abominablesnowman
New Member
I have an '05 liberty (130k), which had stock suspension and tires on in until last July. I bought an OME lift kit from rocky-road.com for a gas-engine Jeep with standard bumper, which got me the light duty springs for the front and the medium duty for the rear. I got the lift installed along with 245/75R16 Goodyear Duratracks at a local shop. The install shop was expensive but they were the 4th shop I called after the others all declined to install it (I'm in Albuquerque).
Now its April, and I could tell the alignment has been out for a month or two (vibrations coming from the front tires). I finally got around to taking it to the shop (different from the install shop). My new mechanic thinks the struts are shot and showed me at least 1/4" difference in wear on the front tires. Now these parts are only 10 months old with maybe 8k miles on them. My new mechanic seems trustworthy but I doubt he sees many lifted Jeeps. His recommendation is to install stock parts again, which would mean I can't run the 245/75R16 tires I want. This makes me sad.
I've been reading up on OME lifts here, but am obviously still new to all this so I figured I'd ask here for some advice.
1) How can I determine if the struts are bad or if alignment is the problem?
2) The front tires have uneven wear, but the backs are OK. The new mechanic seems the think the back struts are bad too, but that seems unlikely that I got 4 lemons in one batch.
3) Based on all the chatter I see on the forums here it seems that I can make the OME lift and the 245/75R16 tires work. My question is how can I avoid getting burned again. Where should I be looking to buy parts from and how can I know that my install shop is competent?
Basically, I just want to get this setup working without too much more $$$ wasted, so any advice would be appreciated.
Now its April, and I could tell the alignment has been out for a month or two (vibrations coming from the front tires). I finally got around to taking it to the shop (different from the install shop). My new mechanic thinks the struts are shot and showed me at least 1/4" difference in wear on the front tires. Now these parts are only 10 months old with maybe 8k miles on them. My new mechanic seems trustworthy but I doubt he sees many lifted Jeeps. His recommendation is to install stock parts again, which would mean I can't run the 245/75R16 tires I want. This makes me sad.
I've been reading up on OME lifts here, but am obviously still new to all this so I figured I'd ask here for some advice.
1) How can I determine if the struts are bad or if alignment is the problem?
2) The front tires have uneven wear, but the backs are OK. The new mechanic seems the think the back struts are bad too, but that seems unlikely that I got 4 lemons in one batch.
3) Based on all the chatter I see on the forums here it seems that I can make the OME lift and the 245/75R16 tires work. My question is how can I avoid getting burned again. Where should I be looking to buy parts from and how can I know that my install shop is competent?
Basically, I just want to get this setup working without too much more $$$ wasted, so any advice would be appreciated.