Thread: Rangie Suspension / Tyre Ideas

With your car on level ground measure the height of your coils. Standard front should be about 250mm. Standard rear should be about 300mm.

I've always had a simple philosophy with suspension- keep it simple. If you want to do a 3 inch plus lift, do it properly. Too many people cut corners and wonder why it handles like a pile of ****

I have a Terra-firma 2 inch medium duty lift and the castor is manageable, you do notice it a bit but it's not uncomfortable to drive in a straight line. I have heard a lot of negatives about the Terra Firma gear and I'm on my second kit from them (had one on a previous Rover) so far it's been good. I don't expect it to last as long as Koni/Bilstein stuff but it's less than half the price too

On the tyre issue, on a daily driver 31-32 inch is manageable but 33 inch and above with a 3.5 is horrible to drive with the stock gearing, the 3.9 is better but it's still a battle and the fuel economy goes from bad to horrendous .

Overall it's a compromise on comfort vs off-road ability, how far do you want to go

Trav

Originally Posted by Mercguy

That is interesting.

Can you extrapolate a little? I'm curious about this, and what you had to do to the sheetmetal....

I have a set of KM2's sitting under my house, and not used, mostly because a) they are on 16x8 ET-11 (so flares & cut req'd) I have the LRA bodylift waiting to be put in. I also have another set of standard 16x7 RRC rims, which I could fit the KM2's to - but haven't gone that way yet.

I had plans to do a 3" spring lift, long travel dampers, and the body lift.
I am reconsidering some of those available options.

Being able to use the KM2's on standard suspension in the interim would be a good thing until I finally decide which way to go.

235/85-16 KM2's should be ok as they're a narrow carcasse.

You'll need to fold the lip on the inner rear guard (door jamb), it is 90* to the door jamb, you need to fold it over on itself (U-shape), this stops the tyres catching.

They will rub slightly in places, but a suspension lift won't change that, only a body lift will. You may need to roll parts of the aluminium guards, but you'll work that out as you go.

Also trim the seat belt bolts down so they don't stick into the tyres.

Originally Posted by dungarover

do it properly.

Terra-firma

That's an oxymoron if ever there was one...

Thanks for the help everyone.

. . . If you're rolling in money, try out your car with good quality 'OEM' - sized tyres, either the 205/R-16 (205 wide, 82% aspect ratio) or their nearest "identical" rolling radius equivalent... 235/75 - R16 and on standard suspension...

- See how far and how well you can go, find your limits with the set-up that made the car famous... You will be surprised.

THEN you will have a better idea as to which way to go... bigger diameter wheels for more air under the diffs or more air between axles and the car...
Or both.

Spencer-King's original theory that 'Equal weight on all tyres at the same time...yields the best grip on the ground', difficult to achieve when the vehicle is listing heavily to one side...

Just remember that lifted 'Hiluxes' on Bigg Wheels are also known as 'Roll-luxes' for a Good Reason.