JKNDUSA

Hey guys,

Newbie here! Just bought my 4in Skyjacker lift kit. Im currently running 33 in Toyo ATs. Im thinkiking about adding 1.5in wheel spacers. Any tips, advice....?

resharp001

That is about as vague as can be. Is there some reason you need spacers? Some reason you went 4"? 4" with 33's seems kinda like a wonky look to me. What are you wanting tips and advice on? Personally, I'd avoid spacers unless there is just some need for them and any other option is just uneconomical at that moment. If you do a spacer, stick with a quality name brand like a Spidertrax.

TheDirtman

You can but you don't need them with those tires. IF you can return that kit do it as it is incomplete and way more then needed for your tire size. If you keep it you will find it will do nothing but cause you headaches and cost you way more money to fix the things that need to be addressed.

Smudgeontheglass

Listen to the Dirtman.

The Skyjacker and Rough Country lifts are missing components and nobody will recommend using the drop pitman arm that goes in those kits.

Return the Skyjacker kit and just throw the spacer kit in. You can comfortably run a 33" tire on the stock suspension, the spacer kit can give you the look without any of the major geometry issues of the tall lift kit.

JKNDUSA

Thanks guys! Much appreciated. I will probably go with 35 in tires as soon as my 33s wear out. I only went with 33s because I had my jeep stock with no lift. I recently went off roading and Im bottoming out so I wanted a nice lift to give me some clearance. The only reason I was asking about the wheel spacers was just to see if it helps for a wider stance and grip. But if its really not gonna do anything for me, ill skip on the spacers.

Mark Doiron

As pointed out, with 33s you don't need a lift or wheel spacers. However, the Jeep does look a lot better with the wheels pushed out a bit. Once you lift, pushing the wheels out helps to offset the easier rollover potential caused by the higher center of gravity (COG). With 35s, you'll probably want at least 2.5" of lift. And, since you don't gain much improvement in off-road performance from just the lift (no tire change), you're usually best to go as little lift as possible. This keeps the COG as low as possible, and rollover potential is a bigger problem than dragging rear bumper because you didn't jack to the sky with a too tall lift (don't tell lifted pick-up truck drivers this--the Jeep community loves to LOL at them for not understanding the most basic things of off-road performance enhancement).

As you go higher in lift more vehicle changes are needed, including shifting the angle of the rear axle spring perches, lengthening the brake lines, recentering the axles, correcting the steering geometry. There are various ways to correct for these things, and sometimes you can get away with ignoring them (for example, if you're a mall crawler you may not care that you'll rip your brake line apart if you actually go off-road, disconnect the front swaybar, and then articulate the front axle to maximum droop). But that's who those "incomplete" kits are designed for. Here's a great post, written a while back by Dirtman, on lifting your Jeep ...

https://www.jk-forum.com/forums/modi...-lifts-288269/

And just to give you an idea of the appearance, here's a friend and my Jeep at Toroweap, Grand Canyon National Park. He (at that time) had 33" Duratrac tires on stock rims with 1.5" wheel spacers and a 2.5" lift. I have 35 Duratracs on 4.5" backspacing aftermarket rims and a 2.5" lift.



And if you're concerned about off-road performance, here is my friend's Jeep on Blanca Peak. By this time he had aftermarket wheels with a 4.7" backspacing, but otherwise the same tires and lift (I rode with him as photographer) ...

(should forward to 4:10 automatically) ...
https://youtu.be/yFjr3hSzEu4?t=250

mr72

on stock Sahara wheels actual 33" tires rubbed in the front at full lock on my Jeep with no lift. FYI. I think the suggestions about running "33s" without lift or spacers are either talking about 33s that are not actually 33" or are assuming you will do cutting, shim the steering lock, or assume you have aftermarket wheels, etc.

A 4" lift is in fact going to cost you a lot to get it right. It's a whole lot more than just spacers.