Відео

No bolt needed in this kit.

Rather replace a radiator than a heater core

So there are a lot of spacer kits out there, made of either steel, delrin plastic, or polyurethane (which is like a synthetic rubber compound). Each kit either tells you to put the spacer on the top of the coil spring, or under the coil spring, both ways work but you should do what the directions in YOUR kit says to do. Our’s said to put it on the bottom and our kit is made of delrin plastic. Since our’s was delrin, it wasn’t a slab of plastic, it was a mold and one side had open voids in it with just internal plastic “bracing.” I assume this was to reduce cost and weight. The instructions had us install everything in this exact order, spacer in axle coil bucket with void sides down and flat side up facing the coil spring, then the rubber isolator, then the coil spring with the rubber isolator on top of coil spring in the upper coil bucket on the “frame” (these are unibody vehicles so technically there is no frame on these, hence the air quotations for “frame). Hope that helps! If you got any other questions, hit me back! Also, I respond a little better over on IG through DM, if you need more help.

At the time I ordered mine, he only offered “regular” but you should order what best suits your application based on your lift height and steering setup.

@@BenTheJeepGuy how long did it take to roughly ship out?

@@skylerheffner8638 they usually got it out pretty quick, not too long of a wait between when I placed my order to when he shipped it out. I talked to Andy on the phone last week and he said they are swamped with orders and they are busting it trying to keep up

Oh ok thank you !

Nope, if you run this as a street Jeep with some lite off-roading, you should be fine. The front driveshaft with the Rezeppa joints may see a shorten lifespan, but I always recommend the front driveshaft conversion to a double cardan joint and traditional u-joints for greater durability and longer life. There really isn’t any impact that any lift would have on the transfercase itself, just the front driveshaft that can be limited in lift height due to the Rezeppa joints if you have that driveshaft. You can run this with the stock shocks, but I don’t recommend it since most Jeep’s shocks are worn out to start with.

Thank you! I love having her out there with me, she is so eager to learn and always asking questions! It’s not her natural interest but she is really trying to learn and understand! That’s all I can ask for at the end of the day 😊 but thank you for the kind words, she enjoys reading them!

That one was unfortunately totaled, but we have another 2002 WJ, Overland model and we put a 4” lift on that one with some 33s that I hope to get a video up soon of. But thank you for the compliments man!

I am so glad to hear you found the review helpful! I should probably do another update review on it, more long term. But the full lock quirk has gotten better. I think it was more to do with the steering box I had. I have sine swapped it out and that little tug doesn’t happen anymore. I did lose steering radius at first because the drag link TRE at the passenger side knuckle, it would contact the sway bar mount on the axle on the passenger side. I clearances the mount and that helped. I also noticed that the body of the steering stabilizer was dented and when I cycled the steering, the dent lined up with the track bar, so I took it off completely. My steering radius has improved, but it is still limited but I think that is more due to the Durango steering box I am running and not the ORO steering system. That’s why I said, I probably should do an update video and mention those things. I guess I hadn’t done it since this video doesn’t get a lot of attention.

@@BenTheJeepGuy Oh that makes sense about the steering box. I've been researching those as well and the stock XJ box has a progressive ratio for sharp turns. The further into the cycle it gets the faster the wheels turn. So, if the steering is more functional than the stock y-link it could amplify the ratio progression.

@@sylvanbowyer341 yup, so there is some minor steering loss at this point but I really mean it is minor. Only time I really notice it is turning into parking spaces, driveways, and cul-de-sacs. But again, it’s only at full lock and it’s small enough that because I have had the Jeep 20 years, I know it’s not as tight of turning, but someone else probably wouldn’t notice.

@@BenTheJeepGuy Nice. It's probably just natural wear on the tres or something, and probably still light years better than stock lol. I have the V8 ZJ setup on mine and while it's better than stock I can't wait to get rid of the Y-link setup and go crossover. This'll be the kit I use for sure.

@@sylvanbowyer341 prior to this kit I had an HD tie rod from Iron Rock that I was running with the stock y-link setup. All the parts of the y-link had been replaced all at the same time I did the HD tie rod, so it was as good as stock could get, plus some with the tie rod upgrade, but the difference between y-link and crossover is night and day. I didn’t think my y-link really had any bump steer, but the ORO has NO bump steer, it’s really a dream to drive now. I think I am going to add back a stabilizer, just to add a little resistance back to the steering since now without one + WJ power steering pump + Durango steering box, it’s almost too lite feeling. Lots of strength and not loose, just a little too lite feeling. I’ll probably do an update video once I do that and get a little seat time under my belt.

Thank you!

No, it was able to drop down low enough. But you MUST disconnect the track bar at the axle end and the sway bar links need to be disconnected, both sides. If you need a little extra clearance to get the coil spring back in, put a floor jack under the driver side of the axle and jack up the driver side of the axle. Keep jacking it up until you have enough clearance, you may have to do this a couple of times before you have enough room. If you jack it up too far, it will eventually take the passenger side up with it so don’t just jack it up full height of the jack right out the gate, that will only be counter productive to your cause, just jack it up in little increments until you have the room you need to get the coil spring back in. May still require a little persuasion. Good luck!

Ok thank you, I'll try that, the part where the shock mounts is what my control arm is hitting.

@@dabbergames3827 yup, that’s going to happen. Try the tips I gave ya and that should be able to give you the room you need. Worst case, yes remove one end of the lower control arm. DO NOT disconnect BOTH lower control arms, it’s a pain to get the axle to line back up with the control arms to get the bolt to go through. Even just one side can be a challenge when only working on the ground.

@@BenTheJeepGuy Awesome! Appreciate you brotha

@@dabbergames3827 happy to help! Find me on IG JeepGuyBen and you can DM me there as well, I pay attention to that just a little more than here and that way you can get a little more direct access to me should you run into any other issues you could use some advice on. Oh and a subscribe here and a follow there would be much appreciated! ✌🏻

Evaporator is holding up perfectly fine, Four Seasons seals the openings for storage and shipping. The first evaporator I went with was not sealed in the box and failed too. If the evaporator isn’t sealed, send it back. The heater core is still holding up well too and I just ordered some for 2 WJs last year and they are still producing them but I had to call the manufacturer in Tennessee and had them tell me who to order from.

Got links in the description just for that! 😎

Thank you!

I get it, it’s not for everyone and I can’t plead everyone with the genre of background music. Hope you at least found the information helpful.

Nope, shouldn’t hurt the 4 wheel drive. Depending on what front drive shaft you have, if you have the Rezeppa shaft, you may wear out those joint prematurely and need to swap to a double cardan front driveshaft. It has been my understanding though that the 242 was usually paired with the double cardan shaft and not the Rezeppa shaft. If you are not sure how to tell, you can send me a photo in DM on IG and I can tell you which one you have from just a good photo.

Aw man that’s so awesome the video was helpful for ya!

If you post any pictures on IG, tag me so I can see the finished product! @JeepGuyBen

@@BenTheJeepGuy I sure will! My bottom spring seats were destroyed so I’ll be replacing those and will film and post pics.

@@rcsimmons85 yeah, after doing so many WJs and seeing how bad all the coil isolators are when I tear one down, I just started ordered all 8 whenever I do a lift kit now. Just makes for a cleaner install.

Yup, we got exactly what we paid for, a budget-friendly ride height increase for larger tire fitment on a daily driver.

@@BenTheJeepGuy For 10 times more the money and a lot more work you can get a much better ride.

@@pennypackmtb2542 paired with the right shocks, it actually rode really nice. We went with Monroe Relfex monotubes on this build and it performed perfectly, took several road trips and lots of daily driving without any issue. We now have a Zone 4” kit on our latest WJ and ride quality is similar but obviously a bit stiffer due to the higher spring rate coil springs compared to the factory coil springs. And by the way, 10 x $150 = $1500. Our Zone 4” kit + Bilstein 5100 series shocks still didn’t cost more than $850 altogether, so it’s completely possible to achieve a good ride quality with a budget friendly kit. There is a kit that fits every budget and every need. This kit was good for my wife at the time because she didn’t go offroad and wanted to fit the set of wheels and tires that I got for free because her tires were all worn out. It rode good, performed well for how it was used, and was at a price point we could afford at the time.

@@BenTheJeepGuy Understood. I was hoping it all worked out. I have seen where the control arms get pushed to the angle to where they bind up instead of absorbing the bump.

But the shocks you used are really good for performance.

Man I am so glad to hear you found this helpful! I literally made this video because when I was getting ready to install our kit, I looked for a video to brief myself on the process, though I would have figured it out anyways, I wanted to see if there were tips or tricks, or just some basic things that apply to only this Jeep that I should know. Nothing was out there so I wanted to provide that for others that might be looking too. To have someone comment and tell me it helped them, makes the time and effort I put into the video, worth it! I really do do this to help out people like yourself. Sure, UA-cam famous would be cool haha but I really just wanted to help some people out. As for the coil compressors, I use them only when I absolutely have to. They can be dangerous and I have seen a friend have to go to the hospital because one slipped off and cut him really bad. One trick I didn’t apply when I was trying to get the coil spring in, when its close but not quite there, put the jack under the opposite side of the axle and pump up the jack a few times for that side. Lifting the opposite side of the axle can push the side you are working on, down some more. Too much lift from the jack and the other side will lift with it so you just have to pump the jack a few times and then see if it will go in, if not, a little more lift from the jack and see what happens. I’ll do anything I can to avoid coil compressors.

Unfortunately I did not, I hail from the south, Georgia to be exact haha but thank you for the compliments! Especially my wife, she is starting to FINALLY get the Jeep bug haha she actually asked me for a 4” Zone lift for her WJ as her anniversary present last year! I about fell over haha so thanks for mentioning her, those little comments do help with keeping her engaged!

So...I went ahead and I'm replacing all of the front end. I just finished new tie rod sleeves/ends, stabilizer, track bar, ball joints, bearings and hub and rotors/brakes. I'm starting on other side wheel tonight. Those ball joints are a force to be reckoned with if you don't have the right press and adapters! Hopefully, all of this will resolve the wobble!

Hey there! Sorry for the late response 😬 so for your death wobble issue, definitely start with the basics. Get an alignment from a reputable shop. If there is an off-road shop in your area with an alignment machine, go there since they will know how to adjust for a lifted vehicle, other shops will just shoot for factory spec and that may not be quite right for you, but would be close enough if your local shop options are limited. Second is wheel and tire balance. If you did not get new tires, get them rotated and balanced and see if that helps. Next, check the condition of the track bar bushings. If they are worn and cracking, that’s your problem. Lay under the Jeep and have someone start it and turn the wheels and tires back and forth. Watch the bushings at either end and see if you can notice any excessive movement in the bushing. If that checks out, inspect the tie rod ends on both the drag link and the tie rod. Next check ball joints and then control arm bushings after that. Rarely is a steering stabilizer ever the cause. Doing a new stabilizer or double stabilizer only puts a bandaid on the issue, the real cause is still there and wasn’t addressed by changing the stabilizer. Hope that helps! If you want a more direct contact with me, feel free to reach out to me via DM on IG. That way if you want to send me any videos or pictures of the different parts I mentioned, I can try and help you diagnose it.

So really cutting will depend on your wheel and tire setup. If you retain the factory wheels, odds of cutting are minimal with up to a 32” tall tire that is no more than 10.5” wide. If you run aftermarket wheel with a heavy offset that sticks the tires outside the body more, and the wheel is wider than 8.5” wide, then you will have to do significant cutting with that same size tire. I recommend a factory JK or JL wheel with the JK Rubicon factory tire size. No rubbing and excellent fitment.

It’s worth it! Made a HUGE difference!

A 2 inch lift shouldn’t cause too many driveline vibrations unless your front driveshaft has the Rezeppa joints instead of u-joints. Rezeppa joints don’t like to be at hardly any angles that result from a lifted vehicle. T-case should be just fine though. You may experience some death wobble depending on a lot of factors but if your steering, ball joints, control arms, track bar, and/or tires are worn out, a lift stresses these parts more than at stock ride height so if there is any play in these parts, the lift will exacerbate the issues to where it results in death wobble. So that’s just a possibility, not quite a guarantee, every Jeep, especially older ones, react different to being lifted. And a lot of that has to do with what shape it’s in over all.

@@BenTheJeepGuy Thank you for the detailed reply! I use to have a 2000 Cherokee and know exactly what you are talking about with the "death wobble". Fortunately, I don't have any vibration or anything feeling loose right now. I'll throw the lift on and deal with it if it comes. I'm assuming with the current mileage on mine, that everything is mostly original. Thanks Ben!

@@BenTheJeepGuy Also, the Rezepa joints you mentioned would obviously be aftermarket correct?

@@mavx318 my pleasure man, happy to help! Hopefully the low miles work in your favor. I often see failures come up more because of age rather than mileage but that still depends on the climate that the vehicle lives in. Southern climates are more forgiving. Northern climates can be a little harder in vehicles, so it varies. Tag my in your post on IG, if you post anything, I’d love to see it when it’s finished!

@@mavx318 nope, Rezeppa is factory, same style joint that plagues the JK Wranglers with issues when they lift their Jeeps too. Jeep couldn’t make up their minds with which model of WJ got with style of joints in the front driveshaft and sometimes the front driveshaft had a Rezeppa at one end, and a u-joint at the other. But you want a Double Cardan, u-joint style slip driveshaft for your’s if you don’t have it. You can buy kits or you can just hit your local junkyard and grab the shaft and the two yokes, one off the axle and one off the t-case.

No apologies necessary, this can be confusing stuff, especially if you are new to it all. So spacer lifts like this one are considered suspension lifts because the lift is added by means of increasing the ride height of the suspension, where a body lift adds lift but spacing the body off the frame via plastic spacers. Another thing to note, for unibody vehicles, the frame and body are all one piece so you cannot install a body lift on a unibody vehicle. The Cherokee XJ and all the Grand Cherokees, including the WJ, are all unibody vehicles so suspension lifts are the only option for these Jeeps. I never recommend body lifts anyways, they increase the center of gravity without ping anything to prevent the sway of the vehicle due to this increased height. This makes them dangerous in my opinion. Plus the idea that the body is lifted up via some plastic spacers for the body to sit on, I’m not a fan. I have seen photos of vehicles that were in a wreck with a body lift and the body went one way while the chassis/frame went another way. Suspension lifts are just better and safer.

@@BenTheJeepGuy thanks

That was the idea! Build the strongest TJ44 I could while holding to as small a budget as I can get away with. Like for the axle shafts, I know I can buy replacement inner shafts and they use the same outer shafts as the D30 so I figured I could nag some cheap junkyard shafts and reuse the outer shafts on the new 30 spline inner shafts!

Still running great! Just bought the same brand for my wife’s WJ and my Dad’s WJ.

@@BenTheJeepGuy awesome! I’m sold, not a job I want to do multiple times.

@@steventure7939 I assure you, this is a job you want to do just one time and be done with it! lol replace the AC evaporator while you are at it. I’ve had good luck with the Four Seasons brand and they aren’t too expensive.

@@BenTheJeepGuy I have to change my A/C evaporator core. Rockauto has 4 seasons, GPD, UAC. I googled search, but couldn't find any reviews. Someone on Dodge forums liked GPD. I'm leaning towards UAC. I also want to replace the dryer/accumulator, liquid line (condenser to evaporator core) www.rockauto.com/en/moreinfo.php?pk=9797168&cc=1310943&jsn=8

@@jle540 I always use 4 seasons evaporators because they come sealed from the factory. I can’t say the same for the other brands but the first one I bought wasn’t sealed and it failed the first time I attempted to vacuum the system down to prepare for a fresh charge. The structure was compromised and near the edge, one of the tubes caved in and created a huge hole, never held a charge for more than 5 minutes. That first one wasn’t sealed from the factory so my guess is just the moisture in the air corroded the inside enough to compromise the evaporator. 4 Seasons was the next brand I tried and it came sealed so that’s how I came to my theory as to why it failed. I don’t know for a fact that that is what caused it, it’s just my experience and my best guess.

So this is what I have found with this lift, if you keep factory wheels, no wheel spacers, you won’t have to cut as much as if you did wheel spacers + stock wheels, or aftermarket wheels with a large offset, then the tires is more likely to contact the inner fender liner and the front bumper. On this Jeep I had to cut a TON of plastic, inner fender liner both front and back of the wheel well, along with the front bump lip. The wheels had a heavy offset and even still, in reverse it rubbed pretty good. If I had cut anymore than I did on the bumper, it would have started to look a little hacked up. We now have an 02 Overland, not the same Jeep in the video, and it has a 2” spacer lift with stock coils and this time we have the same size tires with some OEM Gladiator Rubicon wheels that have a factory offset that keep the tires more tucked under the body, 0 rubbing after some lite trimming. It had a different set of wheels originally with a more outward offset and it rubbed about as bad as the Jeep in the video with the same size tires. I was actually kind of shocked how much it improved the rubbing to go with an OEM wheel with less offset.

Flat side faces the coil spring, non-flat side with “holes” faces towards the metal buck that the coil sits against.

Coolant already contains these additives, which is one of the two reasons it's used instead of pure distilled water.

I say it was a flop because it didn’t have market stay. I judge a products success based on long term viability after the hype wears off. We will see how well the Bronco holds up and only time will tell but I think it’s very well optioned and destined, I have high expectations for it! The FJ Cruiser was just not it, I said that from the beginning. It was massive in size and you couldn’t see out of it. It was only appealing on looks but functionally, it was a turd. It wasn’t a comfortable daily driver but it was well suited for offroad either so it just would up in the middle of a no man’s land. Now there are some die hard lovers that will cling to it so it will have a niche following g for years to come, but for someone hell bent on building a Toyota SUV for off-roading, I will recommend they look at the 4Runner.

@@BenTheJeepGuy Yeah I agree. Visibility was pretty bad. Though I think it could have kept going and done well if they had updated it. It’s crazy how high the demand is for them now though. Bronco is definitely here to stay as Ford is making it almost it’s own brand. I just hope reliability and the front suspension works well.

I think they made the same choice that Jeep made when they had to decide what to do with the Commander. The 4Runner is Toyota’s most popular SUV in the lineup and it’s been around for a while. They dropped the FJ and gave the 4Runner more offroad prowess. Jeep axed the Commander because it was cutting into Grand Cherokee sales so they went with their more traditionally popular vehicle, the Grand Cherokee. The FJ need a major update and Toyota made a business decision of where to place their focus, I get it. I think had the made it just a bit smaller and gave it better visibility, it could have been a far better vehicle that it was.

For being such a simple part, I was thoroughly impressed! I have since switched to ORO’s U-Turn steering system and I’m pretty happy with it. But I would rather do the tie rod and keep the rest stock than do those kits with the heims or the Chevy 1 ton TREs that flop around from tie rod roll.

So I back tracked this unit to a company out of Tennessee called Thermal Solutions Mfg. and they have a website but their catalogue doesn’t seem to work on my phone for me to check for you. I won’t be around a computer for a while but google them and use their catalogue and see if they make one for your Jeep. If they do, call them direct and they can give you a vendor to call, they don’t sell direct to the public unfortunately. Even when I called their vendor, I had to specifically ask for it AND I had to provide them the part number to find it. Hope they have one for ya!

Sadly, those green glowing gauges that came in the 2002-2004 Limited and Overland models, those cannot be change by simply swapping the bulbs. There are only a small amount of companies that offer anything that can change them, and they require some much more complicated procedures to install. Basically you have to do some major surgery to the gauge cluster to put them in. Not for the faint of heart. The difficulty level in this video to simply swap some bulbs, 2 out of 10. To do the surgery needed for the gauge faces, 6.5 out of 10 just because it’s very tedious.

Yeah, but it wasn’t entirely her fault. But this accident in the video, that was definitely all her fault haha

I didn’t get any squeaking but a squeak can develop from a lot of different things that would have been touched during installation. It’s important to try and pinpoint the source of the squeak and then from there you can come up with a solution where it be possibly tightening a bolt that wasn’t torqued to enough spec, or maybe installation procedure wasn’t followed to the letter so something isn’t quite installed properly. If you could narrow down the location you think the squeak is coming from, I might be able to assist in coming up with a remedy.

It’s the Supreme Suspensions 2.5” lift! It’s been great, I highly recommend it. There is a link to the listing on Amazon in the description of the video above!

It’s held up phenomenally! I love the way my Jeep handles now! The pulling itself the rest of the way has seemed to go away with a new steering box so that may have just been the box being worn out. The turning all the way to full lock is still an issue but a smaller issue because I clearanced the sway bar bracket by grinding a small relief groove into it and that has seemed to help to where it’s not as big of deal. But I give this system a 9/10! Easy install, amazing driveability improvements, and excellent strength offroad. I’m building a D44 front axle to match my rear and my build is centered around keeping this steering if that gives you any idea on how much I like it haha

Are you planning on going with any bigger brakes with the 44? I see you have some rather large tires.

@@mackjacobs5489 so I’m currently rocking 35” tall tires now and it handles them VERY well. Though I did see a slight decrease in what I would say is “comfortable” braking. The D44 I’m building is a TJ front D44 from a Rubicon TJ Wrangler. The TJ front D44 is identical to the XJ and TJ D30 counterpart, so I can keep this steering setup and my factory knuckles. Unfortunately there aren’t really any brake up grades that keep the factory knuckles and this steering system only works with factory knuckles. I already swapped the rear brakes for ZJ disc brakes and I bought a Durango master cylinder that is supposed to give me some braking upgrades as well. I will be making a video of that upgrade too but if you want to look into the master cylinder upgrade, Martin Built has a video that highlights that upgrade as well!

www.cherokeeforum.com/f67/17-diy-big-brake-kit-xj-mj-tj-yj-d30-44-a-222937/ Or Vanco big brake kits. Just some food for thought.

@@mackjacobs5489 those all require different knuckles which then would mean I can’t use this steering kit. So I chose to keep the steering because the braking wasn’t so bad to where I felt that it was my deciding factor instead of the steering

So each Jeep is a little different but it goes back to two existing holes. Some Jeeps may have nuts welded onto the frame rail already if you had the front factory skid plate because he uses that mounting location. My Jeep had to front skid originally so I still had the bolts for that so I just used the factory skid plate bolts to secure it since they were the right size for the nuts welded on the frame.

Dose it go on top of the rail or in the bottom when I put it to the two back holes it’s way off from the bracket

@@robertsullivan2483 definitely the bottom side of the rail

Awesome @Ben The Jeep Guy hopefully I can finish the install this weekend do also have the brace for the gear box

Yeah, I’ve fine tuned my videos since then, this was the very first video I ever shot and put together. I tried to come from the approach of a first time mechanic since this is a beginner kit. I didn’t cover the shock problem because I frankly didn’t have it on this one (the joys of living in the south!) but I have had that problem come up twice now since then so I plan to discuss it in my next lift kit video when we put the Zone 4” kit on our new 02 Overland we picked up last year. But there are also just so many little things in this process that frankly if I went over them, the video would be 30 minutes long and very few people would watch that long. UA-cam has a lot of metrics they consider and making videos and being successful about it is viewers attention retention. Plus if I leave small thing about, then it helps inspire people to comment and ask questions to which I can then interact with my viewers! But I appreciate the constructive criticism! These kinds of comments really do help me make better vids!

@@BenTheJeepGuy Thanks Ben, appreciate you taking the time to respond! Keep up the good work.

Stainless steel has a very low thermal conductivity so it probably wouldn't work well. A major reason copper is so good is because it has a thermal conductivity only second to silver (but it is almost equal). Aluminum is also high relative to other metals and very cheap which is why the aftermarket industry likes it, but not up there with copper.

@@deanwright987 yes your right about stainless conductivity. I still think it could work well though. The lower heat conductivity can be compensated by increasing the surface area. Ya copper is definitely better than aluminum.