Novak Conversions Jeep Wrangler JK shifters

In the market for a JK; how to know if it's lifted

T

TRevs

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I'm in the market for a JKU for my college-age son. I have an LJ and a YJ and never thought I'd be looking at JK's, but here we are. I'm looking mainly 2013-16 and so many people put larger tires on them with minimal to no lift. Or there might be a larger lift. Are there standard measurements of stock height front and rear so I can determine for myself?

I can't trust what the sellers say; for example this appears to be on 315/70r 17s and the seller says he doesn't think it has much lift at all.:rolleyes:

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Chris

Thread 'How do I determine how much lift my Jeep Wrangler JK has?'

So you bought a JK with a lift already installed (or at least you think), but you want to know how much it's been lifted. Well, the good news is that it's very easy to determine your lift height.

See this photo:

8491087748_64d3784844_z.jpg


That photo shows the stock JK dimensions for the front suspension.

You'll see that the spring should measure 9 3/8" from top to bottom. This measurement is taken while the vehicle is on the ground.

Measure your spring, and anything over the 9 3/8" will be how much lift you have.

For instance, if you measure your front spring and you come up with 13 3/8", that...
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Reading forums there seems to be a consensus that the 3.6 is a significant improvement over the 3.8 for power and reliability…?
 
TRevs said:
I'm in the market for a JKU for my college-age son. I have an LJ and a YJ and never thought I'd be looking at JK's, but here we are. I'm looking mainly 2013-16 and so many people put larger tires on them with minimal to no lift. Or there might be a larger lift. Are there standard measurements of stock height front and rear so I can determine for myself?

I can't trust what the sellers say; for example this appears to be on 315/70r 17s and the seller says he doesn't think it has much lift at all.:rolleyes:

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You're keeping your TJ right???
 
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TRevs said:
I thought that was mainly the 2012’s. Any case, I’m going to check out three next week, 2 2015’s and a 2016
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Unfortunately the issues trickled into other years. Mine is a 2016 but I negotiated the sale based on a positive result for compression and leak down. Something you may want to think about to ensure you don't purchase one with early signs of degradation.
 
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tJKrider said:
Unfortunately the issues trickled into other years. Mine is a 2016 but I negotiated the sale based on a positive result for compression and leak down. Something you may want to think about to ensure you don't purchase one with early signs of degradation.
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How did you arrange that? Was it from a dealer? Did they use their preferred shop, before you took possession? Or was it a private seller?
 
TRevs said:
How did you arrange that? Was it from a dealer? Did they use their preferred shop, before you took possession? Or was it a private seller?
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I purchased from a local dealer. They agreed to the assessment using their own service dept. and included a powertrain warranty with the sale. It was only 3mos but gave me a bit more peace of mind that there wasn't any ongoing issues with it. They actually had it competitively priced vs. what was available private party at the time as they had taken it in on trade and it wasn't their brand/OEM.
 
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tJKrider said:
I purchased from a local dealer. They agreed to the assessment using their own service dept. and included a powertrain warranty with the sale. It was only 3mos but gave me a bit more peace of mind that there wasn't any ongoing issues with it. They actually had it competitively priced vs. what was available private party at the time as they had taken it in on trade and it wasn't their brand/OEM.
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I’ll have to consider that. It’d be difficult with a private seller 2 hours away from me. I was planning on plugging my OBD reader in and scanning for codes, and hoping that any serious compression/misfire issues would show up there.
 
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TRevs said:
I’ll have to consider that. It’d be difficult with a private seller 2 hours away from me. I was planning on plugging my OBD reader in and scanning for codes, and hoping that any serious compression/misfire issues would show up there.
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I picked mine up locally from a friend. I gave $5500.00 for it knowing it had some small issues and 214xxx miles.

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Bottom photo is with my TJR, top is next to a JL.
 
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Do you feel its underpowered/undergeared for its tire size? I have my eye on a Sport because it looks clean, but apparently it has 3.21 gears. I thought the 3.55 on my YJ was too tall, and the 3.73 in the LJ is just tolerable on 33’s. I couldn’t believe they sold 3.21 from the factory.

So I’m leaning toward another which is a Sahara and should have 3.73’s.
 
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TRevs said:
Do you feel its underpowered/undergeared for its tire size? I have my eye on a Sport because it looks clean, but apparently it has 3.21 gears. I thought the 3.55 on my YJ was too tall, and the 3.73 in the LJ is just tolerable on 33’s. I couldn’t believe they sold 3.21 from the factory.

So I’m leaning toward another which is a Sahara and should have 3.73’s.
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According to my build sheet, I believe mine is 4.10 and yes its still underpowered.

I run my 06 TJR with the OD off and even wheel it on 33's with the stock gears.

The JKU needs at least 4.88 or 5.13 with 33's to make it tolerable in my opinion.

The JK guys here are more knowledgeable on this than I am.
 
TRevs said:
So I’m leaning toward another which is a Sahara and should have 3.73’s.
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It will only have 3.73s if that option was selected. 3.21s are standard regardless of Sport or Sahara. You can verify with a VIN lookup to get the original window sticker or the feature content from Jeep.
 
tJKrider said:
It will only have 3.73s if that option was selected. 3.21s are standard regardless of Sport or Sahara. You can verify with a VIN lookup to get the original window sticker or the feature content from Jeep.
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I’ve downloaded the build sheet for each of these. The Sahara sheet does say 3.73.
 
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Doesn’t seem like the NSG370 gets hate from the JK owners the way it does from TJ owners. Did they rectify some of the early problems with it? Seems like they must have to keep using it all the way through the JK run.
 
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