As of 11-4-2015 I have had my Lexi one year.
This was my build year & I am looking forward to a lot more seat time as far as camping & wheeling. I have put to much thought & energy into this suspension flex business & need to move on with my build other than getting more inches of articulation.
So what I did was just gave up trying to get huge gains in suspension travel, I threw in the towel & put some shorter L shocks on. I'll quote some veterans by saying these 80s are not rock donkeys & use them for expo rigs rather than rocks crawlers.
By putting the front L shocks on it limits the travel to prevent the tie rod hitting the control arms & also allows disconnecting the sway bar. By just putting them on lifted my front almost 1" & also gives me the firm stability that I have been looking for.
I will also play with putting back in the OEM bushings along with narrowing the front control arms to reduce axle bracket bind with the control arms. The new goal is freedom of movement rather than more flex.
This is my current set up as of now:
I currently have the OME Old Man Emu 851/860 medium spring combo with a 25mm/ 1" spring spacer in front for a more level stance.
For shocks Lexi now has the longer OME L shocks front & rear.
To keep the drive line from contacting the sway bar at full drop, there is 1.25" front sway bar spacers.
To keep the rear L shock & 315 tires at bay there is a 1.25" block spacer at the frame bump stop to keep the rear L shock from over compression with 1" of up travel left for full compression & to keep the 35"/315 tire from rubbing in the fender well.
In front is the stock bump stops, the L shock up there is fine with 1.5" left of shock travel to compress for full bump compression. Also to note I added washers to front Ls to make them .5" longer. They now measure 15.75" to 27" from the 15.25" to 26.5"...
To add length to the brake lines I lowered the stock mounts.
To correct caster & add 2" more drop travel Lexi has 2" MAF front control arm brackets with the yellow 2° CC bushings. (Soon coming back out for more flexible OEM bushings).
The wheels have 1" spacers with 3.5" of back spacing to prevent rubbing inside rear fender & to give a wider stance for stability.
To allow unrestricted travel a 1" body lift was added, also to help with airflow over engine compartment & passenger side floorboard cooling.
Lexi does have light armor front & rear with some slider nerf type protection. The spare tire is inside with a modest unfinished storage system.
The transfer case did receive lower gearing from a set of Marlin Crawler reduction gears.
That's about it... Below are some pics.
