Help figuring out lift

[madecant]

I have a 94 Yj that isin desperate need of shocks. besides the bushings being gone when i go over aspeed bump i get whip lash from how hard it hits. the problem is i don’t knowit has a suspension lift or not. it did have a 3 inch body lift when i firstgot it but i removed it. i have 31X10 tires on it. i attached some picturesthanks

 

[69jeepcj]

Its hard to say, but 31" tires on a stock yj usually rub just a tad on the fender flare when wheeling, and the sway bar at full turn but not always. It has alot to do with the back spacing of the wheel.
Your springs don't look flat so that will help you. I would say if you do have a lift it,s not more than 2" in which case you use the stock shock length anyway.

 

[Bounty__Hunter]

What I noticed, you have no rear track bar so that's good, they're not needed on a YJ.

You have stock swaybar endlinks on the front, and from downward angle of the swaybar I'd say it's a 2.5" spring kit. The swaybar is nearly level with stock springs.

That front passenger side spring is bent just behind the shackle.

 

[69jeepcj]

^ yep

 

[Latamir]

the rear pumpkin at stock height is 9 inches and the bottom of the rocker to the ground is 18 inches. So, measure pumpkin height then from ground to rocker and that is the lift if any. I have a YJ that I just got a few months ago and it has a 2 inch lift.... just enough to clear the 31s. Cheers

 

[madecant]

oK, I did the measuring andi have 9 1/2 inches from the pumpkin to the ground and 22 inches from the rocker to the ground. so does that mean i have a 3 1/2 inch lift? do i have to take the tires in consideration? i also measured the spacing from the top of the tire to the bottom of the wheel flare and i have 5 inches.

 

[madecant]

Ok one more thing? I looked at rough country shocks on there website, the same that is on it now and they say the shock is good for a 2-4 in lift. so i should be good, The bushings on mine are shot and i have a really rough ride. ( i mean when it hits after going over a bump it hits solid) would putting the same type of shocks help or do i need to be looking at a different brand. I wont be taking it off road much.

 

[69jeepcj]

You can not measure from the ground to the rocker and get your lift height. depending how long they have been on and the type of abuse they have seen, SPRINGS SAG!! and the distance fron the groung to the bottom of your pumkin will be determand by the size of your tires and amount of air in them. The springs dont lift the dif, the tires do. If you are just wanting to replace your shocks, fully extend them and measure from eye to eye, then fully compress them and measure again, call any shock manufacture and give them the measurements and they will match you right up.

 

[Latamir]

The equation that I gave is a tried and true method as I work in a 4wd shop and that is what we use all the time because it does take into account tire height. but it does not count wear and tear so I normally round down 1/2 inch and it has always been very accurate over the last 20 or so years of working on Jeeps. By your pix your YJ sets higher than mine and I have a 2 inch lift so I would say 3 inch is pretty close to target.

 

[69jeepcj]

If that is the way you guys check suspension heigth, thats crazy.. springs sag, period.. if the spring sags the distance from the ground to the rocker will decrease, and I have owned many jeeps with saggy springs.. The ground to the pumpkin method wont work either, it may give a idea but thats all I see it giving.. the distance from the ground to the pumpkin for say a 31" tire compared to a 35" will be dif by 2". If one of the said tires were under inflated that throws your measuring off too. A lift dont increase the distance from the ground to the pumpkin by itself. EXAMPLE: roughly stock size cj tire-235/75r15 (roughly 29"), you say stock heigth to pumpkin is 9". If i put a 32" tire on same jeep(32,s fit stock jeep) you have just increased the distance of the pumpkin to the ground by 1-2" on a jeep with no lift?????? and your rocker to ground distance will increase as well.. ?? JPmagazine did a write up of putting 40" tires under a tj with no lift, fender trimming and other things went into doing this, but with your shops methods of measureing for lift heigth you would not get stock lift measurments, even though it is a stock suspension.

 

[Bounty__Hunter]

JPmagazine did a write up of putting 40" tires under a tj with no lift, fender trimming and other things went into doing this, but with your shops methods of measureing for lift heigth you would not get stock lift measurments, even though it is a stock suspension.

But they would be able to determine the suspension is stock. On a stock Jeep, a change in tire height, 40" tires as you say, will lift the pumpkin and rocker the same amount. Therefore the difference between the pumpkin and the rocker will be the same regardless of tire height.

The way you're explaining it, a change in tire height will lift the pumpkin and rocker differing distances. Explain that one to me.

I get what you're saying about spring sag and tire inflation. His shop takes that into account and knows it is not an exact science of determining the height of a suspension lift.

 

[69jeepcj]

I didnt mean to say it lifts it different, it would be the same. but, what I was trying to say was that I thought the dif measurment was a bad idea because I can have the same lift on a jeep and put on dif size tires and get dif measurements and dont see how that will tell me the amount of suspension lift I have. Yes it will tell me how much more from stock the jeep is lifted, but it wont tell me if its from a suspension lift or not, or from a body lift, or trimmed fenders and taller tires. The op asked how much of a suspension lift his jeep had, and I was stating you cant really determine it by measuring the pumkin clearance. Tire size will change pumkin clearance regardless of how much lift it has or where it comes from.