Gap tool question

NCLRbear

Adventurer
Hey everyone I'm getting a set of 275/65/18 KO2's and I run a Gap tool. My question is what do people leave their everyday ride height set at with the gap tool? I'm also putting on some new front lower control arms and will need to get it aligned. I want to get it aligned at my everyday height. Thanks
 

Derel1cte

Adventurer
Hey everyone I'm getting a set of 275/65/18 KO2's and I run a Gap tool. My question is what do people leave their everyday ride height set at with the gap tool? I'm also putting on some new front lower control arms and will need to get it aligned. I want to get it aligned at my everyday height. Thanks

I have 31.5" tires. I set my everyday ride hieght at +40mm front and +25mm rear to give it plenty of clearance for the bigger rubber and to level out the stock racked stance.
 

TOUGE

Active member
I just put 275/65 KO2s on a few weeks ago and run stock hight for the street, the only place it rubs is the bump in the wheel liner on the front side of the rear wheels. I just used a heat gun to push them in and it's fine. Mine is a 5 seater. Offroad I use +30mm and haven't noticed any rubbing yet.
 

Jwestpro

Explorer
Anyone running all the time/daily at highway speeds more than even +20mm is a cheap bastard, poser, and/or nonsensical fool who completely ignores "form follows function" idea of a Land Rover. Either do the simple mods that allow running the 32" 275/65-18 with ZERO lift, or just quit posting your crap for others to blindly follow.


The suspension is not designed/engineered to run all the time "lifted". Go ahead if you like to waste money wearing stuff out prematurely while also reducing the vehicle handling safety.

Basic mods to allow the 32":
1-rear fender liner forward buldges need to be flattened.
2-front frame horn must be removed/reworked.
3-a few front lines relocated higher on frame away from where tire can scrub them (these are near/above the frame horn area)
4-ideally tuck the washer bottle up/forward but not absolutely necessary)

See, is that really so hard? No, it's not but it IS better. The "lift" rods are also a joke simply to give someone your money for no true additional function as they do not in fact increase the maximum height available to the vehicle in any circumstance. They do however cause problems when there is a suspension issue resulting in a fault which drops your vehicle requiring you to have the GAP IIDtool to fix.

When the lr3/4 range rovers ground, the system senses this and raises higher than is available on-demand. You can actually induce this feature simply by raising to off road height, place a block under the frame as if it were a stump, lower the air which causes the emergency height. This is usable up through sensible speeds for that height, maybe 20 ish, but definitely it will auto-drop to off road height before 30. This method costs 0. 0 because you should have a safety block of some sort with you for trail spare tire swapping if necessary anyway. The best blocking would have multiple uses such as a tire chock, jack base, under wheel spacer for camping vehicle leveling, etc.

32" fits perfectly fine in full turning and in full suspension articulations as per my testing and general use but with the above basic modifications. This also eliminates the inappropriate realignments and narrowing of the track by pulling the wheels in when lifted. Running higher full time also results in much more use of the air compressor while also softening the ride due to longer air column. While cornering the DTC will want to kick in more often. Personally, I like to take my corners as fast as I wish without the DTC trying to save me as it detects an incorrect sway force. There are simply too many reasons why it's just a bad idea to run an lr3/4/rrs strut "lifted" all the time.
 

Derel1cte

Adventurer
Anyone running all the time/daily at highway speeds more than even +20mm is a cheap bastard, poser, and/or nonsensical fool who completely ignores "form follows function" idea of a Land Rover. Either do the simple mods that allow running the 32" 275/65-18 with ZERO lift, or just quit posting your crap for others to blindly follow.

... Yeah. A <1.5" lift is totally poser. ******?

I'm on 31.5" tires. Proportions look better and clearances are better with ~1" in the rear and ~1.5" in the front. I still had to clearance the rear pinch welds, Move the left front brake sensor wire to the top of the frame, trim the fender liners and remove ~1" from the bottom edge of the front bumper to make sure I had zero rubbing at any articulation. I don't have rear A/C so I didn't need to move those lines and my truck is an '05 so I didn't need to touch the framehorns. Could I have fit the tires on without the lift, yeah, but why when it looks better and performs better with a little lift and leveling? Even with +40mm it still has pleanty of room to go into off road height without needing to worry about the angle on my half-shafts.
 

ColoDisco

Explorer
I run Johnson rods full time. Vehicle came with them. Really don't mind the full time lift and in Moab I only triggered the suspension light once with some extreme articulation on the rear. Cycled the key and fault disappeared. Have never had it drop to the bump stops. I have 275/65 18 LT duratracs with almost no rubbing.
 

zelatore

Explorer
I'll have to respectfully disagree with JWest - at least to some extent.

I run rods full-time. With the GAP tool I was one of those guys who couldn't get much lift. I now run stock height + rods - effectively making my on-road height the equivalent of stock off-road height.

Everything JWest said about the handling on-road is true. The stability control wants to engage much to easily (I turn it off at the first sign of twisty roads but generally leave it on when just cruising the interstate). The track is narrower. yada yada. However, it doesn't ride softer, it rides harder as the spring pressures (air pressure) is higher. So why do it? Well, I run a 33" tire for one thing. But I could still make the truck run at stock height if I wanted to. However my rig is a trail rig first and foremost. The only highway miles it sees are getting to/from the trail. That may be a few hundred miles of highway to get to the trail, but it's still not a daily driver.

What I particularly like is that I can run off-road without engaging off-road height until I get to more serious obstacles. I try to avoid running in off-road unless I need it as it taxes the CVs more and rides harder. And since i'm running at my standard (equivalent of factory off-road) height I don't have to worry about the truck lowering on me.

If my truck was more of a highway rig; a daily driver or even just an 'overlander' rig, I'd probably still run rods but use the GAP tool to dial it down a bit, perhaps take 1/2"-1" out of if. That would put me above stock but lower than where I am now and offer some improvement in road manners.
 

Jwestpro

Explorer
... Yeah. A <1.5" lift is totally poser. ******?

I'm on 31.5" tires. Proportions look better and clearances are better with ~1" in the rear and ~1.5" in the front.
Maybe it's been so long I forgot the pinch welds had to be done even for 31.5 but I honestly don't remember. I've been running with all these mods for over yrs now as some were done in 2007 and the fender liner lines in 2009 I think. 31.5 didn't require that but 32" did.

I know a bit higher looks way cooler, even more appropriate, but I put function first and stability of 7200-8200 lbs at 70-85 mph is a lot more important than how cool 1.5 more inches looks. Honestly I think a flush tire to fender looks a lot more cool than a factory tucked tire with fender a bit higher but that's my own opinion on visual styling.

Maybe I'm more careful than you guys now that I've been through having to replace both front and rear differentials, all hubs, both front half shafts, both sections of propeller shaft, transmission lining, etc.
 

Jwestpro

Explorer
Haha Jwest hey buddy, its OK. I never said any of my ideas were GOOD ones. ;)

Hey, I'm somewhat being blustery for fun. Even bad ideas can be more worth discussing than NO ideas ;)

I just want new people to be fully aware that these "lift" ideas are not necessary, but rather elective for varying degrees of looks vs actual need. I have no problem someone saying they did a body lift because it's the best way to fit a 35" or run 12" wide 20's because it just looks like a cool toy. On my first lr3, and 06, I did a lot of work travel so my 'daily' wheel/tire set was RRSC 'stormer' 20"x9" with Toyo Proxes ST 285/50-20. It looked so ************ squat and flush while also holding corners like it never should be doing - but did. The other set was 265/65-18 bfg ko though, full set of 5 for each.

Right now I'm trying to make the BFG KM2 work in 33.7" diameter 285/70-18 on factory 18. It clears front UCA at full droop so that's a plus as spacers would make this impossible to truly fit and use without major rubbing at access height. I am now in the middle of further relocation of the right rear hvac lines which were pretty good but I'd figured out a way to make it even better to match the full clearance inside the left rear fender liner. I may even try heavy duty flexible rubber sheet in place of the hard plastic fender liner shell but we shall see what's needed.

Why? The why is simply that the KM2 is IMO the best tire choice in it's design and for this 8000lb vehicle. The other size choice I test fitted was the 33.3" dia 255/80-17 and while it tucks in better, it's SO much narrower than seems appropriate even structurally. The load rating is about 3200 lbs but the 18" is nearly 3900 lbs. The cross section shape will be noticeably more stable with the wider tire even though their sidewall is almost the same with the 255 still having a few mm's more on the 17x7 wheel. Weight is another issue and much reduced on the 17" but still it seems like this wider tire is going to be better for long trips to outings. Before I decide in full I plan to discuss the ideas with BFG tech support and a local 4x4 shop. Jeeps are light but anyone wheeling a domestic truck will have similar weight/tire issues even though we usually see trucks on gigantic 12" + wider tires. Rarely do you see the tall-n-skinny MT sporting around.
 

Jwestpro

Explorer
I run Johnson rods full time. Vehicle came with them. Really don't mind the full time lift and in Moab I only triggered the suspension light once with some extreme articulation on the rear. Cycled the key and fault disappeared. Have never had it drop to the bump stops. I have 275/65 18 LT duratracs with almost no rubbing.

I really wish we had someone producing revised control arms like the Land Cruiser crowd gets to enjoy. The idea is to regain what is lost by lifting an independent suspension, which in turn pulls the track in narrower while also negatively reducing down travel. There's a reason standard height is where it is. Ridding around all the time at +50 or more mm (1" = 25.4mm) is just plain bad. The LLAMS system allows choosing +20mm on the fly, which provides just enough extra while staying a lot closer to factory range. The LC can have new longer control arms that sort of put the engineering back near neutral after the spring lift. This is only in the front end seeing as the rear is a solid axle which is simply dealt with via longer radius arms, etc.
 

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