First timer bottle and floor jack question for installing lift kit

[ResurrectionManNH]

Hey all, need some guidance here for how to correctly and safely jack and then drop front axle to put leveling pucks in front. From what I’ve gathered this is my plan:

Use All-In-One bottle jack lift/stand on frame on both sides to jack up, lifting little by little alternating sides, and then lock in place as stands. Then when axle components disconnected use my 2.5 ton floor jack to only lower the axle while keeping the frame jacked at same height to fully extend to remove springs. Then bring down bottle jacks to meet floor jack, reconnect everything etc.

This sound correct? Any suggestions?

Much appreciated!

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[ShastaJT6]

Im sure others with more experience than myself will chime in, but this seems to be a reasonable plan. A few thoughts of mine, from someone who installed their lift kit in their driveway as well.

1) Make sure you put your e-brake on, your rear wheels still being on the ground could get sketchy, dont want the truck to roll back. Break torque on the front lug nuts before you get the tires off the ground.

2) You can use a floor jack and jack stands to lift up the sides one at a time, you dont have to do the all-in-one getdown, but thats not a bad idea and is probably a little safer.

2.5) You can put the front wheels / tires flat on the ground under the vehicle as insurance, if the jacks tip, the wheels will save your bacon.

3) Once the truck body is in the air / on the stands, place the floor jack under the front differential before you start unbolting stuff. Keep a towel or old t-shirt on there and jack it up to where it is just touching the pumpkin but not lifting, then you can lower it safely after youve disconnected all the bits.

4) Rent coil spring compressors from Autozone BEFORE you start this. You dont want to get the truck up, the axle down, and realize you need more room. Ask me how I know..

5) Plan ahead on getting an alignment after all this is done. Lots of people go back and forth on whether you need one or not, and quite frankly, you might not need it, but there is a 50/50 chance (at least, in my mind) that it will need to be done.

 

[TroutFishingInAmerica]

You have a good plan and good advice in the post above. I live alone in a rural area if I jack and crawl around alone I keep my cell phone very close and not in my pocket. If I can't reach it I can ask Google to call 911 (hopefully). Have fun. Be safe.

 

[ResurrectionManNH]

Im sure others with more experience than myself will chime in, but this seems to be a reasonable plan. A few thoughts of mine, from someone who installed their lift kit in their driveway as well.

1) Make sure you put your e-brake on, your rear wheels still being on the ground could get sketchy, dont want the truck to roll back. Break torque on the front lug nuts before you get the tires off the ground.

2) You can use a floor jack and jack stands to lift up the sides one at a time, you dont have to do the all-in-one getdown, but thats not a bad idea and is probably a little safer.

2.5) You can put the front wheels / tires flat on the ground under the vehicle as insurance, if the jacks tip, the wheels will save your bacon.

3) Once the truck body is in the air / on the stands, place the floor jack under the front differential before you start unbolting stuff. Keep a towel or old t-shirt on there and jack it up to where it is just touching the pumpkin but not lifting, then you can lower it safely after youve disconnected all the bits.

4) Rent coil spring compressors from Autozone BEFORE you start this. You dont want to get the truck up, the axle down, and realize you need more room. Ask me how I know..

5) Plan ahead on getting an alignment after all this is done. Lots of people go back and forth on whether you need one or not, and quite frankly, you might not need it, but there is a 50/50 chance (at least, in my mind) that it will need to be done.

Thanks, some great points there. Curious, what was the issue with needing more room that your jack didn’t go high enough?

 

[ShastaJT6]

Thanks, some great points there. Curious, what was the issue with needing more room that your jack didn’t go high enough?

Im going to butcher some of this explanation, there are probably people in here that can explain this more eloquently than myself, but ill give it a go.

Your suspension system is designed to retain the springs even when the axle is "all the way" extended - this way, you dont run the risk of a spring going flying when the axle is flexing - I believe the term is "at full droop".

So, if you raise the vehicle up on stands, then lower the axle, you still *might* not have enough room to pull the springs out - hypothetically, unbolting the lower control arm would give you enough room, but even then, there are many other components limiting the amount of downward travel - the driveshaft, track bar, etc. To remove the springs without disconnecting ALL of these components, you might need to get creative.

You may well find yourself with the vehicle up, axle down, and need another half inch or so to get the spring out - or back in, once the pucks are in place. "Outside spring compressors" can be rented at autozone / oreilly`s etc and youll get a set of two attachments, basically a long threaded shaft with a hook on each end. You can connect these to the springs (Im sure there are a million youtube videos on this) and tighten the compressors with a wrench / ratchet, these will squeeze the springs together and give you an extra inch or so to pull them out or put them in easily.

Please, please, whatever you do - do not store springs under tension. This is absolutely a task where you do a little on each side at a time, like you mentioned with lifting the vehicle. Tighten one compressor a few turns, then the other. Same to remove them. Once you have the springs out, remove the compressors immediately. Keeping them stored under tension is like leaving a loaded gun around.

I apologize if that sound a little scary, but its the reality of it - this is the one part you really need to be careful about. Its not rocket science, just need to go slow and respect it.

Ive done a few of these in my driveway, without a lift, its totally doable, you got this.

 

[ShastaJT6]

Oh oh one more thing - make sure you stay aware of your brake lines / sensor harnesses during this process. You dont want to go lowering your axle and then realize youre stretching a brake line haha. Most of your harnesses / brake lines youll be able to remove the plastic clips connecting them to the body to create extra slack in the lines, then you can plug them back in after.

I always take lots of pictures of these things before I start so that when I am putting everything back together I know where it all went.

 

[bleda2002]

Jack up each side and then jackstands under the frame by where the control arms meet is the way to go. The fronts are actually fairly easy and dont take a crazy amount of droop to get the springs out. Infact you can probably do one side at a time on the fronts from how easy it was.

The rear end is a real bear as the multi-rate coils are extremely long and really require a lot of droop to become unseated. I had to basically unbolt everything on the rear axle and loosed all the control arm bolts to allow enough flex to drop the axle. Literally the top of my tailgate was over 6 feet up in the air. This is because the rear doesnt have a spring post so its only held in by compression. I'd definitely recommend a good pry bar ahead of time and a high torque impact wrench before you tackle the rear. I'd also look for a good coil spring compressor for the rears as it was feeling really sketchy on the rears given how high it was.

Oh! Also, before you do the rears, put it in 4 wheel drive. The front doesnt work with the parking brake and in 2 high park doesnt lock them either. Shift it in to 4 high though and chock them and its not going anywhere.

 

[ShastaJT6]

Oh! Also, before you do the rears, put it in 4 wheel drive. The front doesnt work with the parking brake and in 2 high park doesnt lock them either. Shift it in to 4 high though and chock them and its not going anywhere.

Smart!

 

[HjStrater]

Front you can easily get a 1.5” spacer in while three wheels still on the ground, with only disconnecting the sway bar links. This is actually how teraflex recommends doing it in their instructions. Jack one side at a time from the axel with the floor jack, then put one of your jack stands under the frame and droop the axel by dropping the floor jack.

For the rear it’s not as easy, just loosen the control arm bolts, don’t fight with it like I did!

I tried to use and like my all in one bottle jack/ jack stand but it just didn’t enough travel, it could get high enough, and get low enough, but not in the same lift.

 

[ResurrectionManNH]

Front you can easily get a 1.5” spacer in while three wheels still on the ground, with only disconnecting the sway bar links. This is actually how teraflex recommends doing it in their instructions. Jack one side at a time from the axel with the floor jack, then put one of your jack stands under the frame and droop the axel by dropping the floor jack.

For the rear it’s not as easy, just loosen the control arm bolts, don’t fight with it like I did!

I tried to use and like my all in one bottle jack/ jack stand but it just didn’t enough travel, it could get high enough, and get low enough, but not in the same lift.

You guys are great. So you’re saying I could use just 2 all in one bottle jacks to complete this? Only have to do front. If I’m only doing one side at a time, I would lift front axle from the pumpkin, likely to full height, lock it then put second all in one locked on frame same side. Do disconnecting work then lower axle while keeping same side frame lifted. This doesn’t cause too much stress or strain on any components versus lifting whole front end?

 

[Mac]

One corner at a time is the way to go, there are a bunch of good videos on YouTube, you didn’t wast what you are installing but unless you are installing adjustable control arms or replacing steering components an alignment is a waste of money. I have taken my suspension apart several times on my JT and one wheel at a time IMO is the easiest way to go. If you are replacing control arms you can do it one arm at a time with the JT on the ground on it’s wheels, easy and safer as the fronts need to be torqued to 180ft/lbs.

 

[ResurrectionManNH]

Hey all, put in the leveling kit last night. Couple tough spots but no issues. Everything went smoothly. Took about 6 hours for me start to finish. Didn’t even need to loosen the control arms as the method of leaving axel low and extended frame up gave plenty of room to get springs out. Jeep sits perfect now only about 1/8” higher in rear. Before and after below. Doesn’t look drastically different but looks much better in person. Thanks again for all the input!

 

[Garemlin]

One piece of advice I will give you. You'll be learning from my mistake. When you tighten the nuts for the brake line anchors on the LCA's, go easy. I snapped one off.

 

[ParatusExpeditions]

Sorry to revive this thread but it was very useful for me. I’ve opted for this method of lifting it and didn’t need coil compressors or anything like that.

The only thing is that the teraflex videos are a bit confusing and missing some torque specs. Also like previously mentioned I’m not sure I had to listen control arms so now I wonder if I’m up for some alignment.

Also they give 6ft/lb of torque for the long screw that hold the bottom spacer but in my case unless my small torque wrench is completely off, it’ll go through like butter if you don’t stop before.

 

[BLK HOLE]

Not complicated.

Jack stands on frame behind control arms.
Remove tires
Remove 1 end of sway bar links
Remove lower shock mount (with jack supporting the axle).
lower the axle and remove spring
Insert spacer.

Reverse the process. Torque everything.
30min of your life is over.

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