fastway40

Well I suppose this can be my introduction as well since I am new to the forum.

My name is Chase and live in the great NW, Oregon. I purchased my first Jeep a few months ago and couldnt be happier with it. When I was looking for my xj, I only wanted one with the Tan and Black two-tone interior, cause I really like it. Other than that I wasnt to picky with exterior color. So I found a Black one with 149,000 miles and after a basic tune-up and some new O2 sensors, it runs darn good!

Now, my Father and I have our own truck accessory and outfitting shop called L&C Trucks located in Oregon City, OR. So needless to say, the Jeep had to be lifted asap!

After some extensive research and scanning these forums, I settled on a 3.5" Rubicon Express Lift including new rear leaf packs, with ProComp ES3000 Shocks, ProComp 15X8 Aluminum Wheels and ProComp Xtreme A/T 31X10.5R15 Tires.


The lift would have went together very smooth and quickly if every bolt wasnt severely rusted. The undercarriage is pretty clean and NOT rusted, but all the suspension bolts, leafs and shocks were taken over by rust! But with patience, heat and carefully working every bolt out, I was able to finish it in one day with an install time of about 8 hours.

This is a very nice high quality kit, I have no complaints about it. But though its advertised as a 3.5" Lift, I actually netted 5" of lift both front and rear. Quite a bit more than I was expecting. O well, It looks good!

I aligned it myself and then made a transfercase drop with 1" square tubing and M10X1.5-50 Bolts


Before Lift and all stock:





After Lift:




And some shots from the next weekend at Browns Camp in the Tillamook Forest:







Well let me know your first thoughts and I will do my best to stay up to date here.


Future Ideas:

- Paint Flares and remove side moulding

- Safari Rack

- Some Fog and Driving Lights, Hella, PIAA, VisionX, im undecided still

- New exhaust system (current is rusted bad)

- Some kind of front bumper

Clayne_b

Looks MUCH better!!! Keep up the good work

ArmyGraham

Nice XJ and welcome to the forum!

AeroSynch

Looks very nice! What are your opinions on the RE 3.5" kit, how does it ride?

blankdeluxe

Thats a sketchy bridge.

mattfish1

x2

fastway40

Thanks guys. Yeah it was a little tricky getting over the bridge but easy with a great spotter.

@AeroSync- So far the RE 3.5" is great! The quality of the parts is excellent, it rides real good and better than before (although I had all the original suspension and shocks with 150k miles!).

I may not get as serious about offroading as some of the guys here, but for what im doing the lift works very well.

fastway40

Ok, just a quick update here.

Been busy with work, so I havent got much more done but I made some cosmetic changes that were very much needed.


I spent a couple hours removing the side moulding and tape off the body and buffing it out.

Then I removed the purple "Sport" stickers from the fenders.

And lastly I painted the fender flares with texture paint, RustOLeum bed coating actually. Stuff was $9 a can! But it worked great and looks great.






Next up on my list is some lighting! The stock sealed headlights are so bad..lol So im either doing a H4 Conversion or get some 6" lights mounted on the bumper.

cf1k1

Why not do both? I wanna do 'em both but with the bumper lights, I don't know if I want to mount them to the bumper or get a light bar that Detours makes. Of course, in the picture, that jeep is a different front end. He does make one thats 98+ though.

fastway40

Well nothing new with the jeep yet, except some new WeatherTech Floor Liners, which are awesome! And I have some H4 Conversion headlights on order.


But I did take it out to the Oregon Coast today.

It did pretty well after dropping tire psi to 15, climbed well, did trails good and had fun.

Here are just a few pics-

ArmyGraham

Are you doing the full HID conversion? Or just the bulb?

xjmafia

jeep looks great! how much was the lift you put on? im looking to lift mine and run some 31s any suggestions?

fastway40

@ ArmyGraham- No i just finished putting an H4 Conversion kit using Rampage Housings, and will be putting PIAA 110W bulbs soon. I post pictures of them!


@ xjmafia- The lift is RE 3.5" and think retails for around 600-650? And thats without shocks.

I love my lift, and it actually lifted it 5" plus another 1" from the tires, but i really like how the 31's fit with it all, i think its perfect for what i do and have no need to go taller or with bigger tires. I will just put mud terrains on it next time i need tires.

Biceps McRipped

Might want to reconsider the 110w bulbs, I'm pretty sure they're illegal to use on the street. I put H4's in mine, and it is well worth it, but I used the 55w Hella's. I also have the same tires. How do you like them? I'm really impressed. They're a little pricey, but I feel like an a/t can't get much better.

fastway40

^ yep the tires are pretty awesome, i just had them out on the dunes again this past weekend and I will say they amaze me. I was passing other very well set-up trucks that were getting stuck on minor hills. Heck i was even able to climb the biggest hill in the area with ease, refered to as "the bowl."

And on the road they handle great with very little noise.

Anyway, here is some pics from the weekend in a little area on the beach thats fun to play in-

















And a cool shot from the day, my buddy and I on the horizon of a setting sun.