Clearing Bigger Meats
After going to 33's from 32's, I figured I might have to finally break down and put a body lift on my Jeep. The gap in the wheel well looked ok in the driveway, but when I took the Jeep out to TSF and started getting twisty on the rock piles, I realized it was to cave. If you've seen my JACKASS pages, then you know I'm not a big fan of body lifts, partly cause cheap fuckers use the 3" spacers just to put bigger tires on and it just looks like crap. One time I saw a Jeep with a 3" body lift and shock boots over the spacers, what a JACKASS!!! Too bad I didn't have my camera with me. So I went with the 1" pucks cause that's all I needed to clear the 33's. Of course I would rather have gone to a 3" suspension lift, but right now I can't afford all the crap you have to buy to make it work good, longer control arms, SYE kit, etc.
I knew that if you get a body lift you either had to re-mount the fan shroud or get a motor mount lift. Plus, getting the motor mount lift would help improve my driveline angle, so I looked for a company that made both. I finally settled on the body lift and motor mount lift from Currie because they recommend using them together and I know that they make good shit.
It's All About the Air Gun
I have to say that this project was made a whole lot easier by using DarkWing's air gun. You have to remove 11 bolts that are on pretty tight. The install was really pretty easy, and it helps to have a buddy give you a hand. All you have to do is disconnect the battery, unbolt all the body mount bolts, and jack up the body, starting with the passenger side. I had trouble getting the body up off the frame enough to get the pucks on the stock bushing. In a few places it's pretty much impossible to get them in, so having someone else there to use a pry bar to give some extra lift. The only major problem I had, besides the fan blade (see below), was with the front body mount for the grill. When I put the new longer bolt on it stripped out the threads on the nut welded to the Jeep. I ended up going to my local hardware store and getting a longer bolt and so I could drill out the threads and throw a nut on top of it.
Watch Out for That Fan!!!
So here's another story about how I was in a hurry and fucked shit up when working on my Jeep. When I was jacking up the body to put on the body lift, the fan shroud hit the fan and caused it to bend. It might not have been that bad, but when I was putting the motor lift on, I had to jack up the motor a little higher to get the bolts on, which really slammed the fan blades into the shroud. I didn't think that much of it until the next day when I was looking under the hood with the motor running. The fan was wobbling so bad I thought it might hit the radiator, and we all know from experience that this is very, very bad. So when I took my Jeep in to the dealership for routine service, I asked the guy to check the fan and that I might have fucked it up. He called a while later and said "the cooling fan is malfunctioning, we're going to replace it". I was thinking that he just misunderstood what I said was wrong with it, so I said "No, it's working ok, it's just bent". He followed with "I don't think you're understanding me.....THE COOLING FAN IS MALFUNCTIONING, IT'S NOT WORKING, IT'S BEING REPLACED". That's when I finally realized they were hooking me up and doing about $300 worth of repairs for FREE!!! I was having over $600 worth of service done, so maybe they felt kinda sorry for me. Who cares, thank you Roberts Jeep!!!! |
