit more to buy a new rear drive shaft, slip yoke eliminator, adjustable control arms, and the kit itself will cost more. You should probably get control arms all around at that height.
Good 33 inch tires are the cooper STT, MTR with kevlar, and duratrac.
Good advice right there. For 33" tires, you really should have 4" total of lift which can be done well without cutting corners with the combination of a 3" suspension lift plus a 1" body lift as suggested by GoldenSahara00. It gets expensive once you get to a 4" suspension lift height due to the steep angles at the rear driveshaft & its u-joints it causes.
if you do want to mess with fenders look at Metal Cloak fenders. You can fit 35's with NO lift. For offroad trails 33's should flex nicely and fit well. I'm doing this in August, guess we'll see how it goes!
33x12.5-15 arnt going to rub with a 3" lift. Maybe even a 2". And I would recommend General Grabbers. I'm running them in 35s and the tires are great no complaints at all
I put a 3" BDS lift on with 33x12.5x15 Mickey Thompson Baja MTZs. We have a thread on this lift if you want to read it at http://www.wranglerforum.com/f5/calling-all-bds-lift-owners-238269.html?highlight=. There is also the TJ Lift thread that is one of the Sticky threads you should review. Lots of the different reviews of the lifts are posted there so you can see lots of different opinions/options.
My experience on road has been better than stock and like you, I live in NC. It has been great in the mountains here with my combo.
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