I just bought my 2007 4 door wrangler unlimited x 4x4 with 38000 miles on it for 19500.... Good deal? Well my goal is to make it Colorado ready. I'll be living in the mountains by Denver after I get out of the army. I would love everyone's opinion on what lift (if any) and what wheels and tires to get. I'm not crawling or going crazy with it. Needs to be snow/ice ready. If you can't tell, I'm new to Jeeps. I'm an aircooled VW guy.

 

I just got 315/70 17 goodyear duratracs. Not much road noise at all but still has a pretty aggressive look. Apparently they're great in the snow! You could get 285/70 17 on your stock wheels with no lift and just some wheel spacers.

 

You're going to receive a lot of different opinions (surprise!). But, unless you like just throwing money down a cesspool, you'll pay attention to the advice in this "sticky" thread by Dirtman (stickv meaning it's there for everyone to read before posting, LOL).

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

Bottom line: Unless you're just looking to waste money or strut your stuff with no real gain in performance, there's no reason to add more than the minimal lift necessary to accommodate the tires you plan on using. And tire size should be driven by the trails you anticipate traveling. Those of us in the know LOL at those who put too much lift and incur the wrath of the lift gods (early parts failure) for falling for the foolish notion that they "want it to look mean." A 2.5" lift with 35s can look pretty damned mean ...

 

A set of chains and whichever 33" tire you like the reviews on. If it is too gutless in the mountains, read a few dozen of the thousands of regearing threads on this site. If you think you want a bit more traction, look into adding a pair of truetracs. If you want a bit more height, add a cheap budget boost/spacer lift. If you want a more aggressive stance, add wheel spacers or swap to wheels with less backspace.

But as noted, there is a lot of good info stuck right to the top of this modified area.

And there are member write-ups and how-to's in the write-ups area (index stuck to the top).

And a ton of pic threads down in JK Show & Tell to get some ideas on looks with various setups.

 

Thanks guys! Great information. I'm excited to get going on it

 

What about some dedicated snow tires, ie..Blizzaks, Mich XIce, etc? Then come spring some nice AT tires.

 

My JK has a teraflex leveling kit and 33s now but when I was all stock I didn't have any issues in the snow and I was suprised how well it did and what I made it through. Just a thought before you go spending money but out in Colorado they do get massive amounts of snow

 

If you aren't going overly crazy or anything, I would do rock krawler 1.5" kit, flat flares and 35" cooper stt's

 

Stock tire size with no lift is plenty unless you want to lift, what you want to have are good AT tires or dedicated snow tires, although snow tires are pricey, wear out fast, and will eat your money thusly. Good knobby mud terrains will ride all year and wear decently and bite right into a set of snow chains which you should haul in your back compartment for when you do get it stuck, if you do get stuck in badly unplowed areas.

As for ice, generally just driving properly will sort that out, 4 wheel drive of course, and selectable lockers would be the thing to actually spend money on here, that way if you find yourself on a level patch of super slick and it just does not want to get moving because of wheels spinning even in 4 wheel drive you can lock up and crawl off it. Mind you this is some rare ass ice, but I have found its like in North Dakota and we do not even have mountains here.

TLDR: get some stock size knobby tires to bite into the snow and grip the ice, have an inexpensive set of chains in the rear for when and if you might need them, possibly add some lockers if you find yourself getting stuck.

 

Pretty sure mountains aren't necessary for severe ice. We do get the occasional storm right here in Oklahoma!



On tires, I've found Duratracs (which are snowflake rated ATs) to be quite a good all-around tire. Short of going to a dedicated snow tire, I don't think you can do much better. Those are 35" E-rated Duratracs on the photo I posted higher up in the thread.