3" Lift and ride quality
 

On my XJ, I have 3" Skyjacker springs and OME Nitrocharger sport shocks. I have MT Baja STZ tires, and they aren't aired up too high.

The ride quality is brutal. Every bump in the road is like hitting a parking block.

My shackle angle isn't horrible but could be better. I've got shackle relocation brackets waiting to go on. I'm also going to add longer shackles and coil spacers to get up to 4.5" - 5", as that is the necessary height for control arm drop brackets, which I also have waiting to install. I'm hoping this will improve the ride quality enough that I don't have to worry about my passengers suffering post-traumatic stress disorder from the frightening and painful jolts and bangs that occur whenever my tire hits a pebble or a twig.

My buddy just bought an XJ that already had a 3" lift installed. He described it as being like riding in a shopping cart - every small bump is violent and feels like it's going to knock parts off and tooth fillings out. I'm not sure what components he has. I'll know more on Monday when I see it. Maybe the roads were smooth where he test drove it, but he's very disappointed now. He can't afford to drop more than another $500 to fix it. If it costs more than that, he's gonna sell it and get a Honda or something.

I've never owned a really nice car. Every vehicle I've had has more or less been a beater. I know what a nice suspension feels like, I've just never owned a car that had one. So I'm not judging this based on some skewed perspective where anything that rides rougher than a new Caddy is bad.

All the reviews I've read about the springs and shocks I bought describe them as having nice ride quality. So what's the deal?

I'm wondering if this is the way it is for all 3" lifts. Is it normal for a lifted jeep to respond to every small bump on the road like there's hardly even a suspension? Do they all ride like the axles are welded to the frame, or what?

The Old Man emu shocks are great shocks, Skyjacker springs are fairly soft so you should have a decent ride. How are your bushings on the control arms, axle , and springs ? what PSI are your tires at ?

My 3.5" lift also rides like a shopping cart. Haha I like that one. My shocks are basically non existent because of how shot they are, and my shackle angle is less than desirable. When I upgrade I was also thinking shackle relocation brackets, control arm drop brackets, and I'm probably going to bite the bullet and buy some bilstien or other nice comparable shocks. You can find buy 3 get one free sometimes.

anything's gonna suck with short arms. no if's and's or but's. you can change out the shocks for quality ones or try different coils. but short arms are still gonna ride like a dump truck

With the drop brackets you'll be fine with short arms. Just get good shocks and you can offset any coil. This of course is all relative when we're talking about an XJ's on road driving quality.

short arms are still short arms
if a stock Cherokee rides like crap, why would it make sense to spend money to re-achieve that on your lifted jeep :dunno:

Stock Cherokee rides great. Every single one I have been in. Soon as you lift it with stiff springs it rides like a truck.

Front springs mainly.

How do we know this? Because a 3" bb rides as good as stock. You do the math.

I have bilstiens. Jeep still rides like a truck. ITs the front springs mainly.

Was a cadilac with stock springs, was a cadilac with budget boost. Soon as I put 3" spring on, rode like crap.

Love it off road, but not on road.

Just about every lift we install at work that has to do with aftermarket springs makes the jeeps ride like crap, trucks also.

You can set the shackle angle at exactly 45, get the best shocks known to man, still crap.

I just lifted a wrangler last friday 4.5" Holy cow was it a rough ride!!!! A little too rough. But they love it!!! Probably going to get on a fourm and tell everyone how great it is. LOL

My Zone 3" lift I installed rode harsh at first. Give it a while it will soften up alittle. I did my 8.8 swap a few weeks ago and noticed my rear shocks or trashed, thats where part of my crummy ride comes from the other part is shackle angle. I want to long arm this jeep but I am still debating getting another inch of lift by spacer or new front springs.

My RC 3" lift runs fairly smooth. Still with short arms. But you have to take in account the fact that everyone's opinion on a smooth or nice ride is different. Just because another person says it has a "nice" ride, doesn't mean it will be nice for you.

My wife's truck a 2003 Ford1 ton Diesel 4x4 Crew Cab long bed with a 2" lift on it and 500# in the bed or pulling a trailer rides as well as my Lincoln.......almost:yes:

My XJ before the lift not a bad ride, after the lift quite a bit rougher ride.

in what universe :blink:

every stock Cherokee I owned road like crap. I did every upgrade to make it ride decent. then I finally went to long arms and it road 10x better. drop brackets are a BS upgrade and whenever I see them I just want to laugh

Please explain in detail how long arms would improve ride quality. I'm dying to hear this.

If I wanted a car like ride I would be driving a car.

do I have to draw it out for you? when you hit a bump the axle moves upward. here I have illustrated an imaginary radius that the arms can rotate in. in the short arm application, the arms almost have to move backward when they articulate up and down. now look at the radius the long arms would make. there is much more room for the axle to move up and down without being forced into the jeep.

now with the drop brackets, yes the arms are lowered and flattened out similar to stock. but they're still rotating off of that tiny radius. and now you've got a giant hunk of metal hanging under your jeep. problem in my book

you know, for someone running deavers and bilsteins, you'd figure long arms would've been on your list :icon_rolleyes:

Attachment 334082

true. ride quality isn't the only reason to go with a long arm system though. but in a thread that's questioning why the jeep drives like a dump truck, arms are the first thing to address. you can change the coils, shocks, and shackle angle. still wont even come close to the difference that long arms make

Hahaha. Thanks for the detailed explanation and pictures. . A couple things, I disagree with the amount of ride quality radial arms would add to a lifted jeep with stiff coils and low grade shocks. The difference would be more noticeable with better shocks with drop brackets vs just "long arms" (specify which ones tho). . I was ribbing you since you laughed at the drop brackets. Like you, I laugh when I see a guy with "long arms" and some crappy shocks. And for the record, I've never hit that huge hunk a metal from the brackets. However, If I ever want/or need to upgrade my arms, ill get radials because of the reasons listed in your or so detailed explanation. 👍

Its on my list but Im regearing my front axle next then tires. Hope to have long arms early next year. I am just trying to wrap my head around LCOG and making everything live without cutting the crap out of my rig.

and here is where I disagree with you. but I guess neither of us will know for sure until you try long arms and I try the drop brackets. I will agree that crap shocks with long arms is silly though. all I know is that I could take washboard bumpy roads at 30mph with my long arms. same roads that were knocking my teeth out with short arms at 15mph. and my on road stability went way up. no more sketchy freeway rides

don't even bother with low cog if you're running stock axles. the basic idea is to just not lift your jeep into the sky. understand that 3.5"-5.5" of lift will get you full travel out of 12" shocks. it's just preference as to whether you like more up travel or more down travel. the rest probably wont make a difference in stock applications

Really it comes down to what you want to spend your money on. The best bet for the short arm route would probably be the lightest coils and leaf packs you could find (around stock rating, maybe compensate a bit for the weight of bumpers, roof racks, gear, etc), I've heard OME makes some of the best riding coils, leafs and shocks, plus drop brackets, and a bit of a longer shackle with the taller leafs. I'm not really sure of it would necessary/desirable to run adjustable control arms with the drop brackets, but that would help to correct any caster problems. Long arms are most desirable IMO, and for the money it would be to get full adjustable control arms and drop brackets, it would probably be worth spending the little extra to get a long arm set. Just my $0.02

28 PSI.
The LCAs are fixed-length tubes that were included with the Skyjacker kit. They're a bit longer than stock. The bushings on those are polyurethane. The UCAs are stock. Bushings are rubber, and old, but don't look awful.
I've got some JKS adjustable UCAs & LCAs waiting to go on, when I install my RRO control arm drop brackets.

It's been a couple years. It hasn't softened up.

No one, including myself, expects their jeep to ride like a car.
What I expect is for the thing to ride without every seam and buckle on the highway feeling like someone slamming the frame with a 60 lbs sledge hammer. I was hoping I made this clear in my first post. I am not looking for luxury.

Riding like a dump truck would be an improvement. Hell, I think I've ridden in wooden-wheeled horse-drawn wagons that weren't this bad (just slower and more odorous).

CAD are under $200. You can run stock arms with them. A full set of adjustable control arms can be had for $400. A radius arm conversion is over $1000.
Still, I would have saved up the extra and gone with a long arm setup had I known the 3" lift would ride like a nightmare.

IDK... It must be some dirty little secret that most jeepers are too ashamed to talk about. I spent countless hours over countless days reading about lifts, but apparently no one thought to point out, "That 3" lift kit is gonna make you hate life every time you take it out on the road."

no it's not.. just get some 1" spacers for the front and get these
http://www.seriousoffroadproducts.co...4-7.5-S-A-Lift

yeah it's a big investment for the average jeeper. yeah it sucks up front but it's worth every penny once it's installed and riding like a caddy
I finally got fed up with ride quality of my adjustable short arms and replacing bushings. long arms were the last upgrade I did to my jeep and the short arms served me well. but I so much happier once I got long arms

OP hasn't even posted pics of his set up... Come on, let's see the front end.

From your link:
"Tired of having your fillings knocked loose when you wheel your XJ?
Kidneys taking a beating on rough roads?"

So can we all agree then that anyone wanting to lift more than 1" should be told not to lift less than 4" because something must be done about the control arms? It just seems irresponsible to let newbies buy 3" kits without being told what's in store for them.

What's there to see? I already stated what's on there.
Skyjacker 3" coil springs. OME nitrocharger sports. Stock UCAs. Fixed tube LCAs. Oh, and an IRO track bar, if that matters. Aside from paint color, these things are all gonna look pretty much the same.

well the stock Cherokee rides pretty rough in the first place. so I figure that no one expects it to be better when you lift it which is why not many folks complain about it. it's all a matter of what you're willing to put up with. you happen to be one of those who cannot stand the ride quality. I put up with it for awhile myself and wasn't really bothered by it at first

3" Lift and ride quality
 

Well first of all, sky****ter coils suck.

But my bad then... Fight off proven information and just complain about everything. What do we know anyway?

At 3" of lift your control arm angle shouldn't be at any extreme number to cause a rough ride. If you don't grasp the concept of how long arm set ups work, nothing else we can do chief.

Lol, going with RRO drop brackets out of the 3 on the market.

I guess what I should have said was I want to keep low as I can, fit 33" rubber but wheel decent as I do not get to go as often as I would like right now. I swaped my D35(Bent axle tube, pinion seal ****ing the bed was the final straw) out a few weeks back got an 8.8 with 4.10 gears for free I was fretting over shock mounts and my present shocks I cut my old shock mounts off the D35 and shortened them up. Also built some bump stop brackets to go under the stock bump stops. I was thinking you had to have a 4" lift min. to go with long arms ?

Are you being sarcastic?

No way I am going over 4in. And long arms will not help my 3" lift ride better. Not from an engineering standpoint, and not in the real world. Just check out Atmos's sig.......LOL

Admittedly I have not had long arms. But I have wheeled in long arm rigs. None I have witnessed rides close to stock as far as comfort. Maybe Atmos has the corner on long arm ride quality, I dont know?

Point being springs are still the major culprit here of ride quality.

I agree with Atmos that if you lift your rig too much over 3in then short arms can make your ride worse simply because of the geometry. Long arms then I can see being a worth while option.

theres a point where being too low can be a problem unless you're relocating shock mounts, flat belly pan, and other high clearance stuff including high fender cuts. full traction makes an awesome 3.5" kit at a reasonable price http://www.full-traction.com/product...ension-system/

I don't know what you know. You're saying the Skyjacker springs suck, but I've seen a hundred reviews for them and every single one of them said the ride is on the soft side. Can you tell me what the spring rate is for these???

OK, so tell me what spring rate I have now, and what spring rate I should have instead. Or tell me what shocks are better than these OMEs.

I don't know why you would say this. Who are you talking to? No one is discussing how long arms work. No one has said anything about long arms other than the price.

What's wrong with them?

See, I don't think the way a stock XJ rides qualifies as "rough."

Maybe yours doesn't ride like mine. And if so, I would like to know why. I can't see how any living person would not be bothered by the way mine rides. Every vehicle i've ever owned has had a crappy-riding suspension, and this is horrible. Maybe I need to get a video of it from inside... Every bump there is a loud BANG! like a gunshot going off right outside the cab and the whole thing feels like the frame dropped straight down onto a rock.

No. I quoted a link provided for me just a few minutes ago.

And I didn't tell anyone to pair long arms with a 3" lift.

What is a good spring rate for 3" lift springs, and who makes them? The springs I bought have a reputation for a soft ride. If it's the springs causing the problems, then I can't trust reputation (and probably not any vendors), and I need objective facts. That's why I started the thread. I don't want to throw any more money at the problem.

Sorry, my bad.

Yea, I dont know. I mean being in the biz I see tons of lifts. To me they mostly all ride like a log wagon. But some customers say they cant tell a difference, some hate the ride, some love it. LOL I dont know!!

I bought rc front springs(3in) and my jeep now rides like a truck compared to the BB I had on it at first. Which was no difference than stock.

But just look at the springs. That will tell you right off the bat the spring rate is a lot stiffer than the stock ones.

In my opinion the aftermarket companies do not have the quality of metal the factorys do. Therefore they use a heavy rate to compensate. That is the only logical conclusion I can come up with.

I mean why else? IF an aftermarket company had the same material as stock, they would just make them longer and garrantee that their springs would ride like stock. They would corner the market!!!

But that is not the case is it??

Based on my experiences, associating bad ride quality to coils means something's else isn't right. Either your geometry is off, or those generic, made for any ride shocks aren't doing there job. Try some shocks made for your jeep.

probably can be attributed to a number of things. my rear was set up nice. rubicon express springs, shackle relocation, bilstein shocks. and larger tires at a lower PSI that absorbed some of the impact. but speed bumps in a parking lot were a nightmare

holycaveman-No truer words spoken. I have Bilsteins, CAD brackets, RE rear springs, shackle boxes, 45* shackle angles, yup-still dump truck. I'm tired of throwing money at it to ride better. I don't know what to compare it to, since this is my first lifted 4x4. Maybe it ride nice for others, and I shouldn't complain, but a great disappointment to me.

yep. something like that. normally I would've disputed this but with holycaveman it's generally a lost cause. all the go-fast cars run very stiff springs and some how magically have very comfortable riding suspensions

*cough* *cough* long arms good shocks

please refer back to the diagram I posted on page 2. long arms will give you what you're looking for

+1 for the long arms

I think someone just has a sensitive *** lol