Why Lift?

A 2,3 or 4 inch lift will give more ground clearance under the body sills.
A chassis lift will give more clearance between the chassis and the body and therefore raise the body and give more clearance.
Bigger tyres will raise the diff centres higher from the ground.

So in short more ground clearance between the body sills and the ground allowing you to traverse rougher terrain without damaging the body.

That help?

Will also lighten your wallet enough for the springs not to sag so far ROFL

Hi Allan, lift just gives you greater body clearance. That also allows for larger tyres which in turn gives more clearance on running gear diffs etc., people do it to make their cars more capable off road.

I have a standard height 4wd. I have been bellied out once, where the other (lifted) guys just drove through. I have also lost traction on a sand track because the ruts were too deep. Other times I have scraped the bottom but kept going... All of these situations a lift would have helped.

I have not done anything other then the usual beach tracks and formed forestry/national parks roads. Nothing extreme.

The car is used mostly for camping and touring so I am not going to bother getting a lift, due to cost/benefit. If I had loads of money a 2 inch lift would already be done.

D

G'day Alan,
we have a 2009 hilux we use for work on the property, we are in fairly hilly to very steep country with some cultivation areas. we have had several hilux's over the years and they have gradually got lower with less clearance becoming an issue. This hilux drags it's guts when driving in the old wheel tracks ,that the previous models cleared. A lift of some kind would be beneficial to prevent the undercarriage getting knocked about in this circumstance.
Clearance is the biggest reason i can see for any sort of lift and that's why i optioned for a mild 2'' lift with my Prado, because i like to get off the beaten track for a bit of fishing.
Hope this helps .
Cheers, John.

Hi Allan

I have a 4" lift on my Dual Cab Hilux, as well as greaseable pins and shackles. Where I live, there are no sealed roads for more than 300 km, so without the extra clearance, I could get into all sorts of trouble.

I also have 400kg Rockcrawler springs on the back, and Old Man Emu Shockies all round, have to have stronger gear out here my friend.

Cheers

As well as improving clearance a lift will also improve approach and departure angles.
Not much fun having a nose full of dirt or almost ripping the back end off when hung up.

cheers

Phil

Hi Alan,

the above have explained very well. A picture show things better like the landcruiser pics above. Here is my truck that has been lifted 6 inches.

Yan can see, this makes it level with the 4WD caravan for crossing creeks etc. Without it, the truck would bottom out easily.

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Hi Allan,
Good on you for asking a reasonable question! IMO there's no such thing as stupid questions, only stupid answers!

All of the above responses are good ones IMO. I belong to the Gold Coast Four Wheel Drive Club and we have a membership that crosses a great expanse of people and people's expectations. We have members who belong solely to use membership to claim discounts at 4wd stores or 4wd parks... others who are set up for touring the coast/beaches/islands, others who, like me, like to tour the outback and still others who are only interested in 4wd competitions. A diverse mix of people!
Around the Gold Coast here there are vehicles with 2" lift, some with no lift and others with much higher lifts. All depends on what they want to do. As stated
above, more lift equates to more capability off-road.
There are those who condemn people for having a big lift, obviously those people aren't interested in that sort of driving, just like someone who has no lift may not be interested in driving an "extreme" rated track in a competition event. (This will be where someone will report that they HAVE driven such a track in their stock-as-a-rock 4by!! Good on 'em I say! LOL)
It's a "horses for courses" thing, no different to two blokes owning XR6 Turbo Fords, one of whom spends $100K tricking the engine and gearbox for extreme horsepower and the other leaving it stock to take the kids to school each day.
Each to their own!
FWIW, my GQ Patrol has a 3" lift, previously it had 2" and I find the extra bit helps with the off road ability, even in the Simpson Desert or Fraser Island, it means I can get to previously un-reachable areas with more ease!
As I said, each to their own.

Hope this helps mate,

Cheers

Brian

Allan

i had my navara lifted (only be at 45mm) but this was enough for good ground clearence and better still the on road handling improved greatly.tyre wear was another noticable change too,with the tyres lasting longer.

all round good investment i thought,cheers.

Allan B,

I'm not trolling either. Lifts are only beneficial on a diesel.

- I gets the black smoke higher up before its released into the atmosphere.
- Makes it harder to get bad fuel into the tank.
- Improves fuel consumption because the air is thinner (unless you are behind a diesel that has also been lifted).

Sorry (:

Skull

Could I ask a most pertinant (from my perspective) question:
What are the legalities of any lift from a vehicle's standard suspension?

Are there any re certifications required: ala: the COG of a lifted vehicle is obviously altered.

Is this like fitting tyres contrary to the vehicle tyre specifications (normally tagged near the drivers door).

I know I see many 4wd vehicles around my town which have been lifted. Most belong to roo/pig shooters who never get off flat country anyway, and most simply hoon around town saying "look at me".

Myself, spend a lot of time in W.Qld. working in some rough breakaway country. I have bellows type airbags on the back and pump up shocks on the front. I can vary the lift by up to nearly 3" but it is very seldom required. I mainly use this for carrying extra heavy loads.

I honestly doubt the benefits of vehicle lift, most times I have been hung up is a rock at the front end under the axle housing, and you cant lift that anyway.
mike

Would love to get my Terracan lifted but I did the maths and getting it fully engineered so as to satisfy my insurer and Mr Plod was going to cost in the vicinity of $3k for the lift and all the testing.

If I then got bigger tyres I'd need to look at the gear ratios to ensure everything was balanced.

The list was endless it seemed and my disposable income wasn't.

Allan, yeah I've heard the criticism of lifts. But I rate my 3" lift as one of the most effective improvements I've made to my 4b. Articulation photo above is one aspect. Couple of photos here of friends on a trip to Peake in SA earlier this year gives another.

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Sure enough the 305 tyres raised the running gear on the Trol but hopefully you get the idea. My 3" lift Patrol with std 265/75 tyres also did it easy.

I always noticed less sand on our running boards than other vehicles. I believe this and our often better than average performance in sand has something to do with less friction. Interesting subject.

Cheers

OK guys, thanks for those answers.

It seems that the main reason is for body clearance which was what I expected. Having a Troopy I do not have much problem with body clearance. But I acknowledge that many vehicles, even though built as off-road 4WD do not have the same clearance as I do.

Then again, I have seen Troopies with heaps of lift and wonder where they go to need that much clearance. Maybe it was for wheel articulation?

As for me, with everything packed into the Troopy (no trailer) I need to use a roof-rack and with that extra C of Gravity the last thing I need is raising the body!

Just one thing ......... I'm surprised no-one said "To get a better view of the countryside"! LOL

Hi Allan, when I got my LC200TD in 2008, I went on a quicky 4WD course to test it out in a 'safe' situation. The performance was the poorest of eight vehicles on entry and departures. Nearly hung it up twice.

Then, as I bought it for long distance remote area touring, on went the dual wheel carrier, 260l diesel capacity, bull bar etc.

By the time I'd got 70% thru, the rig was just about bottoming out on the road humps let alone a bushtrack scenario.

As part of a GVM upgrade I added a 4 inch lift kit. More weight again but now my clearances and angles are as good as anything going, and where I go this is very important.

If I was just towing a van I wouldn't have added half the extra weight and the Cruiser would probably have been fine. Horses for courses.

Cheers.

i run a stardard 82 hilux, with sagged springs, went to moreton island with my sister last year and went where ever she went and did it just as easy or easier then she did, she has 5 to 8 inches of lift, they had to design the garage around the 80 series.

lol

but i am looking at 4 inches of lift and 2 inches of body lift for my old girl.

We have a 2" lift on the old girl for the same reasons as above. But I did see a older Hilux d/cab the other day lifted very high, it looked like he was struggling a fair bit as he flew past me. It was all over the road when he came back over . I was doing 100km/hr.

You only lift to fit bigger tyres, and get more articulation.

Simple as that, some people spend $4000 lifting Rangers/BT50s but they can still only fit 33s, without having to chop guards to pieces etc. Yet with a 2inch lift ya can fit 32s anyway. Really isnt much bang for ya buck. If ya need to raise ya vehicle anymore then 3 inchs then you have the wrong vehicle for the application.

Performance is usually compromized by lifting so I try not to do it but clearance and damage to car is obviously to be avioded so usually a small lift and a bit of a clean up with fittings is enough.
Different if you have heavy loads but mostly I have got away with 30mm spacers in springs, combined with modifications to the car that don't increase its weight.

As a general rule when people lift cars they put in stiffer springs which reduces the flex of the suspension , they also raise the centre of gravilty and as well the car gets slightly less range.

Been driving 4WD since early 80's & never been anywhere that i had to go that I would need a lifted 4WD for, Not to mention that there have been places that I wanted to go & basically got stuck on purpose where a higher ground clearance could have helped, ( I even got my ex army Mk3 ACCO with 12.00 x 20 bar treads grounded) but in those cases either I didnt have to get stuck or there was an easier way around. There always is.

There is not many places where you can legally drive - where you really do need that extra lift, other than posing by driving over the biggest rock when there is a easier way, but almost everywhere you drive, (even on sealed roads) a lower CoG could save your life.

Any lift will raise the Center of Gravity of a 4WD and the simple fact is the vehicle becomes more unstable. Ive had both standard & raised 4WD's and the only ones I've rolled were lifted, and yes caused by driver error of course, - they dont roll by themselves. but most likely would not have rolled if they were standard .

Fact is my Factory standard low rider 105 cruiser is a more capable tow car, better on steep slippery rocky hills and feels way better to drive than my 2" lifted 80 series did. Only difference is a lower CoG. No, Im not going to go rock hopping the Rubicon but no problems at all with Blue Rag Range, where I would be really scared to be sitting up with a 4" lift ontop of 35" tyres.

Of course if your 4WD mostly is used for school drop offs I do see a need to be all jacked up with huge wheels and luggy tyres.

In some instances a lift is beneficial , if you live or work out in the sticks with dirt roads and tracks , awful lot of posers out on the bitumen though ,, wife pulled up at the Middleton Pub [halfway between Winton + Boulia] in her Kia Rio [all of 3 inches ground clearance] and parks next to a group heading to the Isa via Boulia [ bitumen all the way] , all 4 vehicles in the group lifted , as wife steps onto the verandah the comment from one woman to her husband " tell me again why we had to spend all that money on lifting and other accessories ." LOL.