Street pounder cheromanche

D

dave92cherokee

NAXJA Forum User
Location
Lynchburg, TN
About to be starting my cheromanche project and have been looking into a few different options. It's going to be my DD street only truck and won't see any offroad time at all. Been looking at several threads about lowering it and have come to the conclusion of using stock XJ shackles in the rear with a 1 maybe 2" block to lower it a total of 2-3". The front the consensus is to either cut a coil or so out of the stock coils which will lower it and stiffen the ride for cornering or use ZJ rear coils which will lower it 2-3" (which I prefer as I did the cut coils on an old s10 I used to own and it rode like crap). As for the bump stops after it's sitting at the height I want it to sit at then I will trim them down as needed for clearance so it's not always riding around on them. The things I haven't seen covered in any of the lowering threads I've looked at was

1. Track bar, when we lift our rigs it moves the axle over and usually has to be redrilled or an adjustable one installed. Well as lowering it will push it the opposite way there's not much room for redrilling it that direction and I haven't seen any aftermarket ones that were shorter than stock.

2. Front swaybar, same thing again when we lift our rigs we get longer disconnects but as with the track bar I haven't seen shorter ones available.

3. Control arms, not sure if they will make a difference at 2-3" drop as the same amount of lift the stock ones can still be used.

And I'm sure there's other little things that will arise throughout the build that I'll prolly work around. Just wanted to get some of this info in a thread for anyone doing a search as there's not many on here about lowering any of our rigs. So any ideas on these or other issues if you've done it would be appreciated not only from me but anyone else looking to have a street only non stock jeep.
 
everything in the lower direction is going to be custom

for the sway i would cut the connects and re-weld them all you need is to shorten them. for a street jeep i would want a stiffer sway as well

i have 3.5" up in the front and i put adj lower controls to get some caster back. if it is for the street getting more adjustments to fine tune for steering would be helpful.
 
I would talk to some component manufacturing companies. Stay with smaller ones as they most likely can do small orders cheaper. I recommend Iron Rock Offroad. Most of the changes you need would be a simple matter of cutting a piece of tube shorter.

I have 3.5" lift and I originally just had RE adjustable lowers control arms. Then I went with Iron Rock adjustable UCAs and their tie rod. Made the handling and steering much better.
 
For the thicker front sway bar, look into getting one off an early cherokee limited. Double check before taking it, but I believe they came with a 28 mm sway bar. I replaced mine with one (on my lifted xj) and I noticed a pretty big difference over my original 26mm one. I paid about $20 for it at the junkyard, well worth the price instead of buying a pricey aftermarket one.
 
dave92cherokee said:
About to be starting my cheromanche project and have been looking into a few different options. It's going to be my DD street only truck and won't see any offroad time at all. Been looking at several threads about lowering it and have come to the conclusion of using stock XJ shackles in the rear with a 1 maybe 2" block to lower it a total of 2-3". The front the consensus is to either cut a coil or so out of the stock coils which will lower it and stiffen the ride for cornering or use ZJ rear coils which will lower it 2-3" (which I prefer as I did the cut coils on an old s10 I used to own and it rode like crap). As for the bump stops after it's sitting at the height I want it to sit at then I will trim them down as needed for clearance so it's not always riding around on them. The things I haven't seen covered in any of the lowering threads I've looked at was

1. Track bar, when we lift our rigs it moves the axle over and usually has to be redrilled or an adjustable one installed. Well as lowering it will push it the opposite way there's not much room for redrilling it that direction and I haven't seen any aftermarket ones that were shorter than stock.

2. Front swaybar, same thing again when we lift our rigs we get longer disconnects but as with the track bar I haven't seen shorter ones available.

3. Control arms, not sure if they will make a difference at 2-3" drop as the same amount of lift the stock ones can still be used.

And I'm sure there's other little things that will arise throughout the build that I'll prolly work around. Just wanted to get some of this info in a thread for anyone doing a search as there's not many on here about lowering any of our rigs. So any ideas on these or other issues if you've done it would be appreciated not only from me but anyone else looking to have a street only non stock jeep.
Click to expand...
Track bar - fortunately you're going in the "easy" direction, since you're making the bar closer to level instead of further away, you can get away with less length change for the same amount of height change. Can explain it with trigonometry if you want. I would doubt you will see much of a change really, but I'm not sure. Maybe a quarter to half inch offset?

Front swaybar - I would just cut and reweld them like some people do for lifting. Not really a big deal, couple minutes with the angle grinder and welder and you are set.

Control arms - well, you'll get a bit of a wheelbase stretch, but you're making the control arms closer to level with the ground and are well within the range of movement the stock suspension allows, so I bet you can get away with the stockers unless you are going to put larger tires on it.
 
I was looking at the track bar on the mj and the xj that will be getting used. There's room to move it further towards the pass side by about a half inch. On the swaybar I checked the mj's and it's a 24mm swaybar but the xj is a 28mm swaybar so I'll use the thicker one. Plus I was looking at the links and the MJ links are shorter from the factory than the XJ links so I'll use those with the XJ swaybar to get it down closer to stock. Control arms I'm not terribly worried about as I was looking and the factory xj design has them at a slight angle so dropping it a couple inches will level them out more. Not going to put bigger tires on it will be keeping the overall diameter the same or maybe a little smaller as it will be either 17 or 20" wheels with low profile tires.
 
Im not sure if youre 4 wheel drive or not, or if you front axle is high pinion or low pinion, but I was thinking that if it is 4x4 and high pinion, you may benefit from going with a low pinion to get more clearance to the engine... which is why Jeep did that in the first place with the Grands being primarilly street vehicles. Just another option for you if you need it.
 
dasbulliwagen said:
Im not sure if youre 4 wheel drive or not, or if you front axle is high pinion or low pinion, but I was thinking that if it is 4x4 and high pinion, you may benefit from going with a low pinion to get more clearance to the engine... which is why Jeep did that in the first place with the Grands being primarilly street vehicles. Just another option for you if you need it.
Click to expand...


Or do what Gradon did and make your own front axle midsection from a 2wd. Atleast I think thats what he he did.

By the way, he needs to chime in here...
 
Look into a CJ or YJ Pitman arm. They're straight, no drop. Move your drag link up an inch or so.

If you get any adjustable track bar, you can modify it to go shorter by cutting the end and possibly running a tap further down the hole.

I wouldn't go too short on the shackles. They need to be long enough to make up the the length of the leaf springs when they flatten out, otherwise it's going to have a really harsh ride.

No Idea of year, but some version of the Grand Cherokee has a faster ratio steering box. It's a direct bolt on. Also consider the grand's dual-piston brakes: Slightly more complex, but very nice for a street truck.

Not too much other useful info, I usually go up and off-pavement, not down and on. Good luck!
 
i think its a darango steering box not sure the year

also i would add a traction bar take care of the axle wrap for better response

oh and limit slip diff

deff upgrade the rear brakes to zj discs and wj fronts and a bigger MC i think i saw a thread on pirate 4x4 about a corvette MC fits with a longer push rod on the xj brake booster.
 
I haven't got her put all together yet, but I did install ironman4x4fab adjustable control arms and track bar two weeks ago. Being 2-3" lower, the stock trackbar shifted the axle 3/8" to the passenger side(So I'd recommend a shorter TB at minimum). I tried the rear ZJ springs on the front, but they look like they're sitting 1" higher than my custom springs. The tops of the ZJ springs are smaller diameter than the XJ spring pads, so they don't seat correctly and I haven't attempted to figure out how to open them up. I'm at a stand still cause I wanted to regear the rear axle to 4.10s and USPS lost the pinion gear(was a new priority mail box when it left AZ and by the time it made it to MD, it had a hole in the side taped over with USPS tape) and shipper didn't pay for insurance. I shipped it back as I got it and the shipper is ignoring me, so I guess Gradon gets screwed this time. I've been driving the MJ and M3, but do miss my DD XJ.
 
You could contest the charge on your account if they continue to ignore you.
 
Yah I don't want this to turn into a company bashing thread but hopefully you paid with a credit card or paypal and have some way to contest the charge. Thanks for the heads up on the ZJ springs as i figured the main body of coils would be wider didn't think about the perch end being smaller. Unfortunately I'm probably going to have to go with a aftermarket TB and probably mount like the RE kit or something but will check the stock trackbar when it's lowered to see how far off everything is and if it can be re-drilled or not. I'm definately going to upgrade to disks all around and at least the 97+ booster/mc. Will check into the vette as I haven't heard of that before.
 
I have the ZJ rear discs on my 8.25". I used the ZJ prop spring and all works great with the 96 booster. The more I drive my MJ and other people's Jeeps, the more I appreciate the mods I've done over the years to perfect my street XJ.
 
Got a little more progress done on the cheromanche today. Was looking at the suspension and everything while I was under it and it's going to have to have a 2 piece driveshaft as a 1 piece would be somewhere around 80". Which got me thinking, the 44 in the back has 3.07 gears as the original was 4.0/ba10/231, well i'm going to 4.0/2wd aw4 and stock gearing on the xj was 3.55. Question is do I want to just keep the stock 3.55 gearing or step up to a higher gear for better performance as it'll be street only with 20's and 255/45/20 tires.
 
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